Public Alpha Test: Audio Without Compromise - Volumio on Bookworm Begins

Volumio Development Volumio Beta Testing
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325

v0.067 - Changelog

Common (all platforms)

  • Wi-Fi Subsystem Resilience Improved
    Updated wireless to include fallback handling, improving reliability across edge-case wireless setups, including problematic USB Wi-Fi dongles and soft-block recovery scenarios.

  • Issue Reporting Streamlined
    Added a structured hardware support request template targeting the Bookworm base. This enables clearer community feedback and faster triage by the development team.

Raspberry Pi

  • Firmware Integration for Pi Devices
    Introduced firmware-volumio, a new bundle specifically tailored for Raspberry Pi devices. It includes updated Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and SoC firmware required by newer Raspberry Pi kernels on Bookworm.

  • Build Pipeline Synchronization
    Merged contributions from bookworm/pi and Bookworm branches to ensure consistency and reliability in Pi image generation. All Bookworm-based Raspberry Pi images now follow the same firmware injection logic.

x86

  • Expanded Intel Platform Support
    Enabled Intel CNVi Bluetooth and LPSS features to support Gemini Lake and other low-power platforms with integrated connectivity subsystems.

  • Improved Display Capabilities
    Enabled Kernel Mode Setting (KMS) and framebuffer for advanced display handling. This allows better compatibility with modern panels and embedded systems.

  • Audio Driver Additions
    Added support for Realtek HDA codecs ALC663 and ALC897, improving compatibility with many OEM and embedded audio configurations.

  • Networking Enhancements

    • Enabled 88XXAU Realtek USB Wi-Fi driver to expand wireless device coverage.
    • Enabled full CIFS kernel support to allow broader SMB file-sharing features.
    • Added runtime rfkill recovery logic to better handle wireless reinitialization after suspend/resume events or BIOS-level blocks.

Known Issues:

  • ACPI controls such as mute, brightness, and function keys may not work reliably on some x86 devices.
  • Important: x86 OTA update to 0.067 is not supported due to partition layout changes. A fresh re-flash is required.

Kind Regards,

2 Likes
326

Hey @Rui_C,

Thanks for your detailed report and log. I’ve reviewed your tDCZoUt log thoroughly and confirmed that your Realtek ALC897 digital interface (hw:0,1) is properly detected at the ALSA level, with no obvious driver or kernel issues. However, before proceeding with any fix or workaround, I’d like to request a few key details to help isolate the root cause without assumptions:

To help narrow down the SPDIF output issue, could you please confirm the following?

  1. Was audio ever heard from the SPDIF port using either Volumio playback or via manual ALSA command-line tools?

  2. What is the SPDIF output connected to? (e.g., amplifier, AV receiver, DAC). Some devices require specific sample rates or may not support PCM input from certain sources.

  3. Was the correct output device selected in the Volumio UI? Please confirm whether the SPDIF interface (ALC897 Digital, typically hw:0,1) was explicitly selected as the playback output.

  4. Can you run this command and share the output?

    aplay -D hw:0,1 /usr/share/sounds/alsa/Front_Center.wav

    This will confirm whether ALSA is able to route audio directly to the SPDIF interface without involving the Volumio stack.

  5. Please also run:

    amixer -c 0

    This will show available mixer controls for the Realtek device. Sometimes SPDIF needs to be unmuted or explicitly enabled via a control toggle.

Once we have these answers, we’ll be able to determine if the issue is due to rate mismatches, mixer handling, UI selection, or something else.

Kind Regards,

327

Log file http://logs.volumio.org/volumio/AeWRHxQ.html

I was unable to type the commands
dmesg | grep -i rt2870
dmesg | grep -i firmware
as the bluetooth keyboard I have interprets | as >
I hope the logfile gives you what you need

Best Regards

328

Hey @JohnR,

Thanks for the log. However, this appears to be from an older Volumio 3.812 (Buster-based) system, which already works fine with your adapter. To continue the investigation, I specifically need this check performed on your 0.66 (or preferably 0.67) Bookworm-based installation, where the hotspot fails.

Also, there’s no need to use a physical keyboard to run the commands. You can use an SSH session instead, which will let you copy and paste commands without issues related to keyboard layout.

To enable SSH on Volumio, follow this guide:
https://help.volumio.com/help/how-do-i-enable-ssh-connection

Once you’re connected via SSH to your Bookworm system, please run:

sudo dmesg -n 8
sudo modprobe -r rt2800usb
sudo modprobe rt2800usb
dmesg | grep -i rt2870
dmesg | grep -i firmware

This will help confirm whether the firmware request is being suppressed or not triggered at all. Let me know once you’ve done this on the Bookworm version.

Kind Regards,

329

Same thing again

Screenshot_2025-05-19-15-59-33-85_5f3ccb62d05d1dc1d470f392f06c97c5
Screenshot_2025-05-19-15-59-33-85_5f3ccb62d05d1dc1d470f392f06c97c51080×1744 98.1 KB

330

Hey @Gelo5,

Can you capture logs at this state, before factory reset?

Kind Regards,

331

http://logs.volumio.org/volumio/TMV3pUm.html

332

Hey @Gelo5,

Thanks for the update and the screenshot.

From the logs, I’ve noticed this line:

sudo: unable to resolve host volumio1920-book: System error

This means the system’s hostname is not correctly resolved locally, which can interfere with system operations - including update checks.

Could you please try the following:

  1. Change the hostname to something shorter, e.g. volumio66
    You can do this from Volumio UI under Settings > System > Player Name.

  2. Reboot the system fully after the change.

  3. After reboot, go back to Settings > System > Check Updates and see if it now offers a newer version.

Let us know what happens after this step - we’ll proceed based on that.

Kind Regards,

333

Tested with:
Toshiba Click Mini => Same results as previous test.
Dell 3189 => Same results as previous test.

Swapping between SSIDs is working correctly, If no SSID’s (even with a previous connected SSID, it falls back to HS)
The time helper errors is gone.

334

Hey, @nerd
http://logs.volumio.org/volumio/nEkBU3A.html
Rename and Restart:
VolumioBook, Volumio1920, Voumio, Volumio66 - still the same

335

Hey @Gelo5,

Thanks for confirming the hostname change and sharing the log.

The hostname issue appears resolved - there are no further resolution errors, so the system is now correctly identifying itself.

To proceed, could you please SSH into the system and run the following command:

ls -la /data

We’d like to verify the contents and state of the persistent data directory. This will help us check for anything unusual that might be affecting the update mechanism.

Let us know the output so we can continue debugging.

Kind Regards,

336 
volumio@volumio:~$ ls -la /data
total 148
drwxr-xr-x  1 volumio volumio  4096 May 19 16:27 .
drwxrwxrwx  1 root    root     4096 Jan  1  1970 ..
drwxrwxrwx  1 root    root     4096 May 15 16:21 INTERNAL
drwxr-xr-x  6 volumio volumio  4096 May 10 23:45 albumart
drwxr-xr-x  2 volumio volumio  4096 May 15 16:07 backgrounds
drwxr-xr-x  2 volumio volumio  4096 May 15 16:08 cddb
drwxr-xr-x  7 volumio volumio  4096 May 19 16:27 configuration
drwxr-xr-x  2 volumio volumio  4096 May 15 16:08 favourites
drwxr-xr-x  2 root    root     4096 May 19 16:27 flagfiles
-rw-r--r--  1 volumio volumio 50668 May 18 19:39 laststates.json
drwxr-xr-x  2 volumio volumio  4096 May 19 15:58 myvolumio
drwxr-xr-x  2 volumio volumio  4096 May 15 16:07 playerstate
drwxr-xr-x  2 volumio volumio  4096 May 15 16:08 playlist
drwxr-xr-x  3 volumio volumio  4096 May 15 16:21 plugins
-rw-r--r--  1 volumio volumio 17229 May 18 19:39 queue
-rw-r--r--  1 volumio volumio     1 May 19 16:01 test
-rw-r--r--  1 root    root        0 May 15 16:08 test-alpha
-rw-r--r--  1 root    root        0 May 15 16:08 testplugins
-rw-r--r--  1 volumio volumio   354 May 15 16:13 updatesHistoryFile
-rw-r--r--  1 volumio volumio    22 May 19 16:42 volumio-update.tmp
drwxr-xr-x 33 volumio volumio  4096 May 19 16:42 volumiokiosk
drwxr-xr-x  3 volumio volumio  4096 May 15 16:18 volumiokioskextensions
volumio@volumio:~$
337

Hey @Gelo5,

Thanks for the directory listing - that confirms a few things.

We do not support a combined update channel like test + test-alpha. Each update tier is handled independently, and those placeholder files:

/data/test
/data/test-alpha

– are not valid update triggers on their own, and currently serve no purpose. They also do not correspond to Volumio’s active OTA rollout logic.

Please go ahead and run:

rm -rf /data/test

Then reboot the device:

sudo reboot

Once it comes back up, try checking for updates again from the UI.

Let me know if the update is now offered.

Kind Regards,

338

Hey @nerd
Now it worked, thank you.
Where did this come from?

/data/test
/data/test-alpha
339

Hi,
before the OTA:

volumio@smx:/imgpart$ ls -al
total 1249705
drwxrwxrwx 3 root root       4096 May 16 10:57 .
drwxrwxrwx 1 root root       1024 May 16 10:57 ..
-rwxrwxrwx 1 root root   92674048 May 16 10:57 kernel_current.tar
drwxrwxrwx 2 root root      16384 May 14 18:34 lost+found
-rwxrwxrwx 1 root root        141 May 14 18:37 remoteConfig
-rwxrwxrwx 1 root root 1186992128 May 14 18:39 volumio_current.sqsh
volumio@smx:/imgpart$ df -h
Filesystem                    Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
udev                          1.9G     0  1.9G   0% /dev
tmpfs                         379M  7.3M  371M   2% /run
/dev/sdb2                     3.7G  1.2G  2.3G  35% /imgpart
/dev/loop0                    1.2G  1.2G     0 100% /static
overlay                        50G   99M   48G   1% /
tmpfs                         1.9G     0  1.9G   0% /dev/shm
tmpfs                         5.0M  8.0K  5.0M   1% /run/lock
efivarfs                      128K   61K   63K  50% /sys/firmware/efi/efivars
tmpfs                         1.9G   48K  1.9G   1% /tmp
tmpfs                          20M   44K   20M   1% /var/log
tmpfs                         1.9G     0  1.9G   0% /var/spool/cups
/dev/sdb1                     241M   89M  152M  37% /boot
tmpfs                         1.9G     0  1.9G   0% /var/spool/cups/tmp
/dev/sda1                     932G  781G  151G  84% /media/T7
//192.168.178.56/nase2/MUSIK  3.7T  1.6T  2.2T  42% /mnt/NAS/nase2
tmpfs                         379M  4.0K  379M   1% /run/user/1000
volumio@smx:/imgpart$

OTA from 0.066 to 0.067 does not work. Here a log after OTA before the reboot:
http://logs.volumio.org/volumio/EFcLe16.html

After the try:

volumio@smx:/imgpart$ ls -al
total 3643181
drwxrwxrwx 3 root    root          4096 May 19 16:58 .
drwxrwxrwx 1 root    root          1024 May 16 10:57 ..
-rwxrwxrwx 1 root    root      92674048 May 16 10:57 kernel_current.tar
-rwxrwxrwx 1 volumio volumio   92674048 May 16 10:57 kernel_fallback.tar
drwxrwxrwx 2 root    root         16384 May 14 18:34 lost+found
-rwxrwxrwx 1 volumio volumio          0 May 19 16:58 rcksum-yYbkXe
-rwxrwxrwx 1 root    root           141 May 14 18:37 remoteConfig
-rwxrwxrwx 1 root    root    1186992128 May 14 18:39 volumio_current.sqsh
-rwxrwxrwx 1 volumio volumio 1185660928 May 19 16:58 volumio_current.sqsh.part
-rwxrwxrwx 1 volumio volumio 1186992128 May 14 18:39 volumio_fallback.sqsh
volumio@smx:/imgpart$
volumio@smx:/imgpart$ df -h
Filesystem                    Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
udev                          1.9G     0  1.9G   0% /dev
tmpfs                         379M  7.2M  372M   2% /run
/dev/sdb2                     3.7G  3.5G     0 100% /imgpart
/dev/loop0                    1.2G  1.2G     0 100% /static
overlay                        50G   99M   48G   1% /
tmpfs                         1.9G     0  1.9G   0% /dev/shm
tmpfs                         5.0M  8.0K  5.0M   1% /run/lock
efivarfs                      128K   61K   63K  50% /sys/firmware/efi/efivars
tmpfs                         1.9G   48K  1.9G   1% /tmp
tmpfs                          20M   44K   20M   1% /var/log
tmpfs                         1.9G     0  1.9G   0% /var/spool/cups
tmpfs                         1.9G     0  1.9G   0% /var/spool/cups/tmp
/dev/sdb1                     241M   89M  152M  37% /boot
//192.168.178.56/nase2/MUSIK  3.7T  1.6T  2.2T  42% /mnt/NAS/nase2
/dev/sda1                     932G  781G  151G  84% /media/T7
tmpfs                         379M  4.0K  379M   1% /run/user/1000
volumio@smx:/imgpart$

Cheers, Robert

340

Hey @Gelo5,

Great to hear it worked!

To answer your question:

  • /data/test is created when you switch to Test Mode via http://<volumio-ip>/dev. It flags the system to look for test-tier updates during the next OTA check.
  • /data/test-alpha is bundled with image intentionally - it acts as a sentinel to prevent switching to production beta or stable channels, especially in protected alpha builds.

Having both at once can cause undefined behaviour in the update logic - which is likely why no updates were offered until /data/test was removed.

Glad we got to the bottom of it.

Kind Regards,

1 Like
341

Hey @Robert.Hecht,

Thanks for the detailed report and logs - very helpful.

I’ve reviewed your output and can confirm the OTA updater attempted to unpack and write the update to /imgpart, but ultimately ran out of space:

/dev/sdb2 3.7G 3.5G 0 100% /imgpart

You’ll also notice the presence of .part and rcksum-* files in /imgpart, which indicates an incomplete OTA staging.

However - the root cause is this:

x86 OTA from 0.066 to 0.067 is not supported

This is documented in the 0.067 changelog under Known Issues:

Important: x86 OTA update to 0.067 is not supported due to partition layout changes. A fresh re-flash is required.

This means the image layout has been changed in a way that cannot be patched in-place on existing x86 installations.

What to do next

To update to 0.067 on your x86 system, you will need to:

  1. Download the latest 0.067 image for x86 from the official source.
  2. Flash it freshly to your target drive.
  3. Restore your configuration manually or from a backup, if applicable.

Kind Regards,

1 Like
342

Hi @nerd

done this (still on the 0.066):

got three crashes (Tidal desktop Application crashes, playback on Volumio keeps running. Restart of the Tidal Application cannot find the Volumio device. Had to switch off and on the MyVolmio to make the device visible again.

http://logs.volumio.org/volumio/oQtwYDI.html

lost connection again:

http://logs.volumio.org/volumio/KwYOzha.html

Cheers,
Robert

343

Hey @Robert.Hecht,

Thanks for continuing to test this issue so thoroughly.

To help us better understand the system state at the time of these intermittent disconnects or stream failures, I’ve prepared a lightweight diagnostics script that captures key runtime stats every 5 seconds. It will run for up to 15 minutes (or until manually stopped).

Instructions

  1. Download the script archive:

  2. Extract it on your Volumio device:

    cd /home/volumio
unzip collect-volumio-runtime.zip

    This will extract collect-volumio-runtime.sh into the current directory.

  3. Make the script executable:

    chmod +x collect-volumio-runtime.sh

  4. Run the script when beginning a test session:

    ./collect-volumio-runtime.sh
    • The script will log system info snapshots every 5 seconds to /tmp/volumio_debug_capture/.
    • It runs for a maximum of 15 minutes unless interrupted earlier with CTRL+C.

  5. After the issue occurs (gap, reconnect, TIDAL crash):

    • Archive the output folder:

      cd /tmp
tar -czvf volumio_debug_capture.tar.gz volumio_debug_capture

    • Then upload the .tar.gz archive.

This will allow us to correlate any potential system-level resource bottlenecks, I/O contention, or VTCS (Tidal Connect) session anomalies with your observations.

Kind Regards,

344

Hi Nerd
Tried 0.67 still no hot spot
log file
http://logs.volumio.org/volumio/7tEWYgW.html
I couldn’t get SSH to work either.
Using monitor and Bluetooth keyboard. terminal declares sudo dsmeg : command not found ?!
By the way when i previously used 0.66 when I used SSH with command

The SSH session froze and never came back , which is why I used the monitor and bluetooth keyboard. I was hoping that the combination of monito/keyboard + SSH would enable me to fulfill your request. I will go back to 0.66 and try
Regards