ULTRA++ installation guide

thanks I’m going to try

1 Like

Any results to your test/attempt?

Same issue here, did you solve it? I have the same project needs
thanks

I have made it work with a 64 bit OS with:

Have you tried that?

I’m running a Pi5 4GB on Raspberry Pi OS Bookworm 64 bit and I tried everything mentioned here including the Sybility drivers, but NOTHING works. This is my aplay -l output:

aplay: device_list:274: no soundcards found…

And these are the last lines from the sudo ./install.sh command output:

Job for wm8960-soundcard.service failed because the control process exited with error code.
See “systemctl status wm8960-soundcard.service” and “journalctl -xeu wm8960-soundcard.service” for details.

When I run sudo dkms status I get:

wm8960-soundcard/1.0, 6.1.0-rpi6-rpi-2712, aarch64: installed

The output of systemctl status wm8960-soundcard.service is:

 Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/wm8960-soundcard.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
 Active: active (exited) since Thu 2023-11-16 20:32:47 CET; 17min ago
Process: 699 ExecStart=/usr/bin/wm8960-soundcard (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)

Main PID: 699 (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
CPU: 236ms

Please help me out!

Continuing the discussion from ULTRA++ installation guide:

Hello, I am setting up a fresh project on a raspberry pi 4, so I have a fresh install of raspberry pi OS 64 bit full with everything up to date. I have gone through the simple install script because the on board mic and speakers are good enough for development of my project.

I think that I “successfully” installed the driver. The mic and speaker show up on the select-able list at the top right corner of the OS. However I am not getting any sound from the speakers and I think that the mic is also not working because arecord made an empty file.

I also do not see the red LED light turning on.

What do you think is going on?

Where are the alsactl preset files? They are not in their listed location. I really need them!! Please put them back up!

Helloooo, RaspiAudioooo. Anybody still here or have you abondoned support for this product?

Hello,

We have updated method 1 and it is working now with the last Raspi OS

Method 2 is broken for now and it seems harder to solve. We are looking into it.

I tried installing the driver but it did not work for me.
I’m using Ultra++ with pi 5 on 64bit OS version 12.5

Everything appears to install correctly, but when I restart I don’t see the audio device listed in the audio menu. I have the pi 5 plugged into an external touch screen which has speakers and it plays over HDMI.

Other wise my only choice is HDMI out or Pro Audio. I don’t know what Pro Audio is but it doesn’t seem to work.

Bump. Any suggestions or updates?

Mine also does not work with a fresh install and following method 1 precisely. I do not understand why this is so difficult considering the ULTRA was anything but cheap :frowning:
Error is the same as with you, except I am using a 3b+ and installed Bulleyes 32bit.

I haven’t even tried to get working on the MIC+ V2 yet and I dread doing so after the pain and wasted time so far.

I have sent mine back now. I am not paying 75€+ for two pieces of unusable garbage. It’s ridicolous, that this is even being sold if it is non-functional.
There is literally nothing I could have done wrong with the instructions as short as they are.

Greetings –

I have to say that this is the worst installation guide I can remember encountering, which means I probably forgot several instances worse or equally bad.

I just finished wirewrapping my new MIC++ into my Raspberry Pi 4 pseudo tablet, it’s working well enough. I get sound out of the speakers, and also out of the panel mount headphone jack that I connected to the headphone jack on the board. I haven’t tried any inputs.

The install script for Method 1 did not do anything when I ran it. I used the script as a guide and performed the necessary changes in an editor. I have no idea why the script failed to perform as promised. The manual changes were enough to verify that the board worked as a hat.

– rec –

1 Like

Any progress. I’d like to use this device at some point

I think I have method 2 working again. I’m runnig an rpi4 on raspian bookworm, updated this very morning to a new verson of pipewire, though that is probably irrelevant. I cloned GitHub - waveshare/WM8960-Audio-HAT: The drivers of [WM8960 Audio HAT] for Raspberry Pi and ran ./install.sh

There were two problems with the use of alsactl in /usr/bin/wm8960-service.

  1. if I call sudo alsactl restore it generates the errors:
    alsa-lib main.c:1541:(snd_use_case_mgr_open) error: failed to import hw:0 use case configuration -2
    alsa-lib main.c:1541:(snd_use_case_mgr_open) error: failed to import hw:1 use case configuration -2
    alsa-lib main.c:1541:(snd_use_case_mgr_open) error: failed to import hw:2 use case configuration -2

I can fix this by calling sudo alsactl --no-ucm restore instead, I don’t know what UCM is or why alsactl decided to make it the default. (Thanks to stackoverflow for remembering this for me.)

  1. if I call alsactl --no-ucm restore with the waveshare supplied asound.state file, I get the errors:

No state is present for card vc4hdmi0
Found hardware: “vc4-hdmi” “” “” “” “”
Hardware is initialized using a generic method
No state is present for card vc4hdmi0
No state is present for card vc4hdmi1
Found hardware: “vc4-hdmi” “” “” “” “”
Hardware is initialized using a generic method
No state is present for card vc4hdmi1

I can fix this by using alsactl to merge the wm8960 settings with:
sudo alsactl --no-ucm restore hw:wm8960soundcard -f /etc/wm8960-soundcard/wm8960_asound.state
and then saving the merged settings via: sudo alsactl --no-ucm store

It’s not clear that these errors are significant, they do cause alsactl to exit with non-zero status, which causes wm8960-service to fail. But I think that the wm8960 settings get done anyway.

Anyway, I can bring up alsamixer, it has the ridiculous number of controls, I can mute the speakers and unmute the headphones (using the gain sliders) and it works as expected. Again, not really interested in inputs, so I hope this helps.

You really need the wm8960 data sheet to figure out what all those controls do.

– rec –

Thanks rec. I’ll give your version a try. I don’t care about inputs other than the onboard microphones. And being able use the speakers.

Method 1 is not working for me using Volumio 3.6.31

I see snd_rpi_googlevoicehat_soundcar as an output device, but when I select it, I don’t get any audio from the speakers that are built into the Ultra++

How can I get this working?

Has anyone got this working with the headphones jack? Im running a raspberry pi 5 64 bit os. I’ve sunk a good 6 hours into trouble shooting this I feel like its a bit of a piss take spending all this money endorsed by home assistant. I got Wyoming with wake word working using with home assistant using the on board speakers but the headphones won’t work.

Job for wm8960-soundcard.service failed because the control process exited with error code.
See "systemctl status wm8960-soundcard.service" and "journalctl -xeu wm8960-soundcard.service" for details.

Hello,

I realize that the ULTRA has been a pain in the neck to configure because the drivers for the WM8960 are never included in the new releases. Could it be due to the fact that Raspberry Pi is now making their own sound card and trying to favor their brand?

So, I will stop making the ULTRA and instead replace it with the Pi Audio Drive that uses a driver included in every distribution and has an EEPROM to automatically load the drivers, while having the same audio input and output capabilities.