Lexicon Alpha and Ubuntu Studio

[frarobertooo]

Hi there,
I'm frarobertooo and I've just bought The Lexicon Alpha USB Audio Interface. I spent the last two days trying to figure out how to hear my plugged guitar on my PC, but i failed. The thing I cannot get is the Alpha showing up on the Jack windows in order to make some connections input->output.
Here it is my system:
Packard Bell DOT-SE
Ubuntu Studio 14.04.1 Tusty Tahr LTS

The system recognize the device, here it is in fact the output of
/proc/asound/cards
arecord -l && aplay -l

diocanissimo@diocanissimo-DOT-SE:~$ cat /proc/asound/cards
0 [Intel ]: HDA-Intel - HDA Intel
HDA Intel at 0x58200000 irq 44
1 [Alpha ]: USB-Audio - Lexicon Alpha
Lexicon Lexicon Alpha at usb-0000:00:1d.0-1, full speed
diocanissimo@diocanissimo-DOT-SE:~$ arecord -l && aplay -l
**** List of CAPTURE Hardware Devices ****
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: ALC272X Analog [ALC272X Analog]
Subdevices: 0/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: Alpha [Lexicon Alpha], device 0: USB Audio [USB Audio]
Subdevices: 0/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: ALC272X Analog [ALC272X Analog]
Subdevices: 0/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: Alpha [Lexicon Alpha], device 0: USB Audio [USB Audio]
Subdevices: 0/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

In Jack Setup, everytime I select Alpha as Input Device, the Jack server cannot be started.

21:30:32.487 Patchbay deactivated.
21:30:32.618 Statistics reset.
21:30:32.897 ALSA connection change.
21:30:32.965 D-BUS: Service is available (org.jackaudio.service aka jackdbus).
Cannot connect to server socket err = No such file or directory
Cannot connect to server request channel
jack server is not running or cannot be started
(qjackctl:2601): Gtk-CRITICAL **: IA__gtk_widget_get_direction: assertion 'GTK_IS_WIDGET (widget)' failed
(qjackctl:2601): Gtk-CRITICAL **: IA__gtk_widget_get_direction: assertion 'GTK_IS_WIDGET (widget)' failed
21:31:04.162 D-BUS: JACK server could not be started. Sorry
Thu Nov 20 21:30:39 2014: Starting jack server...
Thu Nov 20 21:30:39 2014: JACK server starting in realtime mode with priority 10
Thu Nov 20 21:30:39 2014: Acquired audio card Audio1
Thu Nov 20 21:30:39 2014: Acquired audio card Audio0
Thu Nov 20 21:30:39 2014: creating alsa driver ... hw:0|hw:Alpha|256|2|44100|0|0|nomon|swmeter|-|32bit
Thu Nov 20 21:30:39 2014: configuring for 44100Hz, period = 256 frames (5.8 ms), buffer = 2 periods
Thu Nov 20 21:30:39 2014: ALSA: final selected sample format for capture: 24bit little-endian
Thu Nov 20 21:30:39 2014: ALSA: use 2 periods for capture
Thu Nov 20 21:30:39 2014: ALSA: final selected sample format for playback: 32bit integer little-endian
Thu Nov 20 21:30:39 2014: ALSA: use 2 periods for playback
Thu Nov 20 21:31:01 2014: ERROR: JackPosixProcessSync::LockedTimedWait error usec = 20000000 err = Connection timed out
Thu Nov 20 21:31:01 2014: ERROR: JackEngine::ClientActivate wait error ref = 2 name = dbusapi
Thu Nov 20 21:31:01 2014: ERROR: failed to activate dbusapi jack client. error is -1
Cannot connect to server socket err = No such file or directory
Cannot connect to server request channel
jack server is not running or cannot be started
(qjackctl:2601): Gtk-CRITICAL **: IA__gtk_widget_get_direction: assertion 'GTK_IS_WIDGET (widget)' failed
(qjackctl:2601): Gtk-CRITICAL **: IA__gtk_widget_get_direction: assertion 'GTK_IS_WIDGET (widget)' failed
21:31:18.412 Could not connect to JACK server as client. - Overall operation failed. - Server communication error. Please check the messages window for more info.
Thu Nov 20 21:31:09 2014: ERROR: CheckSize error size = 32 Size() = 12
Thu Nov 20 21:31:09 2014: ERROR: CheckRead error
Thu Nov 20 21:31:09 2014: ERROR: CheckSize error size = -1 Size() = 4
Thu Nov 20 21:31:09 2014: ERROR: CheckRead error
Thu Nov 20 21:31:09 2014: ERROR: CheckSize error size = 0 Size() = 12
Thu Nov 20 21:31:09 2014: ERROR: CheckRead error
Thu Nov 20 21:31:13 2014: ERROR: JackPosixProcessSync::LockedTimedWait error usec = 4000000 err = Connection timed out
Thu Nov 20 21:31:13 2014: ERROR: JackEngine::ClientCloseAux wait error ref = 2
Cannot read socket fd = 21 err = Success
CheckRes error
JackSocketClientChannel read fail
Cannot open qjackctl client
Thu Nov 20 21:31:18 2014: ERROR: JackPosixProcessSync::LockedTimedWait error usec = 5000000 err = Connection timed out
Thu Nov 20 21:31:18 2014: ERROR: Driver is not running
Thu Nov 20 21:31:18 2014: ERROR: Cannot create new client
Thu Nov 20 21:31:18 2014: ERROR: CheckSize error size = 32 Size() = 12
Thu Nov 20 21:31:18 2014: ERROR: CheckRead error
Thu Nov 20 21:31:18 2014: ERROR: CheckSize error size = -1 Size() = 4
Thu Nov 20 21:31:18 2014: ERROR: CheckRead error
Thu Nov 20 21:31:18 2014: ERROR: CheckSize error size = 0 Size() = 12
Thu Nov 20 21:31:18 2014: ERROR: CheckRead error
Thu Nov 20 21:31:19 2014: Released audio card Audio1
Thu Nov 20 21:31:19 2014: Released audio card Audio0
Thu Nov 20 21:31:19 2014: Saving settings to "/home/diocanissimo/.config/jack/conf.xml" ...

I'm not a newbye of Ubuntu but I cannot get past this first hurdle.
Any suggestions?
Thanks,
frarobertooo

[Pablo]

Making jack start with two different audio cards is a bad idea.
Just start jack with alpha interface, and leave the input and output devices as default. Jack will use the alpha for input and output. If you really need the onboard for output, use zita_a2j.

Cheers, Pablo