Arch Linux

kaivai

Member

Registered: 2013-05-17

Posts: 21

ALSA sound cuts out at low volume

Hello again folks!
I am very sorry, I feel like I am asking a lot more than I am supplying answers - I still haven't found a post that I have an answer to, but I'll keep lurking and checking on new things.

To be honest, I'm not entirely sure that this is a problem, or if this is expected behavior. I seldom use sound on my computer, but occasionally I link up to my samba share and listen to music with ncmpcpp. I have noticed that beyond a particular
threshold, my sound cuts out completely. (anything below 18 in alsamixer).
The results are stackable. If I set my volume in alsamixer to 24, anything below 41% volume in ncmpcpp is cut off.

I do not have pulse audio installed at all. The only package related to pulseaudio I have installed is: lib32-libpulse

The problem is that it is rather loud when you are using headphones.

I have searched a bit in the usual places (Arch Forums, Arch Wiki, Linux Questions google, gentoo wiki) etc. The most relevant seeming to be this, but I am not quite sure how to adjust mixer settings from the cli. I have played around with some options in alsamixer but nothing seems to fix the problems.

http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=48&t=119432

I found this on Arch's pulseaudio wiki and in the forums, but I do not have pulseaudio installed, so it is not relevant to me:

Known issue (won't fix): https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+sour … bug/223133
If sound doesn't play when Pulseaudio's volume is set below a certain level, try ignore_dB=1 in /etc/pulse/default.pa:

Has anyone else ran into this issue? Is it possible this is a hardware problem? I feel like I didn't have issues with this before, but I really do seldom use the speakers/headphones on this laptop. Actually the cutoff is only noticeable when I have headphones in.

Thanks again folks! I'm sorry for being such a information leech.
Kai

eidorian

Member

Registered: 2013-09-22

Posts: 1

Re: ALSA sound cuts out at low volume

Hey Kaivai

Your first link solves the problem!

I don't know either how to change that setting in the command line, but it's easy in KDE's settings: Multimedia > Audio and Video Settings > Audio Hardware Setup

Now choose your sound card with this problem and use the profile mentioned in your provided link.

Click Apply and you're good to go.
Though maybe you have to restart an application

Greetings. Adrian.

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- Lenovo Y50-70 | 16 GB DDR3 | 256 GB SSD | Full-HD TN-panel | Arch w/ OpenBox
- ThinkPad X220 | 4 GB DDR3 | 120 GB SSD |  1366x768 TN-panel | Arch (native)