Arch Linux

simplisticways

Member

Registered: 2015-12-03

Posts: 49

[Solved] No sounds in my fresh linux install.

I tried to unmute things I saw in alsamixer but no good.

I ran

 amixer sset Master unmute 

amixer: Unable to find simple control 'Master',0

Tried using debug from alsa

 wget -O alsa-info.sh http://www.alsa-project.org/alsa-info.sh 

 bash alsa-info.sh --upload 

Dont really understand it but here are the info.
http://www.alsa-project.org/db/?f=3f9f0 … 1d2409b4b6

So I am using MSI tomahawk motherboard and ryzen processors.. I do use hdmi, but I am trying to use loudspeakers connected to computer. No sounds so far from anything.

I installed pulseaudio but it cant make the connection. I am now using xfce + i3wm but I think these info are unrelated to this problem.

Last edited by simplisticways (2017-06-08 19:25:11)

V1del

Forum Moderator

Registered: 2012-10-16

Posts: 25,435

Re: [Solved] No sounds in my fresh linux install.

Do you intend to use pulseaudio? This will change the steps you have to take.

If not, create a file in /etc/modprobe.d/alsa.conf

options snd-hda-intel index=-2

and reboot, if this fixed things great, if it didnt't post

sudo fuser -v /dev/snd/*

if you intend to use pulseaudio post that same command, but additionally

pacmd list-cards
pacmd list-sinks
#If these don't work because they can't connect
systemctl --user status pulseaudio

simplisticways

Member

Registered: 2015-12-03

Posts: 49

Re: [Solved] No sounds in my fresh linux install.

Wow thanks! Really saved my week.. was struggling with this problem.

It worked. Thought I dont get it how? So the  /etc/modprobe.d/alsa.conf  chose the right soundcard? Because I havent chose one?

sudo fuser -v /dev/snd/*

Chooses the options which ones are available?

If I intend to use pulseaudio. Then I assume I only need to enable pulseaudio service and I dont need to configure that in conf file?

V1del

Forum Moderator

Registered: 2012-10-16

Posts: 25,435

Re: [Solved] No sounds in my fresh linux install.

You can keep the conf file even with pulseaudio, but it isn't as necessary.  The essential reason why this works is this from your info script

 0 [NVidia         ]: HDA-Intel - HDA NVidia
                      HDA NVidia at 0xfd080000 irq 51
 1 [Generic        ]: HDA-Intel - HD-Audio Generic
                      HD-Audio Generic at 0xfd800000 irq 53

**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 7: HDMI 1 [HDMI 1]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 8: HDMI 2 [HDMI 2]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 9: HDMI 3 [HDMI 3]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: Generic [HD-Audio Generic], device 0: ALC892 Analog [ALC892 Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

As you see, your nvidia card was registered as the first card to be used. ALSA default configuration will playback your audio to the hw:0,0 device which as seen in the aplay -l output corresponds to a HDMI output, but you want your output to happen on your analog card which was hw:1,0.  A simple way to remedy that is load the corresponding module (snd-hda-intel in this case) and give the cards registered with it a specific ordering. The index=-2 tells the module to give the first card it finds (Nvidia) any index but 0 thus the 0 is now free to be used by the Generic analog card. If you compare your

aplay -l

output you will see that the analog card is now card 0. And since we haven't changed any ALSA config, it will still play back to hw:0,0 which is now the analog card.

Pulseaudio handles the cards using an unique identifier anyway and wouldn't be that dependent on the index being right.

sudo fuser -v /dev/snd/*

doesn't do anything but provide information, if you play something back and execute that command, it will tell you which application from which user is currently using the sound card. There are certain cases were applications block a soundcard so that only this one application is able to output sound. And this command helps in figuring out which one that is.

If this is solved please edit your initial post's title to indicate it as such.