Arch Linux

raroman

Member

From: Sweden

Registered: 2008-01-05

Posts: 29

ALSA, Multiple soundcards

I hate to post another sound problem, but I'm pretty stuck.
I set up Arch for a computer-illiterate family and they're really happy with it (basically content with firefox, thunderbird, pidgin, OpenOffice.org )

But I still couldn't get sound to work. One problem is the fact that I don't even know how many sound cards there are and which one I should configure. (noob! )
alsaconf says it found the following sound cards:

via82xx   VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8233/A/8237 AC97 Audio Controll
npu401   snd-mpu401
legacy     Proble legacy ISA (non-PnP) chips

I tried the http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/ALSA wiki guide and hoped to get the VIA card to work. The channels are unmuted.
Physically, I can see two sound connector plugs at the back of the PC. I switch back and forth when testing sound. Nothing doing on either one. (testing with aplay /usr/share/sounds/alsa/Front_Center.wav)

Any pointer in the right direction is greatly appreciated.

Background info:

lpci
00:00.0 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8377 [KT400/KT600 AGP] Host Bridge
00:01.0 PCI bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8235 PCI Bridge
00:09.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ (rev 10)
00:0a.0 Communication controller: Intel Corporation 536EP Data Fax Modem
00:10.0 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev 80)
00:10.1 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev 80)
00:10.2 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev 80)
00:10.3 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. USB 2.0 (rev 82)
00:11.0 ISA bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8235 ISA Bridge
00:11.1 IDE interface: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82C586A/B/VT82C686/A/B/VT823x/A/C PIPC Bus Master IDE (rev 06)
00:11.5 Multimedia audio controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8233/A/8235/8237 AC97 Audio Controller (rev 50)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV34 [GeForce FX 5200] (rev a1)

cat /etc/modprobe.conf
#
# /etc/modprobe.conf (for v2.6 kernels)
#
alias wlan0 ndiswrapper

# --- BEGIN: Generated by ALSACONF, do not edit. ---
# --- ALSACONF version 1.0.15 ---
alias snd-card-0 snd-via82xx
alias sound-slot-0 snd-via82xx
# --- END: Generated by ALSACONF, do not edit. ---

options snd-via82xx ac97_quirk=0

(As you can see, I tested the quirks from http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/ALS … o_Sound.3F)

[extract from /etc/rc.conf:]
MODULES=(8139cp 8139too mii slhc ac97_bus snd-mixer-oss snd-pcm-oss snd-seq-oss snd-seq-device snd-seq-midi-event snd-seq snd-page-alloc snd-pcm snd-rawmidi snd-timer snd snd-mpu401-uart snd-mpu401 snd-ac97-codec snd-via82xx soundcore)

lsmod | grep '^snd'
snd_mpu401              6760  0 
snd_via82xx            23064  1 
snd_ac97_codec         95652  1 snd_via82xx
snd_mpu401_uart         7040  2 snd_mpu401,snd_via82xx
snd_rawmidi            19232  1 snd_mpu401_uart
snd_seq_oss            29312  0 
snd_seq_midi_event      6528  1 snd_seq_oss
snd_seq                46672  4 snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi_event
snd_seq_device          6924  3 snd_rawmidi,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq
snd_pcm_oss            37024  0 
snd_pcm                69124  3 snd_via82xx,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm_oss
snd_timer              19332  2 snd_seq,snd_pcm
snd_page_alloc          8072  2 snd_via82xx,snd_pcm
snd_mixer_oss          14592  1 snd_pcm_oss
snd                    45028  14 snd_mpu401,snd_via82xx,snd_ac97_codec,snd_mpu401_uart,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq,snd_seq_device,snd_pcm_oss,snd_pcm,snd_timer,snd_mixer_oss

ilikepudding

Member

Registered: 2008-02-11

Posts: 16

Re: ALSA, Multiple soundcards

My guess is that ALSA is setting your default sound card to something that doesn't work.

first run
$ cat /proc/asound/cards

You'll get some result with a list of sound cards:
0 [Intel          ]: HDA-Intel - HDA Intel  HDA Intel at 0xfdff8000 irq 16
1 [Audio          ]: USB-Audio - Bose USB Audio Bose Corporation Bose USB Audio at  usb-0000:00:1d.2-2, full speed

or something like that

Then edit /usr/share/alsa/alsa.conf with a text editor

Find
# defaults
defaults.ctl.card 0
defaults.pcm.card 0

Change the number on both values to the number that corresponds with the card you want.

raroman

Member

From: Sweden

Registered: 2008-01-05

Posts: 29

Re: ALSA, Multiple soundcards

Oh, that sounds promising. Unfortunately, I can access that computer only once a week (should set up a port forwarding to get in remotely... )
I'll post back next weekend and (hopefully) be able to change the title of this thread to resolved

raroman

Member

From: Sweden

Registered: 2008-01-05

Posts: 29

Re: ALSA, Multiple soundcards

ilikepuddings tip didn't work after all. Soundcard 0 = VIA  is selected. The one I'm trying to get to work...

I tried quirks 0 and 1 http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=43564, I tried moving the snd-via8xx module to the front in rc.conf modules list http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=41676, still I get nothing.
I don't get any errors, I can't find the solution in a previous thread...

I've uploaded the output from ALSA Audio Debug: http://www.syndrega.ch/roman/aout.txt

Could really use some help

brebs

Member

Registered: 2007-04-03

Posts: 3,742

Re: ALSA, Multiple soundcards

Just use index=0 and index=1 in the module options. See wiki.

raroman

Member

From: Sweden

Registered: 2008-01-05

Posts: 29

Re: ALSA, Multiple soundcards

My goodness. I didn't expect this to be a common problem. The article wasn't linked in any of the posts that I read on bbs.archlinux or from the arch wiki...  I think I will add that.
Thank you brebs! I should be able to get a bit further now. Although, after gleaning over the page, I feel like throwing out the soundcard that I don't need

raroman

Member

From: Sweden

Registered: 2008-01-05

Posts: 29

Re: ALSA, Multiple soundcards

It's been a while, but I removed one of my soundcards today. But aplay -l and /proc/asound/cards still say that I have two installed.

cat /proc/asound/cards
 0 [V8235          ]: VIA8233 - VIA 8235
                      VIA 8235 with VT1616i at 0xe400, irq 5
 1 [UART           ]: MPU-401 UART - MPU-401 UART
                      MPU-401 UART at 0x330, irq 10

aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: V8235 [VIA 8235], device 0: VIA 8235 [VIA 8235]
  Subdevices: 4/4
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
  Subdevice #1: subdevice #1
  Subdevice #2: subdevice #2
  Subdevice #3: subdevice #3
card 0: V8235 [VIA 8235], device 1: VIA 8235 [VIA 8235]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

What do I have to do after physically removing one card to make the system realise that one is gone?

brebs

Member

Registered: 2007-04-03

Posts: 3,742

Re: ALSA, Multiple soundcards

Run "lsmod" and look at the sound modules loaded. Delete the .ko file from /lib/modules/... or blacklist the module in /etc/rc.conf or /etc/modprobe.conf

ToastedToad

Member

From: Sequim, WA

Registered: 2006-03-08

Posts: 79

Re: ALSA, Multiple soundcards

Did you make them members of the audio group?

damjan

Member

Registered: 2006-05-30

Posts: 452

Re: ALSA, Multiple soundcards

aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: V8235 [VIA 8235], device 0: VIA 8235 [VIA 8235]
  Subdevices: 4/4
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
  Subdevice #1: subdevice #1
  Subdevice #2: subdevice #2
  Subdevice #3: subdevice #3
card 0: V8235 [VIA 8235], device 1: VIA 8235 [VIA 8235]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

What do I have to do after physically removing one card to make the system realise that one is gone?

If you look hard enough at your output you'll notice that is a single (the same) card and 2 devices:

card 0: V8235 [VIA 8235], device 0: VIA 8235 [VIA 8235]
card 0: V8235 [VIA 8235], device 1: VIA 8235 [VIA 8235]

I'd say one is the normal stereo out, the other device is the 7.1 (maybe spdif digital) or some such device.

BTW, the stereo audio-out output is green.

raroman

Member

From: Sweden

Registered: 2008-01-05

Posts: 29

Re: ALSA, Multiple soundcards

Thanks damjan, my bad. After /proc/asound/cards reporting two different ones and alsaconf as well, I _expected_ aplay -l to show two. It was only after posting that I realised that they were in fact the same...

While trying to get the soundcard to run, the system got "buggy". (The language of the x-system suddenly switched from Swedish to English out of the blue and root lost most of its Path. I had this behaviour on the computer before, but I thought that the harddisk was at fault.) It turns out that either my memory or motherboard are gone. (memtest fails after barely five minutes.)  I will have to switch to new hardware without solving this thread. I'm sorry if someone runs into the same problem later and tries to find the answer here. But since I have no experience in tracking down hardware problems, I can't continue on the sound problem on this computer. It might well have to do with the broken motherboard (Knoppix 5.1 detected the same card/modules and still sound didn't play...)

Thanks for you inputs, ilikepudding, brebs, ToastedToad and damjan.