No sound in Dell Inspiron 1420 in Jaunty

Please use the following command:
apport-collect -p alsa-base 363892

AlsaDevices:
 total 0
 crw-rw----+ 1 root audio 116, 5 2009-04-19 17:53 controlC0
 crw-rw----+ 1 root audio 116, 4 2009-04-19 17:54 pcmC0D0c
 crw-rw----+ 1 root audio 116, 3 2009-04-19 18:11 pcmC0D0p
 crw-rw----+ 1 root audio 116, 2 2009-04-19 17:53 timer
AplayDevices:
 **** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
 card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: STAC92xx Analog [STAC92xx Analog]
   Subdevices: 1/1
   Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
Architecture: i386
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC0: diazbeat 3841 F.... mixer_applet2
Card0.Amixer.info:
 Card hw:0 'Intel'/'HDA Intel at 0xfe9fc000 irq 21'
   Mixer name : 'SigmaTel STAC9228'
   Components : 'HDA:83847616,102801f3,00100201 HDA:14f12c06,14f1000f,00100000'
   Controls : 30
   Simple ctrls : 21
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.04
Package: alsa-base 1.0.18.dfsg-1ubuntu8
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 SHELL=/bin/bash
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 LANGUAGE=
Uname: Linux 2.6.28-11-generic i686
UserGroups: adm admin audio cdrom dialout dip floppy lpadmin netdev plugdev powerdev scanner vboxusers video

You should try the model=3stack quirk, because your Dell's bios is likely broken and contains an incorrect verb table for your HDA codec.

I put in the model=3stack quirk in my alsa-base.conf and I still have the same problem--No sound. I restarted after I made the change, and when my desktop was started up I saw that my volume was muted even though I had set the volume to medium. I unmuted the volume and set it at medium again, and when I tested the audio in the Sound window under Preferences, I still had no sound.

Hi bcasanov,

Can you make sure your system is fully up to date. I too have an Inspiron 1420 and after updating this morning my sound has returned. I've attached my alsa-info.txt file for you to compare. Thanks.

Hi, I checked Update Manager and my system is currently up-to-date, and I still have no sound. Could you tell me where I could find the alsa-info.txt file so that I could compare yours with mine?

The alsa-info.txt file is actually generated from running the also-info.sh script that is mentioned at:

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingSoundProblems

http://alsa-project.org/alsa-info.sh

I usually just run `./alsa-info.sh --no-upload` and it will dump the output to /tmp/alsa-info.txt

Thank you for telling me the information. I found the command to run the script was actually 'bash alsa-info.sh --no-upload'. Here I have attached my alsa-info.txt

I also have a 1420n and was experiencing intermittent problems with sound (it would work in about 1 out of every 5 boots). I am running latest Jaunty as of around 2009-04-20 9:45am PST.

I found that the following fix: https://bugs.launchpad.net/alsa-utils/+bug/315809/comments/7 to the file /usr/share/alsa/init/00main results in sound working for 100% of cold boots. I am unable to get any sound at all after a suspend/resume though.

It turns out that my previous post was incorrect and that I just had a couple of lucky reboots. Whether or not sound works is still a luck-of-the-draw issue.

I am attaching my alsa-info.txt as well.

Sorry for all the updates, I'm figuring this out as I go along.

After my previous update I noticed that the alsa-info.txt lists two different model= options being passed to the snd-hda-intel module, model=laptop and model=3stack. The model=laptop option was being passed in /etc/modprobe.d/alsa.conf and the model=3stack was being set in /etc/modprobe.d/lanai-sound .

I commented out the model=3stack line so that I was only passing model=laptop and my sound worked on the next reboot. I also tested a suspend and resume and sound has continued to work.

So, I'm back to suggesting the patch to /usr/share/alsa/init/00main which I mentioned in #18.

When I compared the 00main file, which was uploaded as an example for the changes suggested, with my own 00main file, which I have uploaded here, the files seem to be identical, and it seems I don't need to make any changes, unless I've misinterpreted what the original person that gave the patch meant by:

"Responsible for >muted< startup seems to be a wrong LABEL inside the script

/usr/share/alsa/init/00main

-> GOTO="00_mainend"
-> LABEL="00main_end"

see attachment (out of last updated package)"

4/5 of the way down or so in the file is this line:

RESULT=="true", GOTO="00_mainend"

Which should be:

RESULT=="true", GOTO="00main_end"

Thank you, Alex, for clarifying that for me. I made the necessary change to the file, saved it, and rebooted. I still do not have sound. I don't know if this information would be relevant, but I have the 'snd-hda-intel module, model=3stack' option being passed in both /etc/modprobe.d/alsa.conf and /etc/modprobe.d/lanai-sound.

I'm sorry, in the previous post, I meant /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf instead of /etc/modprobe.d/alsa.conf, which is an empty file. I tried putting the model=laptop option instead of model=3stack one, like Alex did, in my alsa-base.conf. I then restarted, and I still have no sound.

The relevant quirks here are:
model=dell-bios (default in driver source code)
model=dell-3stack
model=3stack

model=laptop doesn't make any sense; it's not even defined or relevant for this codec id (0x83847616) and quirk table (stac927x_cfg_tbl[]).

Please try these steps: completely remove all snd-hda-intel model quirks from your /etc/modprobe.d/* and reboot. If sound remains inaudible, readd a quirk for dell-3stack and reboot.

Thank you, I finally have sound back! I removed all the snd-hda-intel model quirks from all the files I could find in /etc/modprobe.d/* and rebooted! I tested my sound in the Sound preferences, and it works for all the sound playback areas.

Inaudible audio caused by outdated quirk added by user.

I don't believe that I ever manually touched the lines in /etc/modprobe.d/lanai-sound, and have gone from the stock Hardy that my 1420 shipped with to Jaunty. I saw the same problems, and /etc/modprobe.d/lanai-sound contained model=3stack when I looked.

Quick summary of behavior I saw on my 1420:

model=3stack (what was in here when I first ran across it): no sound in Jaunty

(delete line -- based on Daniel T Chen's text above, this is equivalent to specifying dell-bios): sound is present on external speakers w/o problems, but about a quarter-second after plugging headphones into headphones jack #1, the sound on the headphones (which is fine for a quarter-second) is muted -- external speakers are also muted.

model=dell-3stack: Everything works properly

Based on this, I would guess that the proper workaround for a 1420 (unless there are multiple revisions of this model 1420 that require different settings) is:

* Go to /etc/modprobe.d/lanai-sound

* Remove any existing lines beginning with "options snd-hda-intel"

* Add a line that reads "options snd-hda-intel model=dell-3stack"

* Reboot

Thank you for these directions. I too lost sound under Jaunty on my 1420n. First I reversed a change that I had made to

/etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf

when I lost sound in upgrading from Gutsy to Hardy. At that point, I had added the line

options snd-hda-intel model=auto

to the alsa-base.conf file. That seemed like an "snd-hda-intel model quirk" so following the post above I removed it.

I then made the lanai-sound changes above and rebooted. Sound works great. Thanks again.

Actually after restarting the inspiron, I've lost sound again. Also ever since I originally lost sound under jaunty I have had a really annoying system beep that sounds like an electric shock and that isn't controlled by the volume level. Any ideas where this beep came from and how to get rid of it? Thanks.

Hi Mark,

Try the following:

1) Click the speaker icon on your Gnome panel and select the Volume Control button
2) Under the Device dropdown select "HDA Intel (Alsa mixer)"
3) Click Preferences to bring up the Volume Control Preferences window
4) Make sure the following controls are enabled: Master, Headphone, PCM, Front, PC Beep
5) Mute PC Beep (this will kill the horrible noise) and make sure that the rest are not muted. Crank them up if necessary until you hear sound.

Hi Alex,

Thanks for the PC beep fix. Everytime an email arrived I felt like I was being shocked. Is there a package that would allow me to replace the electrocution sound with something like a gentle bell?

I checked the volume control settings you suggested. Everything is turned up, but I still have no sound. I don't have Headphone, unless it goes by a different name. The controls I have under HDA Intel (Alsa Mixer) are: Master, PCM, Front, Surround, Center, LFE, and PC Beep. All except PC Beep are turned all the way up. Still no sound.

When I lost sound, I also made the edit to /usr/share/alsa/init/00main, replacing the single reference to 00_mainend with 00main_end. After rebooting still no sound.

Ok. Here's a big hint. All I have to do is edit and save /etc/modprobe.d/lanai-sound. To start, I had

options snd-hda-intel model=dell-3stack

When I commented this line out and restarted, I had sound. To check, I tried restarting a second time. No sound. I then went back and added and deleted a whitespace to the lanai-sound file and saved it. Note that all the lanai-sound file now has in it is the options line above commented (#) out. Restarted the inspiron and sound came back.

So it's not the content of lanai-sound that matters. It's whether it's new or not. What is that about?

You may have had an issue with the contents of your /var/lib/alsa/asound.state file. This determines the initial volume levels of the various mixers when ALSA is initialized before Pulseaudio starts.

Try this:

cp /var/lib/alsa/asound.state ~/asound.state.beforeboot
reboot
cp /var/lib/alsa/asound.state ~/asound.state.afterboot

diff ~/asound.state.afterboot ~/asound.state.beforeboot

If your sound goes from working to non-working (or visa-versa) between the reboots then we would hope to see output from the diff command above, indicating that the saved state of your ALSA mixer levels has changed.

Thanks Alex. The only difference I saw was in the value of Master
Playback Volume. But I think this was something I adjusted. When I had
no sound it was 81, when I had sound it was 84. When I didn't have
sound I moved the Master Playback up and back to check that there was
no sound. I think that accounts for the discrepancy.

       control.28 {
                comment.access 'read write'
                comment.type INTEGER
                comment.count 1
                comment.range '0 - 127'
                comment.dbmin -9525
                comment.dbmax 0
                iface MIXER
                name 'Master Playback Volume'
                value 81
        }

I also don't think that editing the lanai-sound file matters. I think
I just get sound on every other reboot. Or maybe it is how I edit the
file. Maybe I have to make sure that it starts with a "#" rather than
a whitespace.

2009/5/27 Alex <email address hidden>:
> You may have had an issue with the contents of your
> /var/lib/alsa/asound.state file.  This determines the initial volume
> levels of the various mixers when ALSA is initialized before Pulseaudio
> starts.
>
> Try this:
>
> cp /var/lib/alsa/asound.state ~/asound.state.beforeboot
> reboot
> cp /var/lib/alsa/asound.state ~/asound.state.afterboot
>
> diff ~/asound.state.afterboot ~/asound.state.beforeboot
>
> If your sound goes from working to non-working (or visa-versa) between
> the reboots then we would hope to see output from the diff command
> above, indicating that the saved state of your ALSA mixer levels has
> changed.
>
> --
> No sound in Dell Inspiron 1420 in Jaunty
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/363892
> You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
> of the bug.
>
> Status in “linux” source package in Ubuntu: Invalid
>
> Bug description:
> Hi,
>
> I have a Dell Inspiron 1420 and here is my sound hardware:
>
> The result of the command lspci -v | grep Audio:
>
> 00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 02)
>
> The result of the command aplay -l:
>
> **** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
> card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: STAC92xx Analog [STAC92xx Analog]
>  Subdevices: 1/1
>  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
>
> I've looked in the Volume Control window after right-clicking on the volume icon in the task bar, and the device shown is HDA Intel (Alsa mixer), and the Master, PCM, Front, Surround, Center, and LFE are all unmuted and set to the highest limit.  I've attached my alsa-base.conf.
>
> I have no sound playback, even when I insert headphones.  I've tried going to Sound in the Preferences menu and sound playback and for sound events, music and movies, and audio conferencing is set to Autodetect, so I've tried the different options available and no sound came out when I tested.  In Intrepid, my sound was working fine.
>

Ok. Think I got it. Can anyone confirm that saving old lanai-sound and alsa-base.conf files by adding an extension to them and keeping them in /etc/modprobe.d/ is a bad idea? Once I moved the detritus I created to an oldfiles folder I got sound on two restarts in a row. The clue here was running the alsa-info script and noticing that it contained multiple driver loads and old driver loads that matched greps of the same driver names. When Daniel Chen talked about removing all quirks in all files in /etc/modprobe.d above, that meant ALL FILES.

Hi Mark,

The following is from "man 5 modprobe.conf":

       Because the modprobe command can add or remove extra more than one mod‐
       ule, due to module dependencies, we need a method of specifying what
       options are to be used with those modules. /etc/modprobe.conf (or, if
       that does not exist, all files under the /etc/modprobe.d directory)
       specifies those options, as required.

So yes, all files under /etc/modprobe.d are treated as configuration files.

Architecture: i386
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC0: gaurav 3409 F.... mixer_applet2
Card0.Amixer.info:
 Card hw:0 'Intel'/'HDA Intel at 0xfe9fc000 irq 21'
   Mixer name : 'SigmaTel STAC9228'
   Components : 'HDA:83847616,102801f3,00100201 HDA:14f12c06,14f1000f,00100000'
   Controls : 37
   Simple ctrls : 24
DistroRelease: LinuxMint 7
Package: alsa-base 1.0.18.dfsg-1ubuntu8
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 SHELL=/bin/bash
 LANG=en_IN
Uname: Linux 2.6.28-11-generic i686
UserGroups: adm admin cdrom dialout lpadmin plugdev sambashare

AlsaDevices: Error: command ['ls', '-l', '/dev/snd/'] failed with exit code 2: ls: cannot access /dev/snd/: No such file or directory
AplayDevices: aplay: device_list:217: no soundcards found...
Architecture: i386
ArecordDevices: arecord: device_list:217: no soundcards found...
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.04
NonfreeKernelModules: hsfengine
Package: alsa-base 1.0.18.dfsg-1ubuntu8
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 SHELL=/bin/bash
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
Uname: Linux 2.6.28-13-generic i686
UserGroups: adm admin cdrom dialout lpadmin plugdev sambashare

AlsaDevices: Error: command ['ls', '-l', '/dev/snd/'] failed with exit code 2: ls: cannot access /dev/snd/: No such file or directory
AplayDevices: aplay: device_list:217: no soundcards found...
Architecture: i386
ArecordDevices: arecord: device_list:217: no soundcards found...
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.04
Package: alsa-base 1.0.18.dfsg-1ubuntu8
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 SHELL=/bin/bash
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
Uname: Linux 2.6.28-13-generic i686
UserGroups: adm admin cdrom dialout lpadmin plugdev sambashare