hda-intel not playing ball

business_kid · 12-22-2009, 11:34 AM

I'm not having a good time. I can't get the microphone up on this HP 6715S laptop running slamd-12.2. The soundcard is in the AMD sb600 southbridge. lspci -v tells me I have this

00:14.2 Audio device: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 Azalia (Intel HDA)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Unknown device 30c2
Flags: bus master, slow devsel, latency 64, IRQ 16
Memory at c8100000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 2
Kernel driver in use: HDA Intel
Kernel modules: snd-hda-intel

but alsamixer tells me I have an AD 1981. I have 2 or three settings for Mic boost, but the setting for 'Mic' is in Red, and I cannot set volume or unmute it. Mixer and Docking are also dashes instead of values.

I went off and specially cooked a kernel with support for everything in snd_hda_intel, but nothing changed. The only other clue I have is that on the screen I started X from is the cryptic line repeated once

ALSA lib pcm.c:2184: (snd_pcm_open_nowupdate) Unknown PCM null

I gather this is some sort of middle finger gesture at my soundcard. Poor industial relations in the audio dept.
My last attempt was to grab the /etc/alsa from the Fedora installation but even that didn't help. Have to go off and sort that out now to see if I can have a working system there.

rcbpage · 12-22-2009, 03:31 PM

Try checking your BIOS setting for this input, on my ASUS p5QC there is an option for it to be set to HDMI (digital) or AC97 (Analog), if it's set to HDMI it will not support an analog mic. Another option is to obtain the latest ALSA source from http://www.alsa-project.org/ and compile/install it then run the alsaconf utility to see if it will allow you to enable that input.

Hope this helps, Good Luck

business_kid · 12-23-2009, 03:04 AM

Hmmm. Last kernel compile I left out ac97 module. Looks like it goes back in. :-(. I have alsaconf and tried it. It was optimistic, but useless. Anyhow, I'll come back with a result on that.

rcbpage · 12-23-2009, 03:41 AM

Be careful grabbing stuff from other distros, they may not be compiled with compatible lib64 libraries for your slamd.
Another thing I thought of, if you have an ATI/AMD video chip you may have to enable that module as well, as it has a built in sound system to drive the HDMI output, on my system these 2 devices HDA_Intel & HDA_ATI conflict with each other in the IRQ sharing dept. loading the HDA_ATI module allows me to turn off that output. from you error line that you posted earlier it looks like you may need the new ALSA drivers previously mentioned, your chipset may be too new to be recognized properly by the .21 drivers.

Good Luck

business_kid · 12-23-2009, 01:26 PM

This kernel compile, I left out the extra junk in snd_hda_intel to prevent false recognition, I know I don't have an SiS, realtek, Via etc soundcard. That's much worse and ac97 isn't any help. I have 3 columns in alsamixer :-((.

I tried the idea in the bios, but there's no config options. I have xfce as a window manager, and there's a number of meaningless settings in the mixer. I can use mixer, digital, etc. It still thinks I have an AD 1981 and I did come accross this
http://mailman.alsa-project.org/pipe...ry/006061.html

which seems to indicate a problem with AMD chipsets. It also made me wonder, and I did this check

bash-3.1$ grep -e 'ac97' -e 'hda' /etc/modprobe.d/*
/etc/modprobe.d/blacklist:blacklist ac97
/etc/modprobe.d/blacklist:blacklist ac97_codec
/etc/modprobe.d/sound:alias snd-card-0 snd-hda-intel
/etc/modprobe.d/sound:alias sound-slot-0 snd-hda-intel

So what next? add Analogue devices into snd_hda_intel (groan) remove all that <expletive deleted> from /etc/modprobe.d, and try again. It seems I'm on alsa-1.0.17. May have to update that. Report back

rcbpage · 12-23-2009, 11:44 PM

If you download and compile/install the new ALSA drivers & libraries it will replace the old kernel modules and the old libraries without rebuilding your kernel, if it still sees your card incorrectly, drop a note to the ALSA guys, they may have some experience with your HP. No offense but I quit buying HP stuff 15 years ago when they scr*wed me on a server .. too much proprietary gear in their machines, and no docs on what is in them. Since your kernel is attempting to load the HDA_Intel stuff you must have an Intel bridge set and the new drivers will probably see your gear correctly. rev. 0.17 is pretty dated, the current kernel tree is at rev. 0.21 or 0.22 depending on distro, they have added a lot of bug fixes & new hardware since 0.17. I would not mess with the stuff in etc/modprobe the blacklisted items might interfere with your new modules, or stop your machine from doing its ACPI thing correctly.

Do a lspci -v It should tell you what your bridges & all of your PCI info are, then do a lsmod this will show you what modules are currently loaded, put those outputs in your post, you will have to use the advanced reply button as it has the added options of inserting code snippets (Without hand coding the html tags yourself).

Good Luck

business_kid · 12-24-2009, 04:06 AM

Well, It seems to be hardware, or maybe a bios update

Alsamixer still shows mic and mixer as not available, whereas mic boost is. Windows vista is unable to hear the mic. My particular copy is preloaded with all drivers. I picked through the (short) bios menu and was unable to find any reference to sound. The best I got was a rough noise when I was talking once. I'll park this thread and attack HP. I have a manual and an email address.Thanks for your many suggestions. Sound is not my forte, and I was glad to have therm.

business_kid · 12-24-2009, 05:17 AM

I have the AMD RS690M Northbridge, and the SB600 Southbridge in a basically all amd/ati box. lspci -v

Code:

00:14.2 Audio device: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 Azalia (Intel HDA)
	Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Unknown device 30c2
	Flags: bus master, slow devsel, latency 64, IRQ 16
	Memory at c8100000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
	Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 2
	Kernel driver in use: HDA Intel
	Kernel modules: snd-hda-intel

lsmod |grep snd
Interestingly I could not load the snd-intel8x0 module. It seems to depend on all the ac97 stuff, and I ran this down to an appearance in the modprobe.d/blacklist, but I still have no mic:-(. The manual tells me how to shine, and that some models don't have a mic. But they gave me a mic jack.

lsmod |grep snd now says

Code:

bash-3.1# lsmod |grep snd
snd_intel8x0           34512  0 
snd_ac97_codec        126008  1 snd_intel8x0
ac97_bus                2280  1 snd_ac97_codec
snd_seq_dummy           3372  0 
snd_seq_oss            32048  0 
snd_seq_midi_event      8680  1 snd_seq_oss
snd_seq                57696  5 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi_event
snd_seq_device          8332  3 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq
snd_pcm_oss            41904  0 
snd_mixer_oss          17416  1 snd_pcm_oss
snd_hda_codec_analog    78008  1 
snd_hda_intel          27304  1 
snd_hda_codec          81080  2 snd_hda_codec_analog,snd_hda_intel
snd_hwdep               9184  1 snd_hda_codec
snd_pcm                87024  5 snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm_oss,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec
snd_timer              23704  2 snd_seq,snd_pcm
snd                    71544  15 snd_intel8x0,snd_ac97_codec,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq,snd_seq_device,snd_pcm_oss,snd_mixer_oss,snd_hda_codec_analog,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec,snd_hwdep,snd_pcm,snd_timer
soundcore               8736  1 snd
snd_page_alloc         10424  3 snd_intel8x0,snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm

business_kid · 12-24-2009, 07:15 AM

$*@£! Vista can work the microphone. Trying alsa users.

business_kid · 02-11-2010, 03:01 PM

Right. I can report some limited success.

I discovered hda-analyser which tweaks these hda chip settings and generally is a useful thing to play with. Mic was crazy. Set EVERYTHING to half volume, and mic boost to 0 and I got close to a usable setup. Some things that simply never showed in alsamixer were muted and made a difference. I managed to get massive overdrive on the mic, and mains hum out of the audio at one stage, but I now have a usable sound and mic. Who ever heard of mains hum on a laptop? On a valve amp, OK. But a laptop? The mind boggles.

Thanks to any who threw me their ideas.