No Audio from Motherboard M3a32 MVP Deluxe Wi/Fi / Ubuntu Lucid 10.4

Austiclees · 05-24-2010, 06:11 PM

Intro: Let me start by saying I've spent two days researching this issue and resolution. I am a noob to Linux, but I've done tons of research as I like to resolve my issues on my own. From the time I've spent with Ubuntu 10.4 Lucid over the past couple of weeks, I'm loving it and want to stick with it. I have it dual booting on my Laptop with no issues.

System:
Motherboard: M3a32-MVP Deluxe Wi/Fi
Video Card: ATI Radeon 3870 512 GB
Ram: 8GB corsair (4x2GB)
HDD: Uh, several, there are 5 HDD's installed on my system with several OS's.

Problems: No Audio from MB, Raid controller not working.
My main concern right now is my audio. I have 2 512 GB Maxtor drives in Raid0 running Win7 Ultimate that I can't access, but like I said, the audio is more important.

I have audio coming from the HDMI port in the video card, but it's choppy. I'd rather use my MB's audio device anyway so I can utilize my surround sound system. I've obtained the Linux drivers from ASUS but don't know how to install them. Besides that, in sound preferences, it appears to be loaded and I've tried every combination of settings possible. And before you ask.. It's not muted, (this seems to be the typical first smart a$$ response to noobs regarding sound).

aplay -l

Code:

austiclees@Austiclees-Linux-Desktop:~$ aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: SB [HDA ATI SB], device 0: AD198x Analog [AD198x Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: SB [HDA ATI SB], device 1: AD198x Digital [AD198x Digital]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: HDMI [HDA ATI HDMI], device 3: ATI HDMI [ATI HDMI]
  Subdevices: 0/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

LSPCI

Code:

austiclees@Austiclees-Linux-Desktop:~$ lspci
00:00.0 Host bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RD790 Northbridge only dual slot PCI-e_GFX and HT3 K8 part
00:04.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RD790 PCI to PCI bridge (PCI express gpp port A)
00:06.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RD790 PCI to PCI bridge (PCI express gpp port C)
00:07.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RD790 PCI to PCI bridge (PCI express gpp port D)
00:0b.0 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc RD790 PCI to PCI bridge (external gfx1 port A)
00:12.0 SATA controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 Non-Raid-5 SATA
00:13.0 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI0)
00:13.1 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI1)
00:13.2 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI2)
00:13.3 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI3)
00:13.4 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI4)
00:13.5 USB Controller: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB Controller (EHCI)
00:14.0 SMBus: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 SMBus Controller (rev 14)
00:14.1 IDE interface: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 IDE
00:14.2 Audio device: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 Azalia (Intel HDA)
00:14.3 ISA bridge: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 PCI to LPC Bridge
00:14.4 PCI bridge: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 PCI to PCI Bridge
00:18.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K10 [Opteron, Athlon64, Sempron] HyperTransport Configuration
00:18.1 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K10 [Opteron, Athlon64, Sempron] Address Map
00:18.2 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K10 [Opteron, Athlon64, Sempron] DRAM Controller
00:18.3 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K10 [Opteron, Athlon64, Sempron] Miscellaneous Control
00:18.4 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K10 [Opteron, Athlon64, Sempron] Link Control
01:00.0 RAID bus controller: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88SE6121 SATA II Controller (rev b1)
02:00.0 Ethernet controller: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88E8056 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller (rev 12)
03:00.0 RAID bus controller: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88SE6121 SATA II Controller (rev b2)
04:00.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Radeon HD 3870
04:00.1 Audio device: ATI Technologies Inc Radeon HD 3870 Audio device
05:06.0 Multimedia controller: ATI Technologies Inc Device 4d50
05:08.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Agere Systems FW322/323 (rev 70)

Conclusion:
I'd appreciate any help the community could provide. If I've left anything out please let me know. My goal was to provide as many details as I could. Thanks again.

pgpython · 05-25-2010, 01:38 AM

A sound card that doesn't work is most likely that you haven't got the sound card driver compiled in the kernel or loaded. You can check this using lsmod as root and checking the kernel config. The driver you need is supported by the kernel so you don't need to get a driver elsewhere just make sure the kernel has it

Austiclees · 05-25-2010, 02:07 PM

Thanks for the reply pgpython. I think I did what you asked for, but I'm not sure how to do anything in this environment. I'm doing the best I can to learn though.

Code:

austiclees@Austiclees-Linux-Desktop:~$ sudo lsmod
[sudo] password for austiclees: 
Module                  Size  Used by
binfmt_misc             6587  1 
ppdev                   5259  0 
snd_hda_codec_atihdmi     2367  1 
fbcon                  35102  71 
tileblit                2031  1 fbcon
font                    7557  1 fbcon
bitblit                 4707  1 fbcon
softcursor              1189  1 bitblit
vga16fb                11385  0 
vgastate                8961  1 vga16fb
snd_hda_codec_analog    58566  1 
snd_hda_intel          22005  2 
snd_pcm_oss            35308  0 
snd_hda_codec          74201  3 snd_hda_codec_atihdmi,snd_hda_codec_analog,snd_hda_intel
snd_mixer_oss          13746  1 snd_pcm_oss
snd_hwdep               5412  1 snd_hda_codec
snd_pcm                70886  3 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm_oss,snd_hda_codec
snd_seq_dummy           1338  0 
snd_seq_oss            26726  0 
snd_seq_midi            4557  0 
snd_rawmidi            19056  1 snd_seq_midi
snd_seq_midi_event      6003  2 snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi
snd_seq                47263  6 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi,snd_seq_midi_event
snd_timer              19098  2 snd_pcm,snd_seq
ati_agp                 5094  0 
snd_seq_device          5700  5 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq
radeon                694521  3 
asus_atk0110            9017  0 
snd                    54148  16 snd_hda_codec_analog,snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm_oss,snd_hda_codec,snd_mixer_oss,snd_hwdep,snd_pcm,snd_seq_oss,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq,snd_timer,snd_seq_device
joydev                  8708  0 
ttm                    50071  1 radeon
drm_kms_helper         29297  1 radeon
drm                   163143  5 radeon,ttm,drm_kms_helper
psmouse                63245  0 
serio_raw               3978  0 
i2c_piix4               8527  0 
soundcore               6620  1 snd
snd_page_alloc          7172  2 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm
agpgart                31788  3 ati_agp,ttm,drm
i2c_algo_bit            5028  1 radeon
lp                      7028  0 
parport                32635  2 ppdev,lp
hid_logitech            7388  0 
ff_memless              4093  1 hid_logitech
ohci1394               27238  0 
usbhid                 36174  1 hid_logitech
usb_storage            39457  0 
hid                    67032  2 hid_logitech,usbhid
floppy                 53080  0 
ieee1394               81213  1 ohci1394
sky2                   41040  0 
pata_atiixp             3148  2 
pata_marvell            2140  0 
ahci                   32040  2

Now what?

Shadow_7 · 05-25-2010, 03:18 PM

It may be disabled in your bios, or set to auto and assumes the after market card over the integrated one.

$ cat /proc/asound/cards

If it's there, then not the issue. If it's not, likely a candidate.

pgpython · 05-26-2010, 04:40 AM

also could you post the output of dmesg | grep -i hda

Electro · 05-26-2010, 09:54 PM

To get your RAID array working make sure dmraid utilities are installed and that the dm module (driver) is loaded. The dmraid utilities accesses your RAID which in fact is software RAID. The quality of this software is not good in Linux. I strongly recommend do not write to this array using dmraid. You can read from it, but writing might give you problems. I recommend something like the following to be cheap while using hardware RAID.

4X1 Hardware Port Multiplier with SATA/USB connection System version
http://www.addonics.com/products/hos...d4sr5hpmus.asp

To get digital audio that is a different story on each setup. I suggest first find out if the sound card outputs analog audio. Hook up headphones to the analog connectors and play audio. If you hear it, then the sound card works. If it does not, they you have to force the snd-hda-intel to use a certain card model. Assuming you hear the sound coming from the connectors, you have to tell the media player to use a certain output device. In your case it is hw:0.1, but this gets confusing if you have two sound cards because either one can be first upon boot up. Designating an snd-hda-intel sound card have to be done with either udev or dbus/hald which is a whole different setup by it self. To output audio digital from a DVD movie with MPlayer, do the following.

mplayer -ao alsa:device=hw=0.1 -ac hwdts,hwac3 dvd://

OR

mplayer -ao alsa:device=hw=0.1 -afm hwdts,hwac3 dvd://

If the above does not work, use spdif or iec958 in place of hw=0.1. Also use alsamixer -V all. In alsamixer, you may need to set the digital to either optical or coaxial. Though if PulseAudio is used, alsamixer may post for PulseAudio, so include -c0 or -c1 for your sound card.

If you are using PulseAudio, you will have layers of problems. You can try set PulseAudio to the digital output and see if that works, but again every setup is different. I do not like PulseAudio because it is not predictable for each setup. If your setup works with PulseAudio, then you are lucky. If it does not you have to to do is either use $HOME/.asoundrc to create surround sound and output through SPDIF or just use analog audio. Analog audio is the easiest to setup in Linux and the most reliable. If your sound system has six or more analog inputs, use them for the best reliability.

Audio in Linux does not automatically create surround sound from mono and stereo sources, so processing is required and this gets complicated. This processing will penalize your computer because it have to copy to multiple channels and re-encode the audio into a different format that your hardware supports. Windows does this but you do not see it. I do not recommend use surround sound for everything that does not have the information for it.