Realtek ALC889A sound problem in Debian
 

Hellu!

Ive just installed latest version of Debian 64bit((5.0.5 Lenny) Kernel: Linux 2.6.23-2-amd64) on my new computer with the motherboard Gigabyte GA-P55A-UD4 that has a integrated soundcard: Realtek ALC889A 7.1 - and the sound just wont work!

I try to run "alsaconf" but it says that there are no PCI soundcards avaible. "lspci | grep audio" doesnt say anything.

Heres what i get when i type lspci:

lspci
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Clarksfield/Lynnfield DMI (rev 11)
00:03.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Clarksfield/Lynnfield PCI Express Root Port 1 (rev 11)
00:05.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Clarksfield/Lynnfield PCI Express Root Port 3 (rev 11)
00:08.0 System peripheral: Intel Corporation Clarksfield/Lynnfield System Management Registers (rev 11)
00:08.1 System peripheral: Intel Corporation Clarksfield/Lynnfield Semaphore and Scratchpad Registers (rev 11)
00:08.2 System peripheral: Intel Corporation Clarksfield/Lynnfield System Control and Status Registers (rev 11)
00:08.3 System peripheral: Intel Corporation Clarksfield/Lynnfield Miscellaneous Registers (rev 11)
00:10.0 System peripheral: Intel Corporation Device d150 (rev 11)
00:10.1 System peripheral: Intel Corporation Device d151 (rev 11)
00:1a.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak USB Universal Host Controller (rev 06)
00:1a.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak USB Universal Host Controller (rev 06)
00:1a.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak USB Universal Host Controller (rev 06)
00:1a.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak USB2 Enhanced Host Controller (rev 06)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak High Definition Audio (rev 06)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak PCI Express Root Port 1 (rev 06)
00:1c.3 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak PCI Express Root Port 4 (rev 06)
00:1c.4 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak PCI Express Root Port 5 (rev 06)
00:1c.5 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak PCI Express Root Port 6 (rev 06)
00:1c.6 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak PCI Express Root Port 7 (rev 06)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak USB Universal Host Controller (rev 06)
00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak USB Universal Host Controller (rev 06)
00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak USB Universal Host Controller (rev 06)
00:1d.3 USB Controller: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak USB Universal Host Controller (rev 06)
00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak USB2 Enhanced Host Controller (rev 06)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 PCI Bridge (rev a6)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak LPC Interface Controller (rev 06)
00:1f.2 IDE interface: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak 4 port SATA IDE Controller (rev 06)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak SMBus Controller (rev 06)
00:1f.5 IDE interface: Intel Corporation Ibex Peak 2 port SATA IDE Controller (rev 06)
02:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation Device 06c4 (rev a3)
02:00.1 Audio device: nVidia Corporation Device 0be5 (rev a1)
04:00.0 USB Controller: NEC Corporation Device 0194 (rev 03)
05:00.0 SATA controller: JMicron Technologies, Inc. JMicron 20360/20363 AHCI Controller (rev 03)
05:00.1 IDE interface: JMicron Technologies, Inc. JMicron 20360/20363 AHCI Controller (rev 03)
06:00.0 IDE interface: Device 1b4b:91a3 (rev 11)
07:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8111/8168B PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet controller (rev 03)
08:03.0 IDE interface: Integrated Technology Express, Inc. Device 8213
08:07.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Texas Instruments TSB43AB23 IEEE-1394a-2000 Controller (PHY/Link)


Thank you!

A couple of things, Lenny should have a default 2.6.26 kernel, not 2.6.23. You can install 2.6.32 from lenny-backports though, which might have a driver for your system.

As to your lspci output, it doesn't seem to see the hardware at all. BTW, your grep command should use "-i audio" so that it doesn't look for case. As you can see, it lists audio devices for Intel Ibex Peak High Def Audio and also a Audio device from nVidia. Not sure what the nVidia device would be since the intel stuff seems to be the onboard audio.

You can also try installing and running lshw as root and seeing if you have better luck finding the card. Otherwise, I'd try reseating the board to see if that's a problem because right now the system doesn't seem to find the board at all.

I just re-read this. It may be that your system is misidentifying the Realtek chipset as an intel or nVidia chipset... Hmmmm....

That isn't healthy. It should have a device description for each of those. The fact that it's throwing up a hex device code means lspci doesn't recognize it. Try
which update-pciids

If it's there, run it as root.Look at (don't post) the lshal -v output to see if a module is talking to them

Oh yea, the kernel is: 2.6.26-2

are you saying that I might have a hardwareproblem?

ill try some things and get back to you. i might just have another linux dist I an try

how do I reaset the board?

and how do i update-pciids?

I get some kind of error when i boot the system the first time after instalation, something wrong with the kernel. i cant find any errors in the bootlog though.

thank you

take a look at http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=856390 and
Trouble shooting ALSA on Debian - LinuxQuestions.org : http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...n-debian-3018/

1. Open a terminal.
2. type sudo update-pciids or become root and then run update-pciids.

If it says command not found, you need to aptitude install pciutils wget as root to install the appropriate packages.

Thank you all!

I installed the newest stable kernel with the same configuration as the old original one. And it found my soundcard after running "alsaconf"

Seems like the old kernel just dont support my motherboard/soundcard.