Alsa problem? Sound problem nevertheless.

phantom_cyph · 11-30-2008, 09:05 PM

I just returned to Slackware from Ubuntu, but my sound is much to be desired. It worked "out of the box", but I have to jack the volume all the way up to hear anything in my headphones, and once there, the tearing in my speakers is almost louder than the music or video I'm playing. I'm using VLC as my media player, same as when I was using Ubuntu. Haven't changed any hardware whatsoever.

Does anyone have an idea?

hitest · 11-30-2008, 09:20 PM

In KDE you may need to un-mute the volume when it first boots up. KMix will un-mute the sound. Then you can better adjust the volume. Just a suggestion.

I'm assuming you've already run:

# alsaconf

# alsamixer

# alsactl store

phantom_cyph · 11-30-2008, 09:25 PM

T3slider · 11-30-2008, 09:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by phantom_cyph

Don't have KDE. Don't have alsaconf or alsactl.

You definitely should have alsaconf and alsactl, regardless of whether KDE is installed. They must be run as root though, so it is possible that you are trying to run them as a normal user and /usr/sbin is not in your $PATH.

phantom_cyph · 11-30-2008, 09:42 PM

Alright. Used alsaconf as root, it searched the card database and found 2 cards:

intel8x0 Intel Corporation 82801BA/BAM AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 04
legacy probe legacy ISA (non-PnP) chips

It has always used the intel before. Told it to reconfigure, it did, same bad sound.

hitest · 11-30-2008, 09:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by phantom_cyph

Alright. Used alsaconf as root, it searched the card database and found 2 cards:

intel8x0 Intel Corporation 82801BA/BAM AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 04
legacy probe legacy ISA (non-PnP) chips

It has always used the intel before. Told it to reconfigure, it did, same bad sound.

Did you run alsamixer and alsactl store as root? When you re-boot your new alsa settings will be loaded on boot-up.

phantom_cyph · 11-30-2008, 10:00 PM

Okay, ran them all, rebooted, still horrible tearing noise due to turning the volume up because I can't hear otherwise.

hitest · 11-30-2008, 10:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by phantom_cyph

Okay, ran them all, rebooted, still horrible tearing noise due to turning the volume up because I can't hear otherwise.

What wm/environment (XFce, Flux?) are you running?

phantom_cyph · 11-30-2008, 10:08 PM

I have xfce (base package - no sound plugin), fluxbox, icewm, and awesome. I'm running awesome right now.

Interestingly enough, the sound is good when I run it through my 2.1 surround sound system that has it's own power source and volume control. Its the headphones that kill. Not sure what the difference is. I'm going to try a different set of headphones to see if thats my problem, but I highly doubt it.

phantom_cyph · 12-01-2008, 07:58 PM

Still bad. Any ideas? Upgraded to vlc 0.9.5 and its the same so that isn't the issue.