just installed slack 10 and i dont get any sound. on boot, an error comes up telling me to type alsamixer and then alsactl store in terminal. so i do this and the output of alsamixer is:

No mixer elems found.


alsactl store doesnt have an output.

i am still a noob so any help is appreciated and have never dealt with sound cards in linux. i have also checked all the sound volume settings, nothing works. in volume control there are three tabs: Silicon Lab Si3036/8 rev [audio mixer (oss)], Intel 82801CA-ICH3 modem [Alsa Mixer], and Intel 82801CA-ICH3 [Alsa Mixer] respectively. only the last tab has volume controls on it. the other two are blank

thanks

Have you run "alsaconfig" yet? This should be run as root an will hopefully solve your problem.

it says command not found

*edit*
the beep when you do something wrong works

oops, it's "alsaconf"

i went throught the configuration and it found the card. i had it modify the modules. there was still no sound. so i restarted and still no sound.

As root-

1) alsaconf
2) alsamixer - Make sure that all the channels are unmuted. Turn up the volume. I like to turn everything possible up to one click below red to start out.
3) alsactl store

What happens now?

the output of alsamixer is:

No mixer elem found

there is no output for alsactl store.

sound doesnt work

could you please print the output of "lsmod", "lspci" (needs root privs.) and tell us which card your speakers/amp are plugged into.
I am thinking you cards are detected ok but the one you use for output isn't in first place (if you get my meaning) the easiest way to remedy this is to add the ones you don't need to /etc/hotplug/blacklist which forces them to NOT be loaded at boot.

edit: btw, alsactl store usually gives no output, it just writes to the file /etc/asound.state

the output of lsmod is:

Module Size Used by Not tainted
snd-pcm-oss 37736 0
snd-mixer-oss 12504 2 [snd-pcm-oss]
keybdev 2052 0 (unused)
mousedev 4212 1
hid 21220 0 (unused)
usbmouse 2040 0 (unused)
input 3200 0 [keybdev mousedev hid usbmouse]
uhci 24444 0 (unused)
snd-intel8x0 18924 2
gameport 1420 0 [snd-intel8x0]
snd-mpu401-uart 3200 0 [snd-intel8x0]
snd-rawmidi 12740 0 [snd-mpu401-uart]
snd-seq-device 3888 0 [snd-rawmidi]
snd-intel8x0m 9544 4
snd-pcm 56072 0 [snd-pcm-oss snd-intel8x0 snd-intel8x0m]
snd-timer 13604 0 [snd-pcm]
ehci-hcd 17580 0 (unused)
usb-ohci 19240 0 (unused)
snd-page-alloc 6328 0 [snd-intel8x0 snd-intel8x0m snd-pcm]
snd-ac97-codec 49500 0 [snd-intel8x0 snd-intel8x0m]
usbcore 59308 1 [hid usbmouse uhci ehci-hcd usb-ohci]
snd 30852 4 [snd-pcm-oss snd-mixer-oss snd-intel8x0 snd-mpu401-uart snd-rawmidi snd-seq-device snd-intel8x0m snd-pcm snd-timer snd-ac97-codec]
soundcore 3396 7 [snd]
eepro100 19252 1
mii 2272 0 [eepro100]
ds 6548 2
yenta_socket 10336 2
pcmcia_core 39972 0 [ds yenta_socket]
ntfs 51424 1 (autoclean)
ide-scsi 9328 1
agpgart 43940 0 (unused)

and the output of lspci is:

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 82845 845 (Brookdale) Chipset Host Bridge (rev 05)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82845 845 (Brookdale) Chipset AGP Bridge (rev 05)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM USB (Hub #1) (rev 02)
00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM USB (Hub #2) (rev 02)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82801BAM/CAM PCI Bridge (rev 42)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82801CAM ISA Bridge (LPC) (rev 02)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82801CAM IDE U100 (rev 02)
00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 02)
00:1f.6 Modem: Intel Corp. 82801CA/CAM AC'97 Modem Controller (rev 02)
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: S3 Inc. SuperSavage IX/C SDR (rev 05)
02:08.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corp. 82801CAM (ICH3) PRO/100 VE (LOM) Ethernet Controller (rev 42)
02:0b.0 CardBus bridge: Toshiba America Info Systems ToPIC95 PCI to Cardbus Bridge with ZV Support (rev 32)
02:0b.1 CardBus bridge: Toshiba America Info Systems ToPIC95 PCI to Cardbus Bridge with ZV Support (rev 32)
02:0d.0 System peripheral: Toshiba America Info Systems SD TypA Controller (rev 03)
04:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd.: Unknown device 8180 (rev 20)
05:00.0 USB Controller: NEC Corporation USB (rev 41)
05:00.1 USB Controller: NEC Corporation USB (rev 41)
05:00.2 USB Controller: NEC Corporation USB 2.0 (rev 02)


how do i tell what card my speakers are plugged into?

thanks

I see you are on a laptop, the cards I recognise are:

snd-intel8x0 18924 2 # primary card (i think) - the one that is for your speakers
snd-intel8x0m 9544 4 # modem sound device

there is also:

snd-mpu401-uart 3200 0 [snd-intel8x0] # midi device (i think)
snd-ac97-codec 49500 0 [snd-intel8x0 snd-intel8x0m] # a codec thingy

As you can tell I am not an expert, but....
try adding "snd-intel8x0m" to the list of devices in /etc/hotplug/blacklist
and let us know what happens after a reboot (also how it affects the tabs in the mixer)

"Silicon Lab Si3036/8 rev [audio mixer (oss)]" is baffling me, at the moment it is the first mixer device (ie. the first tab in the mixer) and I am not sure which module to blacklist for this. Do a search on this website to find out which module to blacklist (it may not be a snd-blabla module)

ok i blacklisted snd-intel8x0m and rebooted and now the sound works thanks.

just to better understand linux what was the problem? from what i have read it seems that sound can come through the modem or the sound card. alsa can only send sound through one of these, which by default was sendng it through the modem but the speakers were looking for input from the sound card. so we had to turn the modem off in order to make alsa send output to the sound card. am i way off?

No, you are right. The problem should be rectified by including these lines in /etc/modules.conf:

options snd-intel8x0 index=0
options snd-intel8x0m index=1

but unless you need your modems sound device it's just simpler to not load it's "kernel module".

glad it worked though, try the other method if you need the modem sound device.

Could you help me out wish the same problem? I get the "no elams found" when I try to run alsamixer aswell. How do you blacklist itmes in hotplug????

Here is my lsmod
root@Sleemans:~# alsamixer
No mixer elems found

root@Sleemans:~# lsmod
Module Size Used by Not tainted
ppp_synctty 4936 0 (unused)
ppp_async 6528 1
ppp_generic 19364 3 (autoclean) [ppp_synctty ppp_async]
slhc 4592 0 (autoclean) [ppp_generic]
snd-pcm-oss 36704 0
snd-mixer-oss 12152 3 [snd-pcm-oss]
parport_pc 15044 1 (autoclean)
lp 6404 0 (autoclean)
parport 22824 1 (autoclean) [parport_pc lp]
printer 7648 0
uhci 24284 0 (unused)
usbcore 58860 1 [printer uhci]
snd-via82xx 12928 2
gameport 1420 0 [snd-via82xx]
snd-mpu401-uart 3200 0 [snd-via82xx]
snd-rawmidi 12320 0 [snd-mpu401-uart]
snd-seq-device 3812 0 [snd-rawmidi]
snd-via82xx-modem 6212 3
snd-ac97-codec 52472 0 [snd-via82xx snd-via82xx-modem]
snd-pcm 54504 0 [snd-pcm-oss snd-via82xx snd-via82xx-modem snd-ac97-codec]
snd-timer 13412 0 [snd-pcm]
snd 31268 2 [snd-pcm-oss snd-mixer-oss snd-via82xx snd-mpu401-uart snd-rawmidi snd-seq-device snd-via82xx-modem snd-ac97-codec snd-pcm snd-timer]
soundcore 3396 7 [snd]
snd-page-alloc 4712 0 [snd-mixer-oss snd-via82xx snd-rawmidi snd-seq-device snd-via82xx-modem snd-pcm snd-timer snd]
via-rhine 12368 1
mii 2272 0 [via-rhine]
crc32 2880 0 [via-rhine]
pcmcia_core 39172 0
ntfs 51232 1 (autoclean)
ide-scsi 9392 0

This is just to say thanks for fixing this problem, I have searched dozens of threads and nobody has been able to solve it. Thanks!

Holy goodness, thank you from me as well! I've been tinkering on this problem for over a week now...