I picked up an older Dell Latitude D610. I have an issue with the sound in linux in that it "POPS" before any sound event (say like back and forth in IMs) or systems sounds or a song. The POP is quite loud.

I googled and only found an issue with a loud pop on resume from suspend, I would settle for that.

I use PCLinuxOS, with kernel 2.6.38.8, KDE desktop.

Intel ICH6 - STAC9750,51 is what mixer and phonon shows. Alsa, have not enabled Pulse at this time. And 00:1e.2 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 03) from lspci

I do not have an issue with sound in windows. Between this and the poor wireless performance I am getting in linux on this laptop (just this laptop, my PCs are fine in linux) I am thinking I may have to figure this for just a windows machine. I only picked it up for interviews, to show my digital portfolio so XP will suffice. But all my other machines are linux and would be nice if I could get this going better.

Thank you for ideas on troubleshooting this. If it was desktop I would say heck with it and just throw in a cheap card but...

I would assume root or sudo and from a terminal run alsaconf then reboot then open your mixer. the pop you may be hearing is when it is being captured or recaptured I very so often if you have this sound durring the play back you will find the old dell laptops had a problem with usb static this was handled and fixed for windows bios up date. so not sure but stock install when the rules were set may be off and running alsaconf you may have fixed it. look to see if the /etc/asound is a link if so no big thing if not delete it and reboot it will then look for the correct setting for your hardware. good luck.

Rebooted as well. Same pop.

Your idea about USB intrigued me because I have a feeling it is a problem with the wireless as well. Not just that the wireless mouse could cause interference, but I think I get a better wireless strength with no USB devices at all plugged in.

I am going to check into the BIOS update. Although it may just be issues addressed in windows with it, perhaps at that level will help with hardware and make some progress in linux. This is an old enough laptop that everything is in the kernel in linux. Should be able to do better than this

update: deleted the link (I had an asound.state) and rebooted to run alsaconf again and on another reboot seems good now. Thank you.