Volume Gain
 

What's the easiest way to increase the volume past the normal maximum? I'm not seeing a setting for additional gain in the alsa mixer. Using PCLOS Gnome if that makes a difference.

If the maximum volume is not loud enough, it might be that the PCM setting is not high enough. The actual output volume is often dependent on both the master and the PCM volume levels. Open the mixer and set both of them to the desired level. Note that if you have both of them on maximum, you will probably get rather distorted output.

Well that seems to work just fine when I'm plugged into the regular jack. I listen through the rear channel though because it has better sound on this card (in theory at least). I used kX mixer in windows to swap the front and rear channels, but I can't figure out how to do it in linux. However, the same stereo sound is coming out through the rear, although it's slightly quieter. It has been loud enough for everything but this particular video I'm trying to watch. Maybe you could tell me how to swap front and rear channels the correct way?

I've not got a card with that feature, so I can't say for sure. It's not a given that the feature is supported, but it might be. If it is supported, a special mixer control should be available for it.

Try this:

Open the gnome volume control. Open the preferences and enable any and all controls. Then look to see if there is a switch or other control which does what you want. If not, then it probably means that the driver for your sound card does not support that feature of the hardware. If it works, please do post back here saying how you got it working (for other users who might find this post when searching for the same solution).