Ubuntu Feisty - Sound was working, but mysteriously stops working after reboot.

woodsy934 · 06-01-2007, 08:35 PM

Hi there...I'm running Ubuntu Feisty. I installed a fresh copy of Feisty a few months ago. When I installed, the sound worked great. "All of a sudden" the sound stopped working. The GNOME volume control shows a little "crossout" sign (like what's in front of a butt for a no smoking sign...you know) and you can't access the volume control. So I used this guide to try and diagnose the problem:

http://doc.gwos.org/index.php/Compre...olutions_Guide

Here's the output:

Code:

swoods@newcomb:~$ aplay -l
aplay: device_list:222: no soundcards found...
swoods@newcomb:~$ lspci -v

[NOTE: various devices omitted here...]

00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corporation 82801EB/ER (ICH5/ICH5R) AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 02)
        Subsystem: ASUSTeK Computer Inc. Unknown device 810d
        Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 21
        I/O ports at e800 [size=256]
        I/O ports at ee80 [size=64]
        Memory at febff800 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=512]
        Memory at febff400 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=256]
        Capabilities: <access denied>

[...and here...]

swoods@newcomb:~$ sudo modprobe snd-intel8x0
swoods@newcomb:~$ aplay -l
aplay: device_list:222: no soundcards found...

I haven't recompiled ALSA because I figure it works already as packaged with Ubuntu.

I got fed up and tried reinstalling, but to no avail. It worked well for awhile, but then I rebooted and the sound didn't work. Maybe there's an error log somewhere? I tried looking in syslog, but...nothing....

Thanks in advance!

jay73 · 06-02-2007, 12:58 PM

Look in dmesg (that is under /var). Have you tried running the command
alsaconf
from a terminal? I don't know whether this is still available on Ubuntu but it works well enough on Debian. You may need to install alsa-utils first.

woodsy934 · 06-02-2007, 08:30 PM

Thanks for the reply...

Tried alsaconf, doesn't work (probably not with ubuntu) ... apt-get doesn't find it.

Here's what I get when I try the dmesg:

Code:

swoods@newcomb:~$ sudo modprobe snd-intel8x0
swoods@newcomb:~$ dmesg | tail
[146257.283996] sda: assuming drive cache: write through
[146257.284014]  sda: sda1
[146337.785216] usb 5-5: USB disconnect, address 7
[146349.867910] SCSI device sda: 625142448 512-byte hdwr sectors (320073 MB)
[146349.873540] sda: Write Protect is off
[146349.873550] sda: Mode Sense: 11 00 00 00
[146349.873554] sda: assuming drive cache: write through
[146349.876449]  sda: sda1
[153829.823776] ppdev0: registered pardevice
[153829.871916] ppdev0: unregistered pardevice
swoods@newcomb:~$ dmesg | grep snd
swoods@newcomb:~$ dmesg | grep intel
[   15.853939] intel_rng: FWH not detected
[   17.867474] intel8x0_measure_ac97_clock: measured 52160 usecs
[   17.867479] intel8x0: clocking to 48000
swoods@newcomb:~$ dmesg | grep 8x0
[   17.867474] intel8x0_measure_ac97_clock: measured 52160 usecs
[   17.867479] intel8x0: clocking to 48000

..check out those last two dmesg commands...is there something there? That's my sound card it's picking up, right?

Thanks again!

Edit: alsa-utils is already at the latest version according to APT

jay73 · 06-03-2007, 04:04 AM

Yes, it does look like the card is getting picked up.

Do you get sound running the liveCD?

woodsy934 · 06-03-2007, 06:57 AM

Yep. LiveCD and initial Ubuntu install work fine. I tried thinking of all the changes I made between when it was working and when it didn't work, but I don't think I made any, really...I just rebooted. Perhaps something "took effect" on reboot.

Either way we should be able to diagnose it somehow.

Tim J · 08-01-2007, 02:56 AM

I had this exact problem, and had also tried all the steps you mentioned. In my case, it turned out to be a permissions issue. For some reason, my user account wasn't in the "audio" group, so I didn't have the correct permissions to (I think) /dev/dsp.

Here's the steps I used to fix it:

Open /etc/group in an editor as root:

Code:

tim@nightcrawler$ sudo vim /etc/group

Then find the line that reads something like

Code:

audio:x:29:

And change it so it reads something like

Code:

audio:x:29:tim

(where tim is your username instead)

Then I logout/login again.

Hope this also fixes your problem

clwhitt · 09-09-2007, 12:00 PM

I was having essentially the same problem as Woodsy934, except mine came after I created other accounts. The parent account worked fine, but no sound on the child accounts. I ran across a suggestion to restart alsa-utils (sudo /etc/init.d/alsa-utils restart) and chmod the permissions to the sound directory(sudo chmod 666 /etc/snd/*). These worked fine, until I rebooted, then I would be back to the no sound icon on the volume control. I strongly suspected I had a permissions issue but had no idea how to resolve that issue on a permanent basis. Tim J's message gave me that answer, and now all the accounts now have sound.
Thanks Tim J!

Chuck

AustinMarton · 07-04-2011, 06:39 PM

I know this is an old thread but I was having intermittent sound problems on my HP EliteBook 8540p running Ubunutu 10.04 and Tim's solution of adding my account to the audio group in /etc/group seems to have fixed it.