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ALSA configuration problems

I have a fresh install from the ISO.  Dmesg shows the sound card was found, but it won't unmute using alsamixer.  I've been trying to fix it using the Arch Wiki but I am pretty sure I screwed something up because now speaker-test gives no sound, whereas before the HDMI device wouldn't unmute or otherwise work but the PCH device would.  (I was trying to get it to default to the PCH device when I made it worse.)  Also, I'm not sure the Arch Wiki is the best source, since it references systemd.

I'm giving up for the night, but will check back here tomorrow.  Any help is appreciated.  I come from BSD land.  I'm trying Linux again for a project I have, and I'm something like seven or eight years removed from the usual tools and way of doing things in Linux land, so I apologize in advance if this is something really obvious or stupid.

(Also, thanks for Artix -- the systemd crap was almost enough to make me abandon even trying Linux again until I found this distro!)

Re: ALSA configuration problems

Reply #1 –
Do you get any sound if you directly cat a file to /dev/dsp or /dev/snd/yourcard? With alsaplayer? Are all outputs (well, main and front mostly) unmuted with alsamixer? Did you get sound from within the ISO environment? Is your user member of the audio group? Are you using pulseaudio? If yes, try some gui config like pavucontrol to view/setup your sound and remove ~/.config/pulse and logout-login (or kill pulseaudio and restart it) to reinitialize your audio setup.

Re: ALSA configuration problems

Reply #2 –
Quote from: nous – on
Do you get any sound if you directly cat a file to /dev/dsp or /dev/snd/yourcard? With alsaplayer?

I do get sound using alsaplayer.

Quote from: nous – on
Are all outputs (well, main and front mostly) unmuted with alsamixer?

I have two cards showing with alsamixer: 1. HDA Intel HDMI, and 2. HDA Intel PCH.  The first one shows chip Intel Broadwell HDMI, the second shows chip Realtek ALC3241.  Before I installed pulseaudio, the default was 1, which showed S/PDIF plus S/PDIF 1-4.  They all showed '00' (or open) and would toggle between that and muted with the 'm' key.  They would not (and will not) increase volume.  The second card had some options that worked.

Since I installed pulseaudio, that has become the default (instead of HDA Intel HDMI) and the graphics when I run alsamixer are messed up.

I was trying to figure out how to change the default from Intel HDMI to Realtek ALC3241 yesterday when I messed things up.

Quote from: nous – on
Did you get sound from within the ISO environment?

No, I didn't see a way to test that from the ISO environment.  How can I do that?

Quote from: nous – on
Is your user member of the audio group?

Yes.

Quote from: nous – on
Are you using pulseaudio? If yes, try some gui config like pavucontrol to view/setup your sound and remove ~/.config/pulse and logout-login (or kill pulseaudio and restart it) to reinitialize your audio setup.

I was not using pulseaudio, but have installed it since I read this.  I can get sound through alsamixer since I added it, but I cannot get audio playback through my browser on sites like audiocheck or youtube.

Re: ALSA configuration problems

Reply #3 –
Well, after rebooting, audio works everywhere now.  My guess is that installing pulseaudio fixed it.

Re: ALSA configuration problems

Reply #4 –
I had the same problem when my default card was set to the HDMI one (Card 0 in my case). Changing default to Analog (Card 1 in my case) in /usr/share/alsa/alsa.conf fixed the problem.

Specifically, defaults.ctl.card and defaults.pcm.card.