Re: Sound Problem

["Stephen P. Molnar" <s.molnar@sbcglobal.net>]

On 03/11/2017 01:42 PM, Dan Ritter wrote:
> On Sat, Mar 11, 2017 at 09:39:11AM -0500, Stephen P. Molnar wrote:
> > Up to date Jessie.
> >
> > Sound worked until I turned power off to the external speakers.  The sound
> > has not been working since I turned the speakers back on.
> >
> > If I run 'speaker-test' I get noise, but if I run 'speaker-test -c 2 -t
> > wav' I get 'front left' and 'front right' from the speakers.
> >
> > I am using the on-board sound:
> >
> > 01:00.1 Audio device: NVIDIA Corporation GF119 HDMI Audio Controller (rev
> > a1)
> > 	Subsystem: Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. [MSI] Device 809f
> > 	Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 25
> > 	Memory at fe080000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
> > 	Capabilities: [60] Power Management version 3
> > 	Capabilities: [68] MSI: Enable- Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit+
> > 	Capabilities: [78] Express Endpoint, MSI 00
> > 	Kernel driver in use: snd_hda_intel
> >
> > I have proven, to my satisfaction, thanks to a suggestion from a
> > correspondent, that this is not a hardware problem.  I loaded the Xubuntu
> > 17.04 Live Desktop on the computer and the sound is live.
> >
> > I would appreciate some help in solving this problem.
>
> In my experience, problems like this are nearly always problems
> in software selection of output and/or mixer volumes.
>
> The card that you are selecting there is an HDMI audio
> controller, which means that it is a sound card which only
> outputs through the HDMI connection going to a TV or video
> monitor. Is that what you are expecting?
>
> If, as is more usual, you are expecting to output through 1/8"
> stereo jacks to self-powered speakers or 1/8" line-level stereo
> to an amplifier, you need to select that sound card and use it.
>
> aplay -L should give you a list of possible outputs, one of
> which  you can then feed to speaker-test via -D to test.
>
> Then you can set this in /etc/asound.conf as a default. Mine
> says
>
> defaults.pcm.card 0
> defaults.pcm.device 3
> defaults.ctl.card 0
>
> -dsr-
Thanks for the reply.  I had pretty well convinced myself that it's a 
software problem,  and therein lies the rub (or, rather a very high 
degree of entropy (mixedupness)).

Here is what might be the applicable portion on the output from aplay -L:

sysdefault:CARD=SB
    HDA ATI SB, ALC887-VD Analog
    Default Audio Device
front:CARD=SB,DEV=0
    HDA ATI SB, ALC887-VD Analog
    Front speakers
surround21:CARD=SB,DEV=0
    HDA ATI SB, ALC887-VD Analog
    2.1 Surround output to Front and Subwoofer speakers
surround40:CARD=SB,DEV=0
    HDA ATI SB, ALC887-VD Analog
    4.0 Surround output to Front and Rear speakers
surround41:CARD=SB,DEV=0
    HDA ATI SB, ALC887-VD Analog
    4.1 Surround output to Front, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround50:CARD=SB,DEV=0
    HDA ATI SB, ALC887-VD Analog
    5.0 Surround output to Front, Center and Rear speakers
surround51:CARD=SB,DEV=0
    HDA ATI SB, ALC887-VD Analog
    5.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround71:CARD=SB,DEV=0
    HDA ATI SB, ALC887-VD Analog
    7.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Side, Rear and Woofer speakers

and, this is what I get from aadebug:

0 [SB             ]: HDA-Intel - HDA ATI SB

                      HDA ATI SB at 0xfe300000 irq 16

also, that is what alsamixer is giving as the default.

So my degree of mental entropy is high and increasing (a thermodynamic 
requirement for an allowed process).

Your further comments will be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

--
Stephen P. Molnar, Ph.D.		Life is a fuzzy set
www.molecular-modeling.net		Stochastic and multivariate
(614)312-7528 (c)
Skype: smolnar1