[alsa-devel] PC speaker beeps in 2.6.30?

[Takashi Iwai]

At Tue, 30 Jun 2009 13:31:07 +0200,
Kurt J. Bosch wrote:
> 
> On 2009-06-30 07:57, Takashi Iwai wrote:
> > At Mon, 29 Jun 2009 16:24:14 -0700,
> > Paul Vojta wrote:
> >>
> >> On Sun, Jun 28, 2009 at 01:09:26PM +0200, Kurt J. Bosch wrote:
> >>> On 2009-06-28 10:38, Takashi Iwai wrote:
> >>>> At Sat, 27 Jun 2009 23:39:08 -0700,
> >>>> Paul Vojta wrote:
> >>>>>
> >>>>> On Sat, Jun 27, 2009 at 09:36:42AM +0200, Takashi Iwai wrote:
> >>>>>> At Fri, 26 Jun 2009 10:03:54 +0400,
> >>>>>> Michael Tokarev wrote:
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> [Adding some more Cc's...]
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> Am I the only concerned about this?  My 2.6.30 is still
> >>>>>>> silent w.r.t. old good PC speaker beeps, and I wasn't
> >>>>>>> able to make it to produce any sound.  Yes, as pointed
> >>>>>>> out by others there is a control now, in alsa, and I
> >>>>>>> can hear ugly and scary beeps from my stereo speakers
> >>>>>>> (when they're turned on and when the control is un-muted).
> >>>>>>> But that's.. not a solution/answer to the original
> >>>>>>> question... ;)
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> Try 2.6.31-rc1.  There was a fix regarding beep frequency.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Not necessarily.  Based on the OP's original post, as well as his mails
> >>>>> to the LKML (Google the subject line to find them), he has a desktop
> >>>>> system with external powered speakers connected to a sound card, and also
> >>>>> a small PC speaker inside the system case.  He wants to hear the beeps
> >>>>> coming out of the small speaker, since the external speakers (and/or sound
> >>>>> card) are not always turned on.
> >>>>
> >>>> To avoid someone misunderstanding: the beep routed through HD-audio
> >>>> can also go to the built-in speaker.  It's just mixed up with the
> >>>> normal audio output, and the volume is controlled via ALSA mixer
> >>>> volume element.
> >>>>
> >>>> But, once after it's hooked up to the codec, the beep can't be output
> >>>> separately to the speaker.  It's always with other audio signal to the
> >>>> same output target.
> >>>>
> >>>> Or, on some systems (mostly laptops), the beep is hooked up to the
> >>>> codec automatically no matter whether you set
> >>>> CONFIG_SND_HDA_INPUT_BEEP once when the codec chip is initialized.
> >>>> So, the behavior depends pretty much on the hardware implementation.
> >>>>
> >>> I face the same problem as the OP since kernel 2.6.30 on ArchLinux on
> >>> a desktop machine. I was able to get beep working through the built in
> >>> speaker again by doing a 'modprobe -r pcspkr' followed by a
> >>> 'modprobe pcspkr' after sysinit. It seems there is some kind of
> >>> struggle goinig on here between alsa and pcspkr. Isn't there any
> >>> kernel line or modules configuration option to disable the alsa pc-beep?
> >>
> >> Hm... apparently not.  Probably there should be a module option for this, though.
> >
> > In the latest sound git tree, you can use "patch" file (passed via
> > module option) to specify codec-specific setup.
> > It's for 2.6.32, though.
> >
> Sounds rather complicated to me. :)
> ALSA's snd-hda-intel is stealing the beeps allready 'owned' by pcspkr. 

It just adds another beep input device.

> It does
> this every time it gets [re]loaded. Doing so while lacking a 
> configuration option
> to disable that behavior is a bug IMHO.

There is a configuration option.

> (If you use beep to get some alarm
> notification from hardware sensors or such you will depend on stereo 
> speakers
> connected and powered on.) Do I miss something ?

Yes.


Takashi