[alsa-devel] No sound from speakers with Realtek ALC3226

[Takashi Iwai]

At Tue, 24 Feb 2015 13:14:38 +0400,
John Frankish wrote:
> 
> I posted this on the alsa-user list, but did not get a reply.
> 
> Although it occasionally works, I am usually unable to get any sound out of
> the speakers on a dell latitude e7240 using alsa-1.0.28 and linux-3.16.6 -
> see details at the end of the post.

Try the later version of Linux kernel at first.  3.16 is way too old
for debugging in the era of 4.x kernel :)

> 1. HDMI is the default sound device - why, the analogue device would make
> more sense?

It's just an order of PCI devices on the bus.
PulseAudio would choose the analog usually as default.

> 2. On the analogue sound device, the headphones are the default instead of
> the speakers. On the few occasions I get sound out of the speakers, the
> headphones need to be muted first - even though no headphones are connected.
> 
> 3. Shutting windows 7 64bit down with "shutdown.exe -s" seems to help with
> getting sound from the speakers with linux on the same machine.

If so, Windows or BIOS is the problem.  It doesn't set up the pin
configuration properly Linux driver relies on.

> Most of the time, I see the error:
> 
> snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1b.0: IRQ timing workaround is activated for card #1.
> Suggest a bigger bdl_pos_adj.

This is likely irrelevant.  The message is only about the DMA timing
issue, which can be almost ignored.

> I've tried various module options:
> 
> options snd_hda_intel probe_only=0,1
> options snd-hda-intel enable_msi=1 bdl_pos_adj=1,32 [and 48 and 64] options
> snd-hda-intel id=PCH index=1
> 
> ..all to no avail.

You really understand what you're trying here.  probe_only option
would make the driver only probing the driver and skipping the
configuration, i.e. you won't get any sound from it.

The enable_msi is in anyway true as default.  bdl_pos_adj is
irrelevant for your problem, as mentioned.  The index option would
break the operation if you pass only a single value for the multiple
devices.

> Any additional troubleshooting suggestions (or a patch) would be much
> appreciated.

If you get the status where the speaker works (e.g. after Windows
clean reboot), try to take alsa-info.sh snapshot.  Run alsa-info.sh
with --no-upload option, and save the generated output.  Then, take
another alsa-info.sh snapshot while the speaker doesn't work.  Compare
these two outputs.  (At best, attach both (compressed) files.)


Takashi