AMD R9 290 noise, crackling sounds and delays for sound via HDMI

English Hardware
#1

Hello, it seems it’s an older problem (or so Google says); but after a year maybe I can solve this, had this problem from the day I bought them (was on 12.3 maybe? at that time). I have 2 x Sapphire R9 290 in Crossfire, but the behaviour is the same with just one card, or if Crossfire is enabled or disabled. I am trying to get sound into a fine Yamaha receiver via HDMI as you might guess from the title. But all I get is some weird sounds - man, I mean it’s really bad! Since TrueAudio HDMI sound in high end AMD cards sound doesn’t work anymore on HDMI, as I have an older HD6950 and this one is fine. It is exactly like https://github.com/ValveSoftware/SteamOS/issues/144 but with R9 290, or http://ati.cchtml.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1043 and I can’t find the ones for Ubuntu and Arch… So it was kind of a more generalized problem.

In this thread http://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php/493729-Asus-Xonar-D2X-Yamaha-RX-V675-and-openSUSE-13-1-S-Pdif-toslink-no-audio?highlight=xonar I had to hook my Xonar via S/PDIF to get some quality sound out of my PC. For now I can’t do that anymore, as I had to install a 1200W PSU to deal with the >700W spikes (for the 2 cards). And of course it doesn’t have a floppy cable, and the Xonar D2X requires extra power… Will get a molex to floppy adapter if this doesn’t work. Also I’d rather not install the Xonar (already a “hot” piece of hardware) as it’s getting even hotter near the 90-95 C degs. of the videocards.

Some info, I am on 13.1 fully updated with the AMD proprietary driver, also tried kernel 3.16 as Phoronix reported some improvements for HDMI sound, no luck:

linux-hpbh:/ # uname -a
Linux linux-hpbh 3.11.10-21-desktop #1 SMP PREEMPT Mon Jul 21 15:28:46 UTC 2014 (9a9565d) x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux


linux-hpbh:/ # cat /etc/os-release
NAME=openSUSE
VERSION="13.1 (Bottle)"
VERSION_ID="13.1"
PRETTY_NAME="openSUSE 13.1 (Bottle) (x86_64)"
ID=opensuse
ANSI_COLOR="0;32"
CPE_NAME="cpe:/o:opensuse:opensuse:13.1"
BUG_REPORT_URL="https://bugs.opensuse.org"
HOME_URL="https://opensuse.org/"
ID_LIKE="suse"


linux-hpbh:/ # lsmod | grep fglrx
fglrx                9489227  192 
amd_iommu_v2           19054  1 fglrx
button                 13952  1 fglrx


@linux-hpbh:~> aticonfig --lscs
    Candidate Combination: 
    Master: 0:0:0 
    Slave: 0:0:0 
    CrossFire is disabled on current device
    CrossFire Diagnostics:
    CrossFire can work with P2P mapping through GART
    Candidate Combination: 
    Master: 0:0:0 
    Slave: 0:0:0 
    CrossFire is disabled on current device
    CrossFire Diagnostics:
    CrossFire can work with P2P mapping through GART


linux-hpbh:/ # cat /proc/asound/cards
 1 [Generic        ]: HDA-Intel - HD-Audio Generic
                      HD-Audio Generic at 0xfe99c000 irq 54
 2 [Generic_1      ]: HDA-Intel - HD-Audio Generic
                      HD-Audio Generic at 0xfe89c000 irq 55


linux-hpbh:/ # rpm -q alsa alsa-utils alsa-firmware
alsa-1.0.28-201.1.x86_64
alsa-utils-1.0.28-131.1.x86_64
alsa-firmware-1.0.28-30.1.noarch

linux-hpbh:/ # aplay -L
null
    Discard all samples (playback) or generate zero samples (capture)
default
    Default ALSA Output (currently PulseAudio Sound Server)
hdmi:CARD=Generic,DEV=0
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 0
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic,DEV=1
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 1
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic,DEV=2
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 2
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic,DEV=3
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 3
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic,DEV=4
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 4
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic,DEV=5
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 5
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic_1,DEV=0
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 0
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic_1,DEV=1
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 1
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic_1,DEV=2
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 2
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic_1,DEV=3
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 3
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic_1,DEV=4
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 4
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic_1,DEV=5
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 5
    HDMI Audio Output
#2 
linux-hpbh:/ # rpm -q pulseaudio
pulseaudio-5.0-5.2.x86_64
#3

Is it just me or other owners also have the same issues with R9 290s HDMI port?

#4

Due to the amount of posts on the web, I really can’t believe I am the only one. Is there any other R9 290 owner whom can confirm this?

#5

Hi fakemoth,
You are not alone, I have been round in circles all night and have awful noise from my Asus R9 290’s, and not a peep yet from the onboard sound from my ASRock 990FX extreme9 motherboard. Like you mine are in Crossfire mode firstly without, but now with proprietary driver installed. I am on Opensuse 13.2.

Did you or anyone else find a solution to this issue?

#6

Hey, I still have the issue, after all this time I think it’s just AMD and their big time suck drivers for linux/gnu… Always been a fan of AMD/ATI but this just can’t go on: I will switch to Intel+nvidia in the future as most do, so they can go bankrupt in peace…

#7

I have no comment on the fglrx/catylst problem, but interestingly enough, there has also been similar trouble on the oss side of things