No Input Signal from my Internal Microphones

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1

No Input Signal from my Internal Microphones.

I do not capture any input from the internal microphones on my Tuxedo XC 1711 running Leap 15.1 with Gnome. The arecord/aplay test does not succeed. I suspect a basic configuration needs fixing.

Sound set-up after power on (as viewed by standard user):

alsamixer

initially this indicates
Card: PulseAudio,
Chip: PulseAudio
<F6> allows sound card selection between:

  • (default)
    0 HDA Intel PCH
    1 HDA Nvidia
    select: 0 HDA Intel PCH
    Card: HDA Intel PCH
    Chip: Realtek ALC1220
    The following channels are presented:
    Headphone MM → unmuted: 00 appears in box below the VU
    & set to 75<>75

Speaker 00 100<>100
PCM blank 100<>100
Mic Boos blank 0<>0 set to 100<>100
Mic Boos blank 100<>100
S/PDIF MM
S/PDIF D 00
S/PDIF 1 00
S/PDIF 2 00
S/PDIF 3 00
S/PDIF 4 00
S/PDIF 1 00
Beep 00 75<>75
Capture Blank 93<>93
Input So Blank
Input So Blank
Internal Blank 100<>100
Internal Blank 100<>100
Rear-Pan Blank 100<>100
Yast → Hardware → Sound
Indicates:
Index 0 TU106 High Definition Audio Controller
Not Configured Comet Lake PCH cAVS
Note: On receipt of this new system neither sound card was configured, experimentation demonstrated that on “Add” (sound card) in YaST that neither model was “known” but that it was possible the edit both the unconfigured cards
→ Other → Volume
Master Volume
PCM 100
Headphone 89
Other channels
Speaker 100
Mic Boost 100
Beep 87
Internal Mic Boost 100
pavucontrol

Playback
Show: All Streams
System Sounds 100%
Recording
Show: All Streams
No application is currently recording audio
Output Devices
Built-in Audio Analog Stereo
Show: All Output Devices
Port: Speakers 100%
Headphones (unplugged) 100%
Input Devices
Monitor of Built-in Audio Analog Stereo
Show: All Input Devices

  •                100%

Configuration
HDA Nvidia: Profile: Off
note all options: unplugged
Built-in Audio Profile: Analog Stereo Output
arecord -l

**** List of CAPTURE Hardware Devices ****
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 0: ALC1220 Analog [ALC1220 Analog]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 2: ALC1220 Alt Analog [ALC1220 Alt Analog]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

The arecord/aplay test:

        arecord -vv -fS16_LE -c2 -D 'hw:0,0' test.wav

Recording WAVE ‘test.wav’ : Signed 16 bit Little Endian, Rate 8000 Hz, Stereo
Warning: rate is not accurate (requested = 8000Hz, got = 44100Hz)
please, try the plug plugin
Hardware PCM card 0 ‘HDA Intel PCH’ device 0 subdevice 0
Its setup is:
stream : CAPTURE
access : RW_INTERLEAVED
format : S16_LE
subformat : STD
channels : 2
rate : 44100
exact rate : 44100 (44100/1)
msbits : 16
buffer_size : 22052
period_size : 5513
period_time : 125011
tstamp_mode : NONE
tstamp_type : MONOTONIC
period_step : 1
avail_min : 5513
period_event : 0
start_threshold : 1
stop_threshold : 22052
silence_threshold: 0
silence_size : 0
boundary : 6207086186423386112
appl_ptr : 0
hw_ptr : 0
#+ | 00%^C
Aborted by signal Interrupt…
#+ | 00
aplay test.wav

Playing WAVE ‘test.wav’ : Signed 16 bit Little Endian, Rate 44100 Hz, Stereo[/font]


 The test.wav was created, size approx 1.8 MB. pavucontrol Output Devices did not show any activity on playback.

  
 
  As root I have run  alsa-info.sh  the image can be found at http://alsa-project.org/db/?f=49c831990e1d84e63934525599d1f4e533bd5ca6

Any observations/suggestions welcome
regards
stevetom
2

Possibly too new hardware:

Comet Lake

Wait for 02 July and try to install Leap 15.2.

3

Thanx for that, the “too new” had occurred to me and Leap 15.2 is on my “to do” list. I’ll update this with good/bad results.

cheers
stevetom

4

Possibly your hardware is too new for 15.1 - but honestly I don’t know about that.

I do know, that if you are trying to get your internal mic to work as a normal user, then running alsa-info.sh as root is the wrong thing to do as it gives us 'root’s ’ cofiguration for the mic - which initially is of NO interest at the initial stage of debugging.

What is of interest is that script run as the user who is trying to use the mic - which is the regular user. How about running that script as a regular user and then providing the link?

Further, even if trying to use the mic as user root, the mic is misconfigured. Given it misconfigured, I honestly can not tell if this is a hardware/driver issue or if it is a configuration issue. Note this:


Simple mixer control 'Capture',1
  Capabilities: cvolume cswitch
  Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: Capture 0 - 63
  Front Left: Capture 61 [97%] [28.50dB] **[off]**
  Front Right: Capture 61 [97%] [28.50dB] **[off]**

Capture is ‘off’. I see elsewhere the internal mic is selected, but after selecting it, why switch off capture? …

Am I missing something obvious here ? It does appear to me your mixer has capture switched off - ergo I can not tell if this is more than a configuration issue.

5

many thanks oldcpu, the non-root alsa-info is at: http://alsa-project.org/db/?f=afe696190df41ba5f4a2aed13994d74f784ccfc5
any other diags you need?

I do suspect new hardware, from what I’ve found so far, the Leap kernel knows about the ALC1220 codec but maybe Gnome/YaST or whatever hasn’t caught up yet.

cheers
stevetom

6

oldcpu

I used “amixer -c 0 set Capture,1 toggle” to switch the capture to “on” and retested arecord/aplay (monitoring via pavucontrol), still null result.

I have provided a new alsa-info at http://alsa-project.org/db/?f=eaa8b989193f7fa416fdd7c7c91ab3112dc36554

cheers
steve

7

oldcpu, Svyatko,

it looks like this has turned a corner, there are minor issues (system noise) but the facility is now functioning.

In a nutshell, it appears that the various different ALC1220 input/output channels are all mixed up (certainly when viewed by YaST(on Gnome)/alsamixer).
YaST/Hardware/Sound/Other/Volume - internal speakers only work with the “Headphone” channel turned up
“alsamixer”, all microphone channels can be set to “0<>0”, and the “Rear-Panel” set to a reasonable percentage, and “arecord” works
in fact all I/O channels in “alsamixer” can be turned down to 0<>0 or muted, apart from “Rear-Panel”
however “pavucontrol (Input Devices)” does not indicate any activity whilst recording (but “arecord” does indicate activity)

Many thanks both for your inputs/observations. I shall be upgrading to Leap 15.2 and will see if it makes a difference (not holding my breath tho’).
Assuming the upgrade makes no difference, do you have any thoughts where best to resolve this - given Intel/NVidea are major suppliers, others are likely to have similar problems.

regards
stevetom

8

Ok thanks. I can see now in this 3rd alsa config, capture is finally unmuted. That is much better.

First, a question for you. Did you do a custom edit to /etc/modprobe.d/50-sound.conf that you did not mention to us? I note this:


!!Modprobe options (Sound related)
!!--------------------------------

snd_hda_intel: model=dual-codecs index=0

I have NEVER seen that before in a 50-sound.conf as a modprobe option.

I am curious, did you add that? Note YaST sound module can create that file if you tried to configure your sound with YaST.

= = = anyway that question aside (for now) … lets continue = = = =

You advised that recording does not work. I note you tried: “arecord -vv -fS16_LE -c2 -D ‘hw:0,0’ test.wav” (I copied/pasted your command) which recorded a rather large file, that would make one suspect audio was recorded, but you reported no audio.

Note there should be a space between the “f” and the “S16”. A failure to put that space between the “f” and the “S16” could invalidate your test and explain why no audio record.

but … maybe there are multiple problems …

I should also caution that I am unfamiliar with your hardware, but I note:


ARECORD
**** List of CAPTURE Hardware Devices ****
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 0: ALC1220 Analog [ALC1220 Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 2: ALC1220 Alt Analog [ALC1220 Alt Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

These are two analog record devices (ie hw:0,0 and hw:0,2) , and my experience is internal mics are often ‘digital’. Still I guess it does not hurt to try and see if your hardware is different from my experience and maybe your internal mic is audio …

Did you try recording with both as a regular user, and with root permissions (in all cases in an xterm or konsole) to see if one relevant and the other not relevant?

Try :

For hw:0,0


arecord -vv -f S16_LE -c 2 -D hw:0,0 new.wav

and press to stop the recording. Then play back new.wav. Any sound recorded?

and also for hw:0,2


arecord -vv -f S16_LE -c 2 -D hw:0,2 new.wav

and press to stop the recording. Then play back new.wav. Any sound recorded?

or in the off chance that pulse audio is interfering with your mic recording, try to suspend pulse in a single command:

For hw:0,0 (with pulse suspended):


pasuspender -- arecord -vv -f S16_LE -c 2 -D hw:0,0 new.wav

and press to stop the recording. Then play back new.wav. Any sound recorded?

For hw:0,2 (with pulse suspended):


pasuspender -- arecord -vv -f S16_LE -c 2 -D hw:0,2 new.wav

and press to stop the recording. Then play back new.wav. Any sound recorded?

So lets assume none of those recorded any sound (unfortunate if true - but I note it is analog and not digital).

In this case, please if you had content in the /etc/modprobe.d/50-sound.conf file, take that file and move it to your /home/user such that its not longer in /etc/modprobe.d/ . Then reboot your PC.

Then run the /usr/sbin/alsa-conf file and post here the output. I am looking for potential information on your mic.

Note we did not delete the 50-sound.conf file, so if for some (unknown to me) reason if removing that totally breaks your sound playback, it can always be added back. You could also if you wish try the above commands with that custom 50-sound.conf edit removed, but I am more interested in seeing the alsa-conf output.

Note that your PC has two instances of the snd_hda_intel alsa module running at the same time, and that is notorious for causing some users issues:


!!Loaded ALSA modules
!!-------------------

snd_hda_intel
snd_hda_intel

But lets deal with that later.

I also note IEC958 is switched OFF, but I don’t know if that relevant for your hardware (IEC958 if related to mic exceeds my knowledge):


Simple mixer control 'IEC958',0
  Capabilities: pswitch pswitch-joined
  Playback channels: Mono
  Mono: Playback [off]

My hope is that is not relevant.

9

OK good news - ignore my last - as I was typing while you were problem solving and posting.

That 50-sound.conf thou is strange. And having two simultaneous instances of the same alsa module may come back to bite later (lets hope it doesn’t). If it does, I can possibly help.

10

oldcpu, many thanks for your comments/observations

the 50-sound.conf came from a forum SDB - that’s where the “dual-codecs” came from (mind you it was one of your articles that told me the importance of identifying the sound card codec, from which the “model-tag” could be discovered in the kernel source), the forced index was from later in that same SDB - sound playback did not work until I had made those modifications.

I noted the dual modules - do you know how I can remove the duplicate? “modprobe” probably… mind you I suspect the doubling is due to the hardware found.

IEC958 appears to be S/PDIF channels

My next related tests (any problems via separate threads) are

[INDENT=2]cable headphone/microphone
bluetooth headphone/microphone
Zoom
[/INDENT]
[INDENT=3]Zoom says it doesn’t like my “audio devices” so I should try firefox - which is exactly what I am using!
[/INDENT]

Again, many thanks for your responses, both here and elsewhere

regards
stevetom

11 

!!Loaded ALSA modules
!!-------------------

snd_hda_intel
snd_hda_intel

In my case first (#0) sound card is HDMI output, and second (#1) is internal sound card (Realtek ALC1220).
By default Leap 15.1 is using first = HDMI output, i.e. no input is available.

Install pasystray utility and examine what PulseAudio is doing. With it I managed to use HDMI audio output for some software, and ALC1220 for another - if I am using PulseAudio for sound output.
With pasystray you may set default sink and source as you wish.

12

oldcpu

your request to see the output from /usr/sbin/alsa-conf[FONT=arial] is not so simple… Leap 15.2 appears to have moved on and no file with that name exists on my system. [FONT=courier new]/usr/sbin/alsactl [FONT=arial]writes to a file [FONT=courier new]/var/lib/alsa/asound.state [FONT=arial]which looks relevant, but is over 1000 lines - how would I get that to you?
There is also a directory structure under [FONT=courier new]/usr/share/alsa with lots of configuration data (but I can’t be certain what you are looking for)
[/FONT][/FONT][/FONT][/FONT][/FONT][/FONT]
cheers
stevetom

13

Svyatko,

interesting… acording to alsamixer card 0 is the “HDA Intel PCH” with inputs and outputs whilst card1 has only S/PDIF channels. With either card it seems not possible to modify the levels of any of the S/PDIF channels. In YaST–>Hardware–>Sound I left card 1 - not configured, not seeing why I should want it, plus the 50-sound.conf “image=0” might upset things.

Can you show me how you made that determination (of the card identities). I do suspect that YaST and alsa are getting mixed up with things maybe due to some basic configuration funnies.

Thanks for the pasystray tip, I think I will leave it in my “back pocket” in case I have more complex needs. I only need a microphone for Zoom type usage and it should be possible to use my combo headset for that.

regards
stevetom

14

Svyatko, apologies, I miscomprehended your recent post; when you described the cards as Card 0 - HDMI, Card 1 ALC1220, I thought you were describing my hardware, whereas, when I read that again, you are describing your own hardware.
It seems like we have very similar sound card hardware…
After thinking it over, I did install pasystray however it seems to hang (root or normal user) - possibly doesn’t like my Gnome environment. Shame, it maybe could have shone a bit of light into whatever is going on…

regards
stevetom

15

Interesting. Thats a surprise.

Note from this alsa project wiki page run in a terminal/xterm:


 cd ~/
 wget http://www.alsa-project.org/alsa-info.sh -O alsa-info.sh && bash alsa-info.sh

You will be prompted to upload the information or save it locally. The easiest way to share the information is to automatically upload it to the alsa-project server and copy/paste the address you’re given. You can also choose to save the information locally, and alsa-info will output a text file in /tmp . You can then upload that file to whoever wants it. (Remember: files in the /tmp directory will be removed on every reboot.)

16

Here is what I would do if it were my computer …

As noted in openSUSE-15.1 you had two intel modules loaded:


!!Loaded ALSA modules
!!-------------------

snd_hda_intel
snd_hda_intel

So to ensure the HDMI is NOT the default device, you can force the PCH to be soundcard 0.

I note the LEAP-15.1 script gave:


!!Soundcards recognised by ALSA
!!-----------------------------

** 0 [PCH[/b]            ]: **HDA-Intel **- HDA Intel PCH
                      HDAudio-Gigabyte-ALC1220DualCodecs
 **1 [NVidia[/b]         ]: **HDA-Intel ****- HDA NVidia
                      HDA NVidia at 0xa1000000 irq 17

and gave:


!!PCI Soundcards installed in the system
!!--------------------------------------

00:1f.3 Audio device [0403]: Intel Corporation Comet Lake **PCH** cAVS **8086:06c8**]
    Subsystem: CLEVO/KAPOK Computer Device [1558:67e1]
01:00.1 Audio device [0403]: **NVIDIA** Corporation TU106 High Definition Audio Controller **10de:10f9**] (rev a1)
    Subsystem: CLEVO/KAPOK Computer Device [1558:67e3]

Hence you could try deleting the original 50-sound.conf file content (or back it up in your /home/user directory) and instead have this as content:


options snd_hda_intel index=0 vid=8086 pid=06c8
options snd_hda_intel index=1 vid=10de pid=10f9

reboot and test. If that does not work, restore your old 50-sound.conf content.

Do NOT backup the 50-sound.conf in the /etc/modprobe.d directory, as it may be run there even if saved as a backup.

This works on LEAP-15.1 and earlier openSUSE versions - I assume it would also work on LEAP-15.2 but I do not know that for certain.**

17

oldcpu, many thanks for that…

  1. my mistake, I’m running Leap 15.1 currently, I expect to upgrade to 15.2 in a day of two.

  2. I understand your modprobe.d suggestions - I didn’t know that the vid/pid info was embedded in card information. I will test that later tonight hopefully, will report results and also provide new alsa-info using the command you provided.

regards
stevetom

18

oldcpu,

that did not work out as expected. I seems that using YaST → Hardware → Sound (Y-H-S hereafter) to configure the NVidia card=1, YaST overwrote 50-sound.conf and after reboot Y-H-S showed the NVidia as card=0 and Intel “not configured”, and no sound input - and a very different 50-sound.conf. However Y-H-S-Volume had sane labels: Master, PCM | Channels (a good thing I thought). But I think that’s enough for tonight.

Tomorrow I will attempt to clean up (as demonstrated by several reboots) and experiment with the sound.conf (with a clean brain) - I’m thinking options: vid,pid,model,index and an alias each for card0/card1.

In the worst case I will re-install (shock! shudder!) and start with a clean sheet, and try to be patient enough to alsa-info before and after changes.

regards
stevetom

19

That would be excessive. You’ll only end up back where you started anyway. You can always remove the existing audio config in /etc/modprobe.d/ directory, and start over. When making custom configs (as suggested by oldcpu), best to edit the file directly, and don’t use YaST.

20

That is true. Once one hand edits the 50-sound.conf file, one can not then go into YaST > Hardware > Sound without losing one’s edits. Ergo, after making the edit to the 50-sound.conf do not go into Y-H-S.