Hi all! First of all, a big thank you for all volunteers who worked on this amazing distro. I just got KSOD from Windows 7 and decided to give OpenSuse a shot even though: 1) I’m your mainstream user, 2) I suck at command lines, 3) I trust more when things are done automatically than when I do it myself (loving Yast by the way) and 4) I knew that the product was not quite “ready for the masses” (as all other distros out there), specially thanks to the lack of Linux support from the hardware devs out there (e.g. Creative Labs >:)).
Getting to the point, I have one onboard sound on my laptop, and one Express Card offboard:
aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: STAC92xx Analog [STAC92xx Analog]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: Generic [HD-Audio Generic], device 0: CA0110 Analog [CA0110 Analog]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
My 5.1 surround sound system is plugged in my Express Card, and I don’t use digital, nor coaxial. I have a direct 5.1 analog connection. Problem is, the only sound I hear is coming from the laptop. I even tried BIOS options to disable onboard sound for my Dell M1730 laptop but strangely that didn’t keep the card, neither the speakers, from working.
Using Yast console advanced settings, and testing both sound cards constantly, there’s no sound for the card at the index value = 1. Weird thing is whatever card is on index value = 0 the laptop’s speakers play the sound. I’ve checked the file (/etc/modprobe.d/50-sound.conf) just to make sure if Yast changes were being aplied, and they were. Possible system bug, because aplay -l and alsa always reports the onboard card on index = 0 even when I switch index = 0 to offboard card using Yast or the sound.conf file and restart the computer. I may be wrong, but I think the main problem is with my offboard driver (snd-hda-intel). Tried manually changing models, but there are not options for the CA0110 chipset. Tried every single step listed here SDB:Intel-HDA sound problems - openSUSE and here SDB:Intel-HDA sound problems - openSUSE, but no help.
Here is the information generated with the Alsa Script: http://www.alsa-project.org/db/?f=618896af5d95a9b15ef34a66585e7a17f512b616
The core issue I think is that the chipset identified by the system is wrong. My product is this one: Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio Notebook Sound Card - Xtreme Fidelity for your laptop, with the docking module for the 5.1 surround sound, but wikipedia (and other sources) says the chipset for X-Fi Xtreme Audio Notebook should be CA0106 (the same as Audigy SE): Sound Blaster X-Fi - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The confusion, I think, comes from Creative Labs PCI-e version, with chipset CA0110, but the same name and features: OEM - Chips - CA0110. Also, system says my card model is: SB1040. But my card model is actually: SB0710 (it is written on the card itself).
Even so, I tried to manually change the sound.conf file to use snd-ca0106 as a driver for the offboard card, but with no success at all (Yast wouldn’t configure it). I really need help here, I know I can get sound because in systems where the X-Fi card was correctly recognized with the CA0106 chip, users managed to get it working with no effort: X-Fi Xtreme Audio (ca0106, audigy) no sound - Ubuntu Forums.
I also need help making sure Opensuse is gonna use my 5.1 surround system instead of my laptop speakers, and, of course, making sure I get surround sound. Any help would be appreciated. Sorry for my bad english. I use Opensuse x64 v11.2 version.