I’m getting a nasty hiss along with normal sound on my system with openSUSE 11.1, and it seems related to movement on screen.
Soundcard: VT8233/A/8235/8237 AC97 Audio Controller
The hiss stays regardless of the PCM volume, ALSA/OSS.
GNOME with Compiz works 20 times better. Problem solved.
Do you have a microphone? If so, ensure it is switched OFF.
I have two low quality min speakers on either side of my TFT monitor that I can not use, because their design is poor and the speakers are subjected to all sorts of EMI, resulting in hiss and noise. I simply use external speakers instead and keep those monitor speakers switched off (I get same noise under windows).
Sometimes it is necessary to go to YaST > Hardware > Sound > Other > Volume and move one’s volume up there, and then in one’s mixer lower the volume levels.
I don’t have any mics plugged in, just headphones. I’ll try messing with the sliders, see if it changes anything, though I doubt it will.
Ok, the constant hiss can be removed by setting the CD slider to 0, but I the background one while playing sounds is still present.
In order to take a more detailed look at this, I need more information. Note when testing your sound, I recommend you use this as a sound test (in a konsole):speaker-test -c2 -l5 -twavDo NOT use a player such as vlc to test your sound quality.
Adjust your mixer to what you believe is the optimal setting, and then to provide more information, with your PC connected to the internet copy and paste the following into a gnome-terminal or konsole:/usr/sbin/alsa-info.shWhen the script completes it will pass you a URL. Please post that URL here.
Also, please copy and paste the following one line at a time into a gnome-terminal or konsole and post the output here.rpm -qa | grep alsa
rpm -qa | grep pulse
rpm -q libasound2
uname -a
cat /etc/modprobe.d/sound
http://www.alsa-project.org/db/?f=ebbaed98a1fd30043232b699cbf1a2b2c2aa1836
rpm -qa | grep alsa
alsa-1.0.18-8.7
alsa-plugins-pulse-1.0.18-6.12
alsa-plugins-1.0.18-6.12
alsa-utils-1.0.18-6.4
alsa-firmware-1.0.17-1.42
alsa-oss-1.0.17-1.37
rpm -qa | grep pulse
pulseaudio-0.9.12-9.6
pulseaudio-module-zeroconf-0.9.12-9.6
pulseaudio-esound-compat-0.9.12-9.6
libpulse0-0.9.12-9.6
alsa-plugins-pulse-1.0.18-6.12
pulseaudio-module-lirc-0.9.12-9.6
libpulsecore4-0.9.12-9.6
pulseaudio-module-bluetooth-0.9.12-9.6
libpulse-browse0-0.9.12-9.6
pulseaudio-utils-0.9.12-9.6
pulseaudio-module-gconf-0.9.12-9.6
libpulse-mainloop-glib0-0.9.12-9.6
pulseaudio-module-x11-0.9.12-9.6
rpm -q libasound2
libasound2-1.0.18-8.7
uname -a
Linux linux-1979 2.6.27.7-9-default #1 SMP 2008-12-04 18:10:04 +0100 i686 athlon i386 GNU/Linux
cat /etc/modprobe.d/sound
options snd slots=snd-via82xx
Ssy1.j+yDHyr5x34:VT8233/A/8235/8237 AC97 Audio Controller
alias snd-card-0 snd-via82xx
Thanks. I reviewed you mixer settings, and I confess, I do not understand the logic that has been applied.
The item that stands out the most is your PCM volume at 97%. That is WAY TOO HIGH. Can you not back off on that? That is certain to introduce distortion.
Also, many items are ON in the mixer with volume set low or at zero. Why have them switched ON if not in use. I note your external amp ON. Is that necessary for sound (it is for some PCs)?
To highlight what I mean I copied and pasted your mixer section out of the diagnostic script output and marked in red what I mean. Please explain why you have these various items on!
!!Amixer output
!!-------------
!!-------Mixer controls for card 0 [V8237]
Card hw:0 ‘V8237’/‘VIA 8237 with CMI9739 at 0xdc00, irq 22’
Mixer name : ‘C-Media Electronics CMI9739’
Simple mixer control ‘PCM’,0
Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined
Front Left: Playback 30 97%] -49.50dB] [on]
Front Right: Playback 30 97%] -49.50dB] [on]
Simple mixer control ‘Surround’,0
Capabilities: pvolume pswitch
Front Left: Playback 6 [19%] -37.50dB] [on]
Front Right: Playback 6 [19%] -37.50dB] [on]
Simple mixer control ‘Center’,0
Mono: Playback 1 [3%] -45.00dB] [on]
Simple mixer control ‘LFE’,0
Capabilities: pvolume pvolume-joined pswitch pswitch-joined
Mono: Playback 3 [10%] -42.00dB] [on]
Simple mixer control ‘Line’,0
Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-exclusive
Front Left: Playback 0 [0%] -34.50dB] [on] Capture [off]
Front Right: Playback 0 [0%] -34.50dB] [on] Capture [off]
Simple mixer control ‘CD’,0
Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-exclusive
Front Left: Playback 0 [0%] -34.50dB] [on] Capture [off]
Front Right: Playback 0 [0%] -34.50dB] [on] Capture [off]
Simple mixer control ‘Mic’,0
Capabilities: pvolume pvolume-joined pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-exclusive
Mono: Playback 4 [13%] -28.50dB] [on]
Front Left: Capture [on]
Front Right: Capture [on]
Simple mixer control ‘Video’,0
Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-exclusive
Front Left: Playback 0 [0%] -34.50dB] [on] Capture [off]
Front Right: Playback 0 [0%] -34.50dB] [on] Capture [off]
Simple mixer control ‘Phone’,0
Capabilities: pvolume pvolume-joined pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-exclusive
Mono: Playback 0 [0%] -34.50dB] [on]
Front Left: Capture [off]
Front Right: Capture [off]
Simple mixer control ‘IEC958’,0
Capabilities: pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-joined
Mono: Playback [on] Capture [off]
Simple mixer control ‘IEC958 Playback AC97-SPSA’,0
Capabilities: volume volume-joined
Mono: 2 [67%]
Simple mixer control ‘PC Speaker’,0
Mono: Playback 0 [0%] -45.00dB] [on]
Simple mixer control ‘Aux’,0
Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-exclusive
Front Left: Playback 0 [0%] -34.50dB] [on] Capture [off]
Front Right: Playback 0 [0%] -34.50dB] [on] Capture [off]
Simple mixer control ‘Capture’,0
Capabilities: cvolume cswitch cswitch-joined
Front Left: Capture 0 [0%] [0.00dB] [on]
Front Right: Capture 0 [0%] [0.00dB] [on]
Simple mixer control ‘External Amplifier’,0
Capabilities: pswitch pswitch-joined
Playback channels: Mono
Mono: Playback on]
Thanks for the help so far.
Please excuse my lack of knowledge, but how do I switch them off?
I’m a KDE3 user, not a gnome nor KDE4 user. But in KDE3, they are controlled by the program kmix.
I think in Gnome a combination of the GUI alsamixer and the the command line amixer can be used to switch them OFF, where appropriate.
But please, focus first on your PCM volume level and your external amp. Try to back that down to a lower level from 97%. Its also possible your external amp needs to be ON, … but if not, switch it OFF.
Ok, I found the gnome volume control.
Here’s my updated configuration: http://www.alsa-project.org/db/?f=2422fa2368e36517c15fb307f47fc54aec48f882
///Bump!///
What response are you looking for? You provided a couple URLs, but no indication as to the result of the mixer changes you made. Even a statement that “the noise is still there” is better than nothing.
Same as before. The changes had no effect.
Do you get this noise with another other operating system ? (ie if dual booting to windows or another Linux distribution, do you get this hiss ? ).
Nope. Sound playback works perfectly in Windows XP, but it’s broken in every distro I’ve tried.
Ok, the constant hiss can be removed by setting the CD slider to 0, but I the background one while playing sounds is still present.
This statement indicates that your CD player is generating (electrical) noise.
I would review oldpu’s advice carefully again. Make sure you’re entirely familiar with CLI or GUI mixer controls.
If you rmmod the relevant sound module, or shutdown your sound system with
rcalsasound stop
and the noise is still there, then this would suggest a hardware issue beyond the scope of a simple mixer adjustment. Could be the quality of the amplifiers, or bad grounding between CD player and sound card for example.
Mmm, yes but this doesn’t explain why it’s working fine in Windows. So it’s prolly not a hardware issue.
You could try updating to the latest alsa version (openSUSE-11.1 does NOT have the latest alsa, as one of the alsa dev’s created some cutting edge alsa rpms for openSUSE).
If you wish to do that, open a gnome-terminal or a kde-konsole and type ‘su’ (no quotes, enter root password when prompted) and with your pc connected to the internet, copy and paste the following in sequence one line at a time:
zypper ar http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/multimedia:/audio/openSUSE_11.1/ multimedia
zypper install alsa alsa-utils alsa-tools alsa-plugins-pulse alsa-plugins alsa-oss alsa-firmware libasound2
zypper rr multimedia
zypper ar http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/multimedia:/audio:/KMP/openSUSE_11.1/ multimedia
zypper install alsa-driver-kmp-default
zypper rr multimedia
then restart your PC, and then CAREFULLY tune your mixer to try and remove the hiss.