# Something is muting the sound

## binro

I haven't used my laptop for the last yar, just applying maintenence once a month. Recently I noticed no sound was audible. Everything looks normal (alsamixer, lsmod, KDE audio settings), the sound is just muted. It is quite basic, if I kill the desktop and use aplay from a console there is still no sound. Most bizarre, if I hibenate the machine, after it resumes the sound works for about 30 seconds then it is muted. So some process is responsible. There is neither systemd nor pulseaudio on this system, I made quite sure of that. Furthermore:

[*]It is not the hardware, sound is fine on a Windows partition. 

[*]The same thing happens with USB digital headphones

[*]It is not the kernel, I upgraded it. The chip is a bog standard Intel HDA

This is a very strange problem, our finest minds are needed!  :Smile:  Any ideas out there?

topaz alsa # emerge --info

Portage 2.2.14 (python 2.7.7-final-0, default/linux/amd64/13.0/desktop/kde, gcc-4.8.3, glibc-2.19-r1, 3.15.7-gentoo x86_64)

=================================================================

System uname: Linux-3.15.7-gentoo-x86_64-Intel-R-_Core-TM-_i7_CPU_M_620_@_2.67GHz-with-gentoo-2.2

KiB Mem:     3911332 total,    634072 free

KiB Swap:    8388604 total,   8388508 free

Timestamp of tree: Fri, 07 Nov 2014 16:45:01 +0000

ld GNU ld (Gentoo 2.24 p1.4) 2.24

ccache version 3.1.9 [enabled]

app-shells/bash:          4.2_p53

dev-java/java-config:     2.2.0

dev-lang/perl:            5.20.1-r1

dev-lang/python:          2.7.7, 3.3.5-r1, 3.4.1

dev-util/ccache:          3.1.9-r3

dev-util/cmake:           2.8.12.2-r1

dev-util/pkgconfig:       0.28-r1

sys-apps/baselayout:      2.2

sys-apps/openrc:          0.13.3

sys-apps/sandbox:         2.6-r1

sys-devel/autoconf:       2.69

sys-devel/automake:       1.11.6, 1.13.4

sys-devel/binutils:       2.24-r3

sys-devel/gcc:            4.6.4, 4.7.4, 4.8.3

sys-devel/gcc-config:     1.7.3

sys-devel/libtool:        2.4.3-r2

sys-devel/make:           4.0-r1

sys-kernel/linux-headers: 3.13 (virtual/os-headers)

sys-libs/glibc:           2.19-r1

Repositories: gentoo systemd local-portage

ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="amd64"

ACCEPT_LICENSE="*"

CBUILD="x86_64-pc-linux-gnu"

CFLAGS="-O2 -pipe -fomit-frame-pointer -march=native -mtune=native"

CHOST="x86_64-pc-linux-gnu"

CONFIG_PROTECT="/etc /usr/share/config /usr/share/gnupg/qualified.txt /usr/share/themes/oxygen-gtk/gtk-2.0"

CONFIG_PROTECT_MASK="/etc/ca-certificates.conf /etc/env.d /etc/fonts/fonts.conf /etc/gconf /etc/gentoo-release /etc/revdep-rebuild /etc/sandbox.d /etc/terminfo"

CXXFLAGS="-O2 -pipe -fomit-frame-pointer -march=native -mtune=native"

DISTDIR="/usr/portage/distfiles"

EMERGE_DEFAULT_OPTS="--keep-going --autounmask-write=y"

FCFLAGS="-O2 -pipe"

FEATURES="assume-digests binpkg-logs ccache config-protect-if-modified distlocks ebuild-locks fixlafiles merge-sync news parallel-fetch preserve-libs protect-owned sandbox sfperms strict unknown-features-warn unmerge-logs unmerge-orphans userfetch userpriv usersandbox usersync"

FFLAGS="-O2 -pipe"

GENTOO_MIRRORS="http://opal/            http://ftp.jaist.ac.jp/pub/Linux/Gentoo/ http://mirrors.64hosting.com/pub/mirrors/gentoo/ http://ftp.twaren.net/Linux/Gentoo/ http://ftp.kaist.ac.kr/pub/gentoo/ http://www.mirrorservice.org/sites/www.ibiblio.org/gentoo http://distfiles.gentoo.org http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/distributions/gentoo"

LANG="en_GB"

LC_ALL="en_GB.utf8"

LDFLAGS="-Wl,-O1"

MAKEOPTS="-j4 -l6"

PKGDIR="/usr/portage/packages"

PORTAGE_CONFIGROOT="/"

PORTAGE_RSYNC_OPTS="--recursive --links --safe-links --perms --times --omit-dir-times --compress --force --whole-file --delete --stats --human-readable --timeout=180 --exclude=/distfiles --exclude=/local --exclude=/packages"

PORTAGE_TMPDIR="/var/tmp"

PORTDIR="/usr/portage"

PORTDIR_OVERLAY="/var/lib/layman/systemd /usr/local/portage"

SYNC="rsync://binro.org/gentoo-portage"

USE="X a52 aac acl acp acpi alsa amd64 amd64codecs asf bash-completion berkdb bluetooth branding bzip2 cairo cdda cdr cli consolekit cracklib crypt css cups curl cxx dbus declarative divx4linux dri dts dvd dvdr dvdread encode ethereal exif fam fbcon fbsplash ffmpeg firefox flac fortran gdbm gif gimpprint glamor gnutls gpm gtk iconv ieee1394 irc jpeg kde kdeenablefinal kipi lcms ldap libnotify lm_sensors mad matroska mbox mmx mmx2 mmxext mng modules mp3 mp4 mpeg mpeg2 mpeg4 mplayer multilib musicbrainz mysql ncurses nfs nls nptl nptlonly ogg oldpim opengl openmp openssl pam pango pcre pdf phonon pic plasma png policykit ppds private-headers qt3support qt4 rdesktop readline rss sasl sdk sdl semantic-desktop session slp smp spell sse sse2 ssl startup-notification subversion svg tcpd theora tiff transcode truetype udev udisks unicode upower usb v4l vcd vim visualization vorbis webkit wifi wmf x264 xcb xcomposite xine xinerama xinetd xml xscreensaver xv xvid xvmc zlib" ABI_X86="64" ALSA_CARDS="ali5451 als4000 atiixp atiixp-modem bt87x ca0106 cmipci emu10k1x ens1370 ens1371 es1938 es1968 fm801 hda-intel intel8x0 intel8x0m maestro3 trident usb-audio via82xx via82xx-modem ymfpci" APACHE2_MODULES="authn_core authz_core socache_shmcb unixd actions alias auth_basic authn_alias authn_anon authn_dbm authn_default authn_file authz_dbm authz_default authz_groupfile authz_host authz_owner authz_user autoindex cache cgi cgid dav dav_fs dav_lock deflate dir disk_cache env expires ext_filter file_cache filter headers include info log_config logio mem_cache mime mime_magic negotiation rewrite setenvif speling status unique_id userdir usertrack vhost_alias" CALLIGRA_FEATURES="kexi words flow plan sheets stage tables krita karbon braindump author" CAMERAS="ptp2" COLLECTD_PLUGINS="df interface irq load memory rrdtool swap syslog" DRACUT_MODULES="lvm systemd syslog" ELIBC="glibc" GPSD_PROTOCOLS="ashtech aivdm earthmate evermore fv18 garmin garmintxt gpsclock itrax mtk3301 nmea ntrip navcom oceanserver oldstyle oncore rtcm104v2 rtcm104v3 sirf superstar2 timing tsip tripmate tnt ublox ubx" INPUT_DEVICES="mouse keyboard evdev synaptics" KERNEL="linux" LCD_DEVICES="bayrad cfontz cfontz633 glk hd44780 lb216 lcdm001 mtxorb ncurses text" LIBREOFFICE_EXTENSIONS="presenter-console presenter-minimizer" LINGUAS="en_GB" OFFICE_IMPLEMENTATION="libreoffice" PHP_TARGETS="php5-5" PYTHON_SINGLE_TARGET="python2_7" PYTHON_TARGETS="python2_7" QEMU_SOFTMMU_TARGETS="i386 x86_64" QEMU_USER_TARGETS="i386 x86_64" RUBY_TARGETS="ruby19 ruby20" USERLAND="GNU" VIDEO_CARDS="nouveau" XTABLES_ADDONS="quota2 psd pknock lscan length2 ipv4options ipset ipp2p iface geoip fuzzy condition tee tarpit sysrq steal rawnat logmark ipmark dhcpmac delude chaos account"

USE_PYTHON="2.7"

Unset:  CPPFLAGS, CTARGET, INSTALL_MASK, PORTAGE_BUNZIP2_COMMAND, PORTAGE_COMPRESS, PORTAGE_COMPRESS_FLAGS, PORTAGE_RSYNC_EXTRA_OPTS

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## Hu

The first step should be to identify whether your problem is that the system has configured itself not to produce sound or that the system is trying unsuccessfully to produce sound.  When you say the sound is muted, do you mean that alsamixer reports that one or more relevant channels are in state MM or are you using "muted" in the more generic sense that there is no audio output, even though the system seems like it should produce output?  When you use aplay or mplayer, are there any messages indicating that the program has encountered a problem accessing the audio device?  In alsamixer, when there is no sound, are all the relevant channels set to a reasonable volume?  Does it matter whether you run aplay as root?  Are there any important differences in ps output between when sound works and when it fails?  Are there any kernel messages indicating that the kernel had a problem using the audio device?  Does it help if you close all X processes, log in directly on the console, hibernate, resume, and then play something after the 30 second window expires?  If yes, that would suggest the offending process is part of your X session.

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## binro

[*]The sound is muted in the generic sense: alsamixer shows all the channels to be unmuted and at 100% 

[*]There are no messages either from aplay or the syslog

[*]Shutting the X server and doing a suspend/resume make no difference

[*]There are no extra processes after the sound mutes

A mystery.

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## Ant P.

Well, let's get rid of all other variables: boot into single-user mode and do `rc-service alsasound start` manually, move any custom asound.conf files out of the way, then see if the speaker-test command works in that state.

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## binro

That's an excellent idea but how do you boot into single user mode now? I have grub2 and recovery mode doesn't work, I still boot to X. Editing a linux line to add "softlevel=single" has no effect. IMHO, Linux is becoming unusable, there is so much complication now.

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## szatox

When everything fails, you can allways append "debug" to kernel boot line

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## krinn

just end your boot command line with s

kernel /vmlinuz/blahb root=/dev/sdsomething s

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## binro

You live and learn, if you use a ramdisk you must put 'init_opts=1' on the kernel command line. Doing that I  got to single user mode and started alsasounds. Issuing aplay produced sound once and then the sound became muted. So it is something very basic.

Thanks

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## i92guboj

Maybe the driver is segfaulting or something.

Reboot, run "dmesg > 1.txt", play sound, wait 30 seconds until sound stops. Run "dmesg > 2.txt", now diff both files and see if there's something relevant in there.

It could be a regression in the driver for your sound chip. Do you still have some old kernel around?

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## binro

 *i92guboj wrote:*   

> Maybe the driver is segfaulting or something.
> 
> Reboot, run "dmesg > 1.txt", play sound, wait 30 seconds until sound stops. Run "dmesg > 2.txt", now diff both files and see if there's something relevant in there.
> 
> It could be a regression in the driver for your sound chip. Do you still have some old kernel around?

 

There is no output to dmesg when the sound mutes. The first thing I did was upgrade the kernel when this problem started but it made no difference. Also, the same problem occurs with my USB headphones which use a different driver.

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## i92guboj

That for sure cuts down the possible offenders list.

Since it happens in single user as well, to me, there are two candidates: system services and driver.

I'd try downgrading rather than upgrading the kernel. As said, this might be a regression.

As for system services, typically pulse is the one that brings the big trouble, but it could be some other such as oss4. 

Another thing to check is that, maybe, for some reason, the default output is being changed to some other sound chip in your system (modems and vga cards can have these, also usb speakers and headsets have their own sound chips). Maybe your programs are sending the output to the wrong place.

If nothing works the only thing I can suggest is to ask directly to the alsa people.

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## krinn

many laptop soundcard have an option for intel drivers, did you check your codec and card in the documentation to seek that?

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## binro

 *krinn wrote:*   

> many laptop soundcard have an option for intel drivers, did you check your codec and card in the documentation to seek that?

 

Yes. This used to work.

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## binro

 *i92guboj wrote:*   

> That for sure cuts down the possible offenders list.
> 
> Since it happens in single user as well, to me, there are two candidates: system services and driver.
> 
> I'd try downgrading rather than upgrading the kernel. As said, this might be a regression.
> ...

 

I didn't upgrade the kernel during the period the sound stopped working, so downgrading would probably not work. I have an nVidia graphics chip which has HDMI support but you can select which chip to use. I will try your suggestion of asking on the alsa list.

Thanks.

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## steveL

 *binro wrote:*   

> I have an nVidia graphics chip which has HDMI support but you can select which chip to use.

 

Hmm I had that issue when I upgraded my nvidia card so as not to use onboard; the best advice I got was "don't bother with onboard HDA, they're crap, just use a Gaming headphone with a USB sound-card builtin."

Now I recommend the same to friends, since it just works. (so long as the headset works with PC too, and is USB; not a jack connection.)

I realise that might feel like a cop-out (it did to me and I resisted for a year or so) but it really does take the pain out of it. (and this is on my desktop, as well as the laptop, til I sort out a pro-audio card for it.)

I particularly like that all my USB stuff is modular (since I don't need to boot from USB) so I can rmmod it if I want, but it's never been an issue. And ofc Teamspeak works like a charm.

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## binro

OK, that's weird, I plugged in my USB digital headphones and they just worked. I know that last time I tried them they were mute too, but that was some time ago and I have done a lot of rebuilding since then. So maybe there is a regression in the kernel HDA drivers, although it seems unlikely.

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## steveL

I just deleted the hda stuff from the kernel config altogether, in the end. The advice I got (from Griz, so it's golden afaic) is that the builtin hda chipsets are borked, and it's best not to have any support for them at all in-kernel, as they cause all sorts of problems just being around.

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