nm256: no ac97 is found (Dell Inspiron 3500 & others)

[mark burdett]

On bootup and shutdown, there are a series of beeps and error messages due to
the soundcard not being found.

dmesg reads:
nm256: no ac97 is found!
  force the driver to load by passing in the module parameter
    force_ac97=1
  or try sb16 or cs423x drivers instead.
NeoMagic 256: probe of 0000:01:00.1 failed with error -6

modprobe snd-cs4232 returns these errors:
FATAL: Error inserting snd_cs4232
(/lib/modules/2.6.10-5-386/kernel/sound/isa/cs423x/snd-cs4232.ko): No such device
FATAL: Error running install command for snd_cs4232modprobe cs4232
I did try appending the various options (irq, isapnp, port etc.), to no avail.
Btw I didn't see a BIOS setting corresponding to the cport option, how would I
figure out what to set for cport?
modprobe cs4232 returns:
FATAL: Error inserting cs4232
(/lib/modules/2.6.10-5-386/kernel/sound/oss/cs4232.ko): No such device

The soundcard works fine under FreeBSD, using the mss driver. If I can't get it
to work on Ubuntu I'll have to reinstall FreeBSD. I was surprised that sound
works so well under FreeBSD and not at all under Ubuntu.

[Olaf (tholap)]

I have the exact same problem, but in my case it is a Gericom Silver Seraph
Laptop (PII 300). Same dmesg output, same series of beeps during startup and
shutdown.
I tried various boot options (noapic, nolapic, acpi=off, etc...) and had the
same problem with other Distros.
It only worked on Win98 with the driver that came with the Laptop.

[Olaf (tholap)]

Created an attachment (id=2110)
Silver Seraph: lspci -v

[Thomas Hood (jdthood)]

(In reply to comment #0)
> On bootup and shutdown, there are a series of beeps and error messages due to
> the soundcard not being found.
>
> dmesg reads:
> nm256: no ac97 is found!
> force the driver to load by passing in the module parameter
> force_ac97=1
> or try sb16 or cs423x drivers instead.
> NeoMagic 256: probe of 0000:01:00.1 failed with error -6

Did you try loading nm256 with "force_ac97=1" ?

[Olaf (tholap)]

> Did you try loading nm256 with "force_ac97=1" ?

I did - many months ago. Might have produced another error message (don't
remember), but did not solve the problem.

I'll upgrade to Badger Colony 3 and try force_ac97=1 again. Without that it
still didn't work when I recently installed badger 2.

[Thomas Hood (jdthood)]

(In reply to comment #4)
> > Did you try loading nm256 with "force_ac97=1" ?
>
> I did - many months ago. Might have produced another error message (don't
> remember), but did not solve the problem.
>
> I'll upgrade to Badger Colony 3 and try force_ac97=1 again. Without that it
> still didn't work when I recently installed badger 2.

The problem problably won't have been solved in the interim; however,
it will be good if you can quote the exact error message and provide
any other information that could possibly be relevant. ;)

[Ben Collins (ben-collins)]

This bug has been flagged because it is old and possibly inactive. It may or may
not be fixed in the latest release (Breezy Badger 5.10). It is being marked as
"NEEDSINFO". In two weeks time, if the bug is not updated back to "NEW" and
validated against Breezy, it will be closed.

This is needed in order to help manage the current bug list for the kernel. We
would like to fix all bugs, but need users to test and help with debugging.

If this change was in error for this bug, please respond and make the
appropriate change (or email <email address hidden> if you cannot make the
change).

Thanks for your help.

[Ben Collins (ben-collins)]

Closing, inactive.

[Michael Monreal (mimox)]

I had the "pleasure" to work on the Inspiron 3500 of my gf today. Same problem as described here with Ubuntu 8.04.1.

However, digging around I got it working.

1.) some mail from these http://www.mail-archive.com/search?q=inspiron 3500&<email address hidden>&start=0 seems to suggest that the Inspiron 3500's NM256 is actually no proper NM256. It seems to be missing AC'97 and use a Crystal chip.

2.) The solution posted here works for me: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=109057&page=3

-- quote --
In file /etc/modules added this line:

snd-cs4231

In file /etc/modprobe.d/sound I have:

blacklist snd-nm256
blacklist snd-opl3sa2

alias snd-card-0 snd-cs4231
alias sound-slot-0 snd-cs4231
options snd-cs4231 port=0x534 irq=5 dma1=1 dma2=0

[Michael Monreal (mimox)]

Oh... I have to set the audio to manual using these settings in the bios btw:

SB I/O address 220
WSS I/O address 530
AdLib I/O address 388
Interrupt: IRQ 5
1st DMA channel: 1
2nd DMA channel: 0