snd-hda-intel needs machine-specific flags sometimes

[Claude Heiland-Allen]

On claude's laptop 'zebimus' booted with 2010-01-11T09:40 -dev.iso:

lspci:
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 03)
        Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device 306d
        Control: I/O- Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B- DisINTx-
        Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B- ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR- INTx-
        Latency: 0, Cache Line Size: 64 bytes
        Interrupt: pin B routed to IRQ 22
        Region 0: Memory at db000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
        Capabilities: <access denied>
        Kernel driver in use: HDA Intel
        Kernel modules: snd-hda-intel

dmesg:
[ 40.597010] hda-intel: azx_get_response timeout, switching to polling mode: last cmd=0x000f0000

mplayer with alsa output:
audio is incredibly quiet even with everything turned up in alsamixer
mplayer freezes at end of playback

jackd:
jackd watchdog: timeout - killing jackd (after about 6 seconds from launch)

there are workarounds with kernel and module settings (boot-time flags, no recompilation necessary), but different machines may have different workarounds...

[Claude Heiland-Allen (claudiusmaximus)]

the workarounds for 'zebimus' (for the generic-pae Ubuntu kernel) are here: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/267913/comments/40

[Aymeric Mansoux (aymeric)]

We need to create a section on the wikibooks to list some common alsa tips and tricks. In this case what are the popular alsa module arguments that can fix some problems with specific sound cards.

[Aymeric Mansoux (aymeric)]

I added the entry, please check http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Puredyne/Sound_Configuration at the bottom and fill it up with an example and generic method for module settings. Close the bug when it's done. Thanks!