Sound profile roll back from 4.1 to stereo in Ubuntu 11.10, also the connector in sound settings acts weird

[Kamil Nadeem]

I set the sound profile to 4.1 surround but when I turn up the volume(from the sound indicator)to high it reverts to stereo output.I think I found the reason of it being that when I increase the volume the connector in sound setting starts interchanging between Headphone and speaker(like crazy because I don't have a headphone connected) and because of that sound profile reverts to stereo output(as headphone connector doesn't support 4.1 surround profile). I have had this problem on all of my Ubuntu 11.10 installs. Is There A Fix? Thank You.

Here is is the screenshot of it http://i.imgur.com/oNUGn.png I selected 4.1 surround then increased the sound to max, the profile changed to stereo output as the connector started to interchange between speakers/headphones.

I have two jacks with my speaker system. 1st is green and is for front speakers, 2 is black and for rear speaker+sub woofer. I have plugged them as usual in the cabinet and the things is that this problem doesn't happen in my Kubuntu 11.10 install or any other distros that I have installed yet. This phenomenon of the connector shuffling between speaker/headphone is a first for me on Ubuntu 11.10 and has happened on all of my Ubuntu 11.10 installs.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.10
Package: alsa-base 1.0.24+dfsg-0ubuntu2
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.0.0-13.22-generic 3.0.6
Uname: Linux 3.0.0-13-generic i686
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
AlsaVersion: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.24.
ApportVersion: 1.23-0ubuntu4
Architecture: i386
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC0: kamil 1410 F.... pulseaudio
Card0.Amixer.info:
 Card hw:0 'NVidia'/'HDA NVidia at 0xf9f78000 irq 23'
   Mixer name : 'Nvidia MCP73 HDMI'
   Components : 'HDA:10ec0888,1462399a,00100101 HDA:10de8001,10de0101,00100000'
   Controls : 41
   Simple ctrls : 23
Date: Tue Dec 6 11:28:17 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 11.10 "Oneiric Ocelot" - Release i386 (20111012)
PackageArchitecture: all
SourcePackage: alsa-driver
Symptom: audio
Symptom_AlsaPlaybackTest: ALSA playback test through plughw:NVidia successful
Symptom_Card: Internal Audio - HDA NVidia
Symptom_Jack: Green Line Out, Rear
Symptom_PulsePlaybackTest: PulseAudio playback test successful
Symptom_Type: None of the above
Title: [MG-63MI-7109, Realtek ALC1200, Green Line Out, Rear] Playback problem
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
dmi.bios.date: 02/25/2009
dmi.bios.vendor: American Megatrends Inc.
dmi.bios.version: V1.5B3
dmi.board.asset.tag: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.board.name: MG-63MI-7109
dmi.board.vendor: XFX
dmi.board.version: 2.0
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.chassis.type: 3
dmi.chassis.vendor: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.chassis.version: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAmericanMegatrendsInc.:bvrV1.5B3:bd02/25/2009:svnXFX:pnMG-63MI-7109:pvr2.0:rvnXFX:rnMG-63MI-7109:rvr2.0:cvnToBeFilledByO.E.M.:ct3:cvrToBeFilledByO.E.M.:
dmi.product.name: MG-63MI-7109
dmi.product.version: 2.0
dmi.sys.vendor: XFX

[Raymond (superquad-vortex2)]

post the output of alsa-info.sh

is this a desktop or notebook ?

how did your 4.1 speaker connected? only green and black jacks

Node 0x1a [Pin Complex] wcaps 0x40018f: Stereo Amp-In Amp-Out
  Control: name="Speaker Playback Switch", index=0, device=0
    ControlAmp: chs=3, dir=Out, idx=0, ofs=0
  Amp-In caps: ofs=0x00, nsteps=0x03, stepsize=0x27, mute=0
  Amp-In vals: [0x00 0x00]
  Amp-Out caps: ofs=0x00, nsteps=0x00, stepsize=0x00, mute=1
  Amp-Out vals: [0x00 0x00]
  Pincap 0x0000373e: IN OUT HP Detect Trigger
    Vref caps: HIZ 50 GRD 80 100
  Pin Default 0x99130120: [Fixed] Speaker at Int ATAPI
    Conn = ATAPI, Color = Unknown
    DefAssociation = 0x2, Sequence = 0x0
    Misc = NO_PRESENCE
  Pin-ctls: 0x00: VREF_HIZ
  Unsolicited: tag=00, enabled=0
  Connection: 5
     0x0c* 0x0d 0x0e 0x0f 0x26

[Raymond (superquad-vortex2)]

do your speakers have a hardware volume knob to ChanGE the subwoofer ?

try surround40 profile

[Raymond (superquad-vortex2)]

Simple mixer control 'Headphone',0
  Capabilities: pswitch penum
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Mono:
  Front Left: Playback [on]
  Front Right: Playback [on]
Simple mixer control 'Speaker',0
  Capabilities: pswitch penum
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Mono:
  Front Left: Playback [on]
  Front Right: Playback [on]

there is an unused DAC and amp out which can be used for volume control for the headphone

ode 0x25 [Audio Output] wcaps 0x11: Stereo
  Converter: stream=0, channel=0
  PCM:
    rates [0x560]: 44100 48000 96000 192000
    bits [0xe]: 16 20 24
    formats [0x1]: PCM
Node 0x26 [Audio Mixer] wcaps 0x20010f: Stereo Amp-In Amp-Out
  Amp-In caps: ofs=0x00, nsteps=0x00, stepsize=0x00, mute=1
  Amp-In vals: [0x00 0x00] [0x00 0x00]
  Amp-Out caps: ofs=0x1f, nsteps=0x1f, stepsize=0x05, mute=0
  Amp-Out vals: [0x00 0x00]
  Connection: 2
     0x25 0x0b

[Kamil Nadeem (nadeemsdreamz)]

Thanks for replying.
It is a desktop. The speaker is a Creative 4.1, has two jacks, 1 gree(the front speakers) and 1 black(the rear speakers amd the subwoofer).
There is a hardware volume knob for volume and there is a hardware knob on the subwoofer(which is always set to the middle). I posted a video about it on G+ https://plus.google.com/112759940931397244391/posts/BpWXvRuMvRc , this bug as I mentioned on G+ has persisted from 11.10 to 13.04 daily. I mostly run Ubuntu(and Ubuntu based distro) so I haven't tested this on any other distro.

For the command that you asked:

kamil@kamil-MG-63MI-7109:~$ alsa-info.sh
alsa-info.sh: command not found
kamil@kamil-MG-63MI-7109:~$

I may be doing something wrong here.

[Raymond (superquad-vortex2)]

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Audio/AlsaInfo

if your desktop does not have any internal speaker

you need to fix up the pin default of node 0x1a to [N/A] instead of [Fixed] by early patching

http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/tiwai/sound.git;a=blob_plain;f=Documentation/sound/alsa/HD-Audio.txt;hb=HEAD

[Kamil Nadeem (nadeemsdreamz)]

Here is the output:
http://www.alsa-project.org/db/?f=6109fdfc3d33434b98f222de4dd9c56eb1f4c4f5

Sorry but I didn't get the fix that you mention.
Thanks for helping.

[Raymond (superquad-vortex2)]

HD-Audio Reconfiguration
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This is an experimental feature to allow you re-configure the HD-audio
codec dynamically without reloading the driver. The following sysfs
files are available under each codec-hwdep device directory (e.g.
/sys/class/sound/hwC0D0)

For example, when you want to change the pin default configuration
value of the pin widget 0x1a to 0x411111f0 , and let the driver
re-configure based on that state, run like below:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
  # echo 0x1a 0x411111f0 > /sys/class/sound/hwC0D0/user_pin_configs
  # echo 1 > /sys/class/sound/hwC0D0/reconfig

[Kamil Nadeem (nadeemsdreamz)]

Here is what I get:

kamil@kamil-MG-63MI-7109:~$ echo 0x1a 0x411111f0 > /sys/class/sound/hwC0D0/user_pin_configs
bash: /sys/class/sound/hwC0D0/user_pin_configs: Permission denied
kamil@kamil-MG-63MI-7109:~$ sudo echo 0x1a 0x411111f0 > /sys/class/sound/hwC0D0/user_pin_configs
bash: /sys/class/sound/hwC0D0/user_pin_configs: Permission denied
kamil@kamil-MG-63MI-7109:~$ sudo bash
[sudo] password for kamil:
root@kamil-MG-63MI-7109:~# echo 0x1a 0x411111f0 > /sys/class/sound/hwC0D0/user_pin_configs
root@kamil-MG-63MI-7109:~# echo 1 > /sys/class/sound/hwC0D0/reconfig
bash: echo: write error: Device or resource busy
root@kamil-MG-63MI-7109:~# echo 1 > /sys/class/sound/hwC0D0/reconfig
bash: echo: write error: Device or resource busy
root@kamil-MG-63MI-7109:~#

[Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt)]

Thank you for reporting this bug to Ubuntu.
Ubuntu 11.10 (oneiric) reached end-of-life on May 9, 2013.

See this document for currently supported Ubuntu releases:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Releases

We appreciate that this bug may be old and you might not be interested in discussing it any more. But if you are then please upgrade to the latest Ubuntu version and re-test.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for pulseaudio (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]