[G31M-ES2L, Realtek ALC883, Blue Line In, Rear] No autoswitch

[Weej Jamal]

Having only 3 outputs Pink = Mic Green = SpeakerOut, and Blue = Line In - I usually get a message when I want to use a jack for other purposes - usually asking if I connected headphones / speakers to the jack or not, the jack then autoswitches from Line In to LineOut this has been working great for almost a decade now on XP, but I remember not facing any issues with older versions of Ubuntu either. Not sure what's missing now.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 14.04
Package: alsa-base 1.0.25+dfsg-0ubuntu4
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.13.0-24.46-generic 3.13.9
Uname: Linux 3.13.0-24-generic i686
ApportVersion: 2.14.1-0ubuntu3
Architecture: i386
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC1: tiny 1285 F.... pulseaudio
 /dev/snd/controlC0: tiny 1285 F.... pulseaudio
 /dev/snd/pcmC0D0p: tiny 1285 F...m pulseaudio
CurrentDesktop: Unity
Date: Sat Apr 19 18:22:03 2014
InstallationDate: Installed on 2014-04-19 (0 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 14.04 LTS "Trusty Tahr" - Release i386 (20140417)
PackageArchitecture: all
SourcePackage: alsa-driver
Symptom: audio
Symptom_Card: Built-in Audio - HDA Intel
Symptom_Jack: Blue Line In, Rear
Symptom_Type: No auto-switch between inputs
Title: [G31M-ES2L, Realtek ALC883, Blue Line In, Rear] No autoswitch
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
dmi.bios.date: 09/29/2009
dmi.bios.vendor: Award Software International, Inc.
dmi.bios.version: F10
dmi.board.name: G31M-ES2L
dmi.board.vendor: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
dmi.chassis.type: 3
dmi.chassis.vendor: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAwardSoftwareInternational,Inc.:bvrF10:bd09/29/2009:svnGigabyteTechnologyCo.,Ltd.:pnG31M-ES2L:pvr:rvnGigabyteTechnologyCo.,Ltd.:rnG31M-ES2L:rvr:cvnGigabyteTechnologyCo.,Ltd.:ct3:cvr:
dmi.product.name: G31M-ES2L
dmi.sys.vendor: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.

[Raymond (superquad-vortex2)]

you need to change channel mode to retask input jacks as output

Simple mixer control 'Channel Mode',0
  Capabilities: enum
  Items: '2ch' '4ch' '6ch'
  Item0: '2ch'

do you mean rear mic and line in Jack are still available as input after you changed channel mode from 2ch to 6ch ?

you need to file a bug in kernel org

analog-input-microphone-rear: Rear Microphone (priority 8200, latency offset 0 usec, available: yes)
   properties:
    device.icon_name = "audio-input-microphone"
  analog-input-linein: Line In (priority 8100, latency offset 0 usec, available: yes)
   properties:

[Raymond (superquad-vortex2)]

http://www.intel.com/support/motherboards/desktop/sb/CS-034206.htm

you need to specify hint indep_hp=1 if you want independent headphone

[Weej Jamal (weejamm)]

@Raymond @superquad-vortex2

Thanks but you dont really explain HOW to do that - maybe because the report is detailed? I 'm fairly new to linux and I just filled out the Ubuntu crash form which was helluva lot more intuivitive than past forms - most of the data in there is auto-generated (apart from my note).

However I was able to solve this, in the report I noticed ALSA while previously I've only ever seen Pulse Audio, I looked up 'auto switching intel HDA alsa' on google which led me to an ArchLinux forum with someone in my EXACT same situation. One of the answers mentioned trying hda-verb which is how I found my solution:

1 - open up Ubuntu software Center
2 - search for alsa-tools-gui (I found this originally by typing 'hda', this popped up immediately)
3 - install it
4 - This is a COLLECTION of programs for the ALSA system - All need to be run from a terminal / command line window.
5 - type in hdajackretask in the terminal window and you'll get an awesome graphical list of which audio jack does what by default along with options to override the function of each jack (in my case I wanted the Blue jack in the rear to function as another speaker/headphone out jack)

I used this to fix the issue for now, but I implore the Ubuntu folk to include this tool by default!

[Raymond (superquad-vortex2)]

use

amixer -c0 set "Channel Mode" "6ch"

save your mixer setting before shutdown

alsactl store

restore your setting after boot and before pulseaudio start

alsactl restore

Alsactl output
!!-------------

--startcollapse--
state.Intel {
 control.1 {
  iface MIXER
  name 'Channel Mode'
  value '2ch'
  comment {
   access 'read write'
   type ENUMERATED
   count 1
   item.0 '2ch'
   item.1 '4ch'
   item.2 '6ch'
  }
 }

[Raymond (superquad-vortex2)]

https://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/tiwai/sound.git/tree/Documentation/sound/alsa/HD-Audio-Controls.txt

Realtek codecs
--------------

* Channel Mode
  This is an enum control to change the surround-channel setup,
  appears only when the surround channels are available.
  It gives the number of channels to be used, "2ch", "4ch", "6ch",
  and "8ch". According to the configuration, this also controls the
  jack-retasking of multi-I/O jacks.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.