[USB-Audio - USB Audio DAC] FiiO E7/TI Burr-Brown: Volume control does not work

[morsch]

The volume control for the FiiO E7 USB sound card doesn't work. Tested with the normal gnome volume control and in alsamixer. 0% mutes the audio, everything larger than 0% is full volume. Alsamixer only shows one control, labeled "PCM". The chipset is a TI Burr-Brown PCM2706. Might be related to #559939 (different chipset, though).

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.10
Package: alsa-base 1.0.23+dfsg-1ubuntu4
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.35-28.49-generic 2.6.35.11
Uname: Linux 2.6.35-28-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
AlsaVersion: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.23.
Architecture: amd64
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC1: moritz 2265 F.... pulseaudio
 /dev/snd/pcmC1D0p: moritz 2265 F...m pulseaudio
 /dev/snd/controlC0: moritz 2265 F.... pulseaudio
Card0.Amixer.info:
 Card hw:0 'Intel'/'HDA Intel at 0xfbff4000 irq 51'
   Mixer name : 'Realtek ALC892'
   Components : 'HDA:10ec0892,1458a002,00100302'
   Controls : 34
   Simple ctrls : 18
Card1.Amixer.info:
 Card hw:1 'default'/'Burr-Brown from TI USB Audio DAC at usb-0000:00:1a.1-1, full s'
   Mixer name : 'USB Mixer'
   Components : 'USB08bb:2706'
   Controls : 2
   Simple ctrls : 1
Card2.Amixer.info:
 Card hw:2 'NVidia'/'HDA NVidia at 0xf9ffc000 irq 17'
   Mixer name : 'Nvidia GPU 12 HDMI/DP'
   Components : 'HDA:10de0012,10de0101,00100100'
   Controls : 16
   Simple ctrls : 4
Date: Fri Mar 18 15:28:48 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.10 "Maverick Meerkat" - Beta amd64 (20100901.1)
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 LC_MESSAGES=en_GB.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SelectedCard: 1 default USB-Audio - USB Audio DAC
SourcePackage: alsa-driver
Symptom: audio
Title: [USB-Audio - USB Audio DAC ] Playback problem
dmi.bios.date: 08/20/2010
dmi.bios.vendor: Award Software International, Inc.
dmi.bios.version: F5
dmi.board.name: H55N-USB3
dmi.board.vendor: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
dmi.board.version: x.x
dmi.chassis.type: 3
dmi.chassis.vendor: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAwardSoftwareInternational,Inc.:bvrF5:bd08/20/2010:svnGigabyteTechnologyCo.,Ltd.:pnH55N-USB3:pvr:rvnGigabyteTechnologyCo.,Ltd.:rnH55N-USB3:rvrx.x:cvnGigabyteTechnologyCo.,Ltd.:ct3:cvr:
dmi.product.name: H55N-USB3
dmi.sys.vendor: Gigabyte Technology Co., Ltd.

[Johannes Sasongko (sjohannes)]

I don't know if it's relevant, but in Windows the E7 also makes the volume control non-functional.

[Duan Joubert (duanjoubert-0)]

This is not a bug... This is the correct way of handling digital audio output.

Digitally altering the volume affects does affect sound quality, so when you use a digital output, you want to output the volume at fullscale, unmodified.

Altering the volume is then left to your external equipment.

It works the same on OSX when using the optical output of a mac mini.

[Johannes Sasongko (sjohannes)]

That may be the idea, but the fact remains that the user is presented with a non-functioning volume control. At least the control should be disabled (which makes this a UI bug).

[Luke Yelavich (themuso)]

Not necessarily, there is some hardware that does exist that allows you to adjust digital output volume. In such cases, the digital output can only be used for stereo audio, and cannot be used for any surround sound uses.

[Marcus Tomlinson (marcustomlinson)]

This release of Ubuntu is no longer receiving maintenance updates. If this is still an issue on a maintained version of Ubuntu please let us know.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Linuxslate (johnapf)]

This bug affects me with a PCM2706C bare DAC (USB Soundcard standalone board). I use 2 other very similar external USB DAC's (Different chipsets) and the volume control works fine with them. Also verified on a laptop. Both Laptop and Desktop are running 18.04.4.4

At anything above silent, I get full volume. The volume for the specific source (application) can be adjusted under the Playback tab (software (ALSA) volume).

This is particularly obnoxious since each new sound begins playback at full volume.

I believe this is a kernel bug for this particular USB DAC.