Volume always too loud: "headphone" level always reset to 100% (AD1981B, ICH6)

[Gioele Barabucci]

The volume of the sound coming out from the headphone jack is always too loud.

When the GNOME volume applet slider is set to ~50%, I see the following values on alsamixer:

* Master: 52%
* Headhone: 100%
* PCM: 74%

The sound coming out from the jack is unbearably high.

If I set the slider to ~3% (a setting that produces an high but acceptable volume) the alsamixer values change to

* Master: 0%
* Headphone: 100%
* PCM: 10%

I found that setting Headphone to ~40% is the only way to get an acceptable volume when the GNOME volume applet slider is set to ~50%. The problem now is that these seems to be no way to store that value permanently, it is always reset to 100% on boot.

So,

* the default values for this device should be adjusted to values that produce an acceptable volume on the headphone jake.
* the value manually set for the Headphone knob should be restored on boot.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.04
Package: alsa-base 1.0.22.1+dfsg-0ubuntu3
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.32-31.61-generic 2.6.32.32+drm33.14
Uname: Linux 2.6.32-31-generic i686
AlsaVersion: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.21.
Architecture: i386
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC0: gioele 1219 F.... pulseaudio
                      gioele 4707 F.... alsamixer
Card0.Amixer.info:
 Card hw:0 'ICH6'/'Intel ICH6 with AD1981B at irq 23'
   Mixer name : 'Analog Devices AD1981B'
   Components : 'AC97a:41445374'
   Controls : 34
   Simple ctrls : 23
Date: Wed May 18 09:06:34 2011
EcryptfsInUse: Yes
PackageArchitecture: all
SelectedCard: 0 ICH6 ICH4 - Intel ICH6
SourcePackage: alsa-driver
Symptom: audio
Title: [ICH4 - Intel ICH6] Playback problem
dmi.bios.date: 11/29/2005
dmi.bios.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.bios.version: A07
dmi.board.name: 0WH415
dmi.board.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.chassis.type: 16
dmi.chassis.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnDellInc.:bvrA07:bd11/29/2005:svnDellInc.:pnOptiPlexSX280:pvr:rvnDellInc.:rn0WH415:rvr:cvnDellInc.:ct16:cvr:
dmi.product.name: OptiPlex SX280
dmi.sys.vendor: Dell Inc.

[Luke Yelavich (themuso)]

Thanks for your bug report. Please try updating your audio drivers, as outlined at the following URL: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Audio/InstallingAlsaDriverModules.

Thanks in advance.

[Gioele Barabucci (gioele)]

The page you linked, <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Audio/InstallingAlsaDriverModules>, is no longer available; it looks like the new one is <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Audio/InstallingLinuxAlsaDriverModules>.

[Luke Yelavich (themuso)]

Sorry, my mistake, the latter link you mentioned is the page I meant to point to.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Ben Davis (bendavis78)]

I'm also experiencing this issue in 12.04 on my macbook pro. If I look at alsamixer, the headphones volume is always reset to 100% if the volume is changed with the gnome volume control.

I noticed that if I open up the sound settings, and I change "connector" to "speakers", the headphone level will stay where I set it in alsamixer (and I can still hear audio from the headphones, and not the speakers).

[Philipp (phrudloff)]

Alsa still doesn’t restore its settings on boot. It even resets when unplugging my audio cable. This is a big annoyance resulting in quirky workarounds where people manually store a configuration and loading it via autostart after sleeping for N seconds.

Any way this can progress?