Headphone muted 12.04

[franbugallo]

Hi! After a fresh install of 12.04 I found that I had no audio comming trought my headphone output. I've added to the alsa-base.conf the line options snd-hda intel model=3stack because this helped some versions ago. It didn't. Please, let me know if you need more info.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.04
Package: alsa-base 1.0.25+dfsg-0ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.2.0-23.36-generic 3.2.14
Uname: Linux 3.2.0-23-generic x86_64
AlsaVersion: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.24.
AplayDevices:
 **** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
 card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: ALC268 Analog [ALC268 Analog]
   Subdevices: 1/1
   Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
ApportVersion: 2.0.1-0ubuntu5
Architecture: amd64
ArecordDevices:
 **** List of CAPTURE Hardware Devices ****
 card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: ALC268 Analog [ALC268 Analog]
   Subdevices: 1/1
   Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC0: fran 1743 F.... pulseaudio
Card0.Amixer.info:
 Card hw:0 'Intel'/'HDA Intel at 0xf8500000 irq 49'
   Mixer name : 'Realtek ALC268'
   Components : 'HDA:10ec0268,1179ff02,00100003 HDA:11c11040,11790001,00100200'
   Controls : 16
   Simple ctrls : 9
Date: Wed Apr 25 01:41:58 2012
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 12.04 LTS "Precise Pangolin" - Beta amd64 (20120328)
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 TERM=xterm
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 LANG=es_ES.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: alsa-driver
Symptom: audio
Symptom_AlsaPlaybackTest: ALSA playback test through plughw:Intel failed
Symptom_Card: Audio incluido - HDA Intel
Symptom_Jack: Black Headphone Out, Front
Symptom_Type: Only some of outputs are working
Title: [Satellite A200, Realtek ALC268, Black Headphone Out, Front] Playback problem
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
dmi.bios.date: 04/25/2007
dmi.bios.vendor: TOSHIBA
dmi.bios.version: V1.20
dmi.board.name: ISKAA
dmi.board.vendor: TOSHIBA
dmi.board.version: 1.00
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: *
dmi.chassis.type: 10
dmi.chassis.vendor: TOSHIBA
dmi.chassis.version: N/A
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnTOSHIBA:bvrV1.20:bd04/25/2007:svnTOSHIBA:pnSatelliteA200:pvrPSAE3E-02900GSP:rvnTOSHIBA:rnISKAA:rvr1.00:cvnTOSHIBA:ct10:cvrN/A:
dmi.product.name: Satellite A200
dmi.product.version: PSAE3E-02900GSP
dmi.sys.vendor: TOSHIBA
mtime.conffile..etc.modprobe.d.alsa.base.conf: 2012-04-25T01:37:51.586751

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Insane1 (fusionmetroid)]

Now I don't think this works within ubuntu because of the sound system used, but if anyone is willing to test this...I had the issue myself where the audio was so unbelievably low that it sounded like the headphones had no audio even at full volume (you had to listen extremely carefully). But try booting xubuntu. Open up the sound preferences (pauvcontrol) when the headphones are plugged in. Change the "port" from headphones to speaker with the headphones plugged in. I wind up personally getting full sound through the headphones, and not the speakers. It seems the speaker port works for both headphones and the normal speakers, while the headphone port causes extremely low vollume.

My system uses a similar sound chip to the bug reporters. An ALC model that uses the Intel HDA sound drivers.

[franbugallo (franbugallo)]

@Insane1 Thank you for your info; but I've tried several times to do what you describe and for me it makes no difference. I still get no sound in my headphones.

Hope someone could help us and fix this bug.

Thank you very much

[Dusty Herring (dlherring1964)]

@Insane1 I'm having the same problem with no sound from my headphone jack. Yes, I can confirm that if I change the "Connector" setting on the Output Tab from 'Headphones' to 'Speakers', I have full volume on the headphone jack and the internal speakers properly mute. Also, when I run alsamixer in terminal; headphones are listed but there is no graphic slider so using the arrows can't raise the volume. In other words, in alsamixer the headphones don't exist.

[psyray (psyray)]

Same problem for me, no headphone slidebar.
When i plug headphone jack, sound is muted on speaker slide, i need to raise the volume by hand in alsamixer.
Not possible in the gnome sound preferences

Ubuntu 12.04 64bits, Asus G73SW, HDA Intel ALC296VB.

See capture

lspci output for my laptop
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 6 Series/C200 Series Chipset Family High Definition Audio Controller (rev 05)
01:00.1 Audio device: NVIDIA Corporation GF106 High Definition Audio Controller (rev a1)

Kernel
3.2.0-24-generic #37-Ubuntu x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

[jamie campbell (3-jamie)]

@Insane1 that approach works for me but only survives the session within which it's done.. I have to redo it every time a reboot occurs (and since I have a laptop that moves around a lot, reboots are quite frequent creatures). Note that I can do the same solution just using alsamixer and changing speaker volume, but in both cases ( pavucontrol or alsamixer), the settings change is "forgotten" on shutdown.

I had the exact same problem 2 or 3 LTSs ago and ended up having to manually do some pretty crazy low-level stuff to work around it.. I'm really hoping I won't have to do that again.

[Insane1 (fusionmetroid)]

@jamie campbell

I added my own bug report on this. Find out which of your alsa controls needs to be unmuted for your headphones to work with alsa mixer. Then edit the file /usr/share/pulseaudio/alsa-mixer/paths/analog-output-headphones.conf

Change the line similar to
[Element Speaker]
switch = off
volume = off

to:

[Element Speaker]
switch = mute
volume = zero

Where Speaker is the channel your system needs unmuted for headphones to work. Mine had to have speaker unmuted.

[Insane1 (fusionmetroid)]

@Dusty

Refer to my post above. It seems that like some older systems used front as part of the headphone path...a few of our systems are now using "Speaker" instead. Check if that works for you.

[Aang (aang-aero)]

@Insane1

Your post #8 solved the issue for me. Thank you very much for the advice! :)

[Insane1 (fusionmetroid)]

@Aang
No problem whatsoever. I'm just glad I found a fix that works for some people which can be documented. This issue drove me nuts because nothing like this was written anywhere. Still awkward that our systems use Speaker for the headphone path, but it is what it is.

[Aang (aang-aero)]

Sorry, I should probobly give a little more info.

Post #8 solved my issue. Here is my system info:

Ubuntu 12.04 - 64bit, Asus G73JW-A1, HDA-Intel - HDA Intel

Audio device: Intel Corporation 5 Series/3400 Series Chipset High Definition Audio (rev 06)

Kernel
Linux 3.2.0-24 (x86_64) #39-Ubuntu

Thanks again!

[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.]