Sound card occasionally not found

[Davor Cubranic]

Every so often, when I boot up into Ubuntu (Dapper, 32-bit Intel), the sound card is not found. Other times, it works just fine. I never run into this problem if I boot the same machine into Windows. The sound card is a Realtek ALC880 (HD sound) integrated with the motherboard. The motherboard is ATI's Xpress200 in a Shuttle ST20G5 (AMD64).

When the card is not found, I get the following error messages in the terminal window:

ALSA lib confmisc.c:672:(snd_func_card_driver) cannot find card '0'
ALSA lib conf.c:3493:(_snd_config_evaluate) function snd_func_card_driver returned error: No such device

Dmesg output shows the following two lines:
[ 40.994319] hda-intel: unable to grab IRQ 7
[ 40.994332] HDA Intel: probe of 0000:00:1d.0 failed with error -16

I will attach the full dmesg and lspci output separately.

[Davor Cubranic (cubranic)]

BTW, I notice that /proc/interrupts currently has the following entry for 7:

  7: 5889 XT-PIC parport0

I believe that when the sound card works, this shows:
  7: 7600 XT-PIC HDA Intel

[Davor Cubranic (cubranic)]

I haven't seen this since disabling the parallel port in the bios, so it was almost certainly caused by an IRQ conflict. But it does look like a bug that 90% of the time, IRQs were assigned so the sound card worked, and the rest it didn't.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Beginning with the Hardy Heron 8.04 development cycle, all open Ubuntu kernel bugs need to be reported against the "linux" kernel package. We are automatically migrating this linux-source-2.6.15 kernel bug to the new "linux" package. We appreciate your patience and understanding as we make this transition. Also, if you would be interested in testing the upcoming Intrepid Ibex 8.10 release, it is available at http://www.ubuntu.com/testing . Please let us know your results. Thanks!

[Xan (dxpublica)]

I think I have this bug too: sometimes the soundcard works and sometimes not. In 8.04.1
Can you say me what output do you need for diagnostic?

Xan.

PS: I include some files when soundcard does not work.

[Leann Ogasawara (leannogasawara)]

The Ubuntu Kernel Team is planning to move to the 2.6.27 kernel for the upcoming Intrepid Ibex 8.10 release. As a result, the kernel team would appreciate it if you could please test this newer 2.6.27 Ubuntu kernel. There are one of two ways you should be able to test:

1) If you are comfortable installing packages on your own, the linux-image-2.6.27-* package is currently available for you to install and test.

--or--

2) The upcoming Alpha5 for Intrepid Ibex 8.10 will contain this newer 2.6.27 Ubuntu kernel. Alpha5 is set to be released Thursday Sept 4. Please watch http://www.ubuntu.com/testing for Alpha5 to be announced. You should then be able to test via a LiveCD.

Please let us know immediately if this newer 2.6.27 kernel resolves the bug reported here or if the issue remains. More importantly, please open a new bug report for each new bug/regression introduced by the 2.6.27 kernel and tag the bug report with 'linux-2.6.27'. Also, please specifically note if the issue does or does not appear in the 2.6.26 kernel. Thanks again, we really appreicate your help and feedback.

[Davor Cubranic (cubranic)]

Leann, I haven't used Dapper since Feisty came out and haven't had this issue since then. As far as I'm concerned, this bug can be closed.