ROG MAXIMUS Z790 HERO: no sound from jack microphone

[vak]

If you have a jack microphone connected to your ROG MAXIMUS Z790 HERO motherboard and you go into Settings > Sound > Input, you'll see two entries:

  * Digital Input S/PDIF USB Audio
  * Microphone - USB Audio

if you detach your microphone jack the second one disappears. So, the second one is responsible for your jack mic.

Unfortunately, if you choose this "Microphone - USB Audio" no sound will be shown by the indicator gauge, even if you pull the mic volume to the maximum.

The default sound system in Ubuntu 23.04 is PipeWire. I see ALSA-related packages installed by default, but no pulseaudio and pulseaudio-utils packages.

It would be nice to get microphone working without creating a mess of different sound systems. I'd stay with ALSA+PipeWire without PulseAudio and without JACK.

I see that arecord can use ALSA to record sound from microphone, but what about Skype and your other apps that rely on usage of "Microphone - USB Audio" exposed via PipeWire? They don't work.

Any idea how to fix the mic issue without creating a mess?

thanks.

Other details:
----
% lsb_release -rd
No LSB modules are available.
Description: Ubuntu 23.04
Release: 23.04

% apt list --installed |grep -i pipewire
gstreamer1.0-pipewire/lunar,now 0.3.65-3 amd64 [installed,automatic]
libpipewire-0.3-0/lunar,now 0.3.65-3 amd64 [installed,automatic]
libpipewire-0.3-common/lunar,lunar,now 0.3.65-3 all [installed,automatic]
libpipewire-0.3-modules/lunar,now 0.3.65-3 amd64 [installed,automatic]
pipewire-alsa/lunar,now 0.3.65-3 amd64 [installed,automatic]
pipewire-audio/lunar,lunar,now 0.3.65-3 all [installed,automatic]
pipewire-bin/lunar,now 0.3.65-3 amd64 [installed,automatic]
pipewire-pulse/lunar,now 0.3.65-3 amd64 [installed,automatic]
pipewire/lunar,now 0.3.65-3 amd64 [installed,automatic]

% apt list --installed |grep -i alsa
alsa-base/lunar,lunar,now 1.0.25+dfsg-0ubuntu7 all [installed,automatic]
alsa-topology-conf/lunar,lunar,now 1.2.5.1-2 all [installed,automatic]
alsa-ucm-conf/lunar-updates,lunar-updates,now 1.2.6.3-1ubuntu9.1 all [installed,automatic]
alsa-utils/lunar,now 1.2.8-1ubuntu1 amd64 [installed,automatic]
gstreamer1.0-alsa/lunar-updates,lunar-security,now 1.22.1-1ubuntu1.1 amd64 [installed,automatic]
pipewire-alsa/lunar,now 0.3.65-3 amd64 [installed,automatic]

% apt list --installed |grep -i pulse
libcanberra-pulse/lunar,now 0.30-10ubuntu4 amd64 [installed,automatic]
libpulse-mainloop-glib0/lunar,now 1:16.1+dfsg1-2ubuntu3 amd64 [installed,automatic]
libpulse0/lunar,now 1:16.1+dfsg1-2ubuntu3 amd64 [installed,automatic]
libpulse0/lunar,now 1:16.1+dfsg1-2ubuntu3 i386 [installed,automatic]
pipewire-pulse/lunar,now 0.3.65-3 amd64 [installed,automatic]

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 23.04
Package: pipewire 0.3.65-3
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 6.2.0-31.31-generic 6.2.15
Uname: Linux 6.2.0-31-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia_modeset nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.26.1-0ubuntu2
Architecture: amd64
CasperMD5CheckResult: pass
CurrentDesktop: ubuntu:GNOME
Date: Sun Sep 3 13:04:51 2023
InstallationDate: Installed on 2023-07-03 (61 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 23.04 "Lunar Lobster" - Release amd64 (20230418)
ProcEnviron:
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 SHELL=/usr/bin/zsh
 TERM=xterm-256color
 XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=<set>
SourcePackage: pipewire
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

[Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt)]

ALSA is the common layer below PipeWire and PulseAudio so I'd recommend checking to see if the bug is originating in ALSA. If so then it might just need a config file change, or worse a kernel fix.

Sorry I don't know the commands but you should have a look at 'alsa-info', 'alsamixer' and 'alsactl'.

[vak (khamenya)]

@vanvugt the recording with `arecord` works:

`arecord -D hw:1,2 -d 5 -f cd -t wav /tmp/test0.wav`

Not loud enough, but works. I tried `-c 256` option to magnify the mic level, but got no distinguishable difference.

But anyway ALSA level seems to work.

[Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt)]

In that case I suggest reporting the issue directly to the developers:
https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/pipewire/pipewire/-/issues

[vak (khamenya)]

@vanvugt thanks, done!
https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/pipewire/pipewire/-/issues/3488

[vak (khamenya)]

It looks like the problem root is that the driver of alc4082 doesn't support S32_LE mode for the microphone

[Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt)]

I would rephrase that as "Pipewire fails to try S16_LE or S24_3LE when they're available".

https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/pipewire/pipewire/-/issues/3488#note_2082953