FC2 -> FC3 Upgrade on Toshiba Tecra 8100 Causes All PCM Sounds to be Scratchy - Workaround?
Hello everyone. I've just recently upgraded my FC2 laptop to FC3 and to my dismay the PCM playback (xine, xmms, aplay) all produce staticy sounds. I've googled on the subject and tried the following to correct it:
(As an aside sound in FC2 was spotty on this same machine ... however during it's life time, and several kernels the sound did work at one point, it always worked on FC1).
*) Made sure that my volumes aren't muted etc. I hear the sound, it's just horrid.
*) Added commands to /etc/modprobe.conf so that the sound levels were saved and restored ... that appears to work.
*) I think I've disabled the mysterious IEC958 device that everyone mentions needs to be turned off (I think that's it). The machine has a Yamaha chipset in it which displays as:
Vendor: Yamaha Model: Corporation YMF-744B [DS-1S Audio Controller] Module: snd-ymfpci
This is in Gnome. Sound doesn't work (for PCM) in Gnome or KDE same issue - crackling sound).
*) The modules appear to have loaded. lsmod displays tons of snd-* modules etc.
*) I tried setting up a /etc/asound.conf file so that it could 'duplex' sounds being played over the PCM channel (this was off the ALSA website).
*) I've tried to get sound working in Xine by switching the backend that it uses (to no avail). I've also tried, under KDE, to change the Gstreamer settings for the sink and source ... to no avail.
*) With this kernel I have typically had to set in /etc/grub.conf acpi=off - not sure if that's messing things up. I removed that and tried again but it didn't seem to help.
Where can I go for further information? Can I upgrade some packages? I guess what I'm confused about is that CD playing works great (crystal clear). PCM playback ... just crackles and hisses.
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! If this has been dealt within the archives just point me to the link so that I can read about it. I've tried searching but haven't really run across this same issue (nor solved it with any of the advice that I found).
cheers ian
Ian Wallace wrote:
Hello everyone. I've just recently upgraded my FC2 laptop to FC3 and to my dismay the PCM playback (xine, xmms, aplay) all produce staticy sounds. I've googled on the subject and tried the following to correct it:
(As an aside sound in FC2 was spotty on this same machine ... however during it's life time, and several kernels the sound did work at one point, it always worked on FC1).
*) Made sure that my volumes aren't muted etc. I hear the sound, it's just horrid.
Um. I don't have your hardware, but I suspect you've got something digital going down the wires that connect to your speakers.
Play something, and one by one mute everything that *doesn't* get rid of the music. When the noise goes, you've found your culprit...
James.
On Sat, 2005-02-26 at 12:03 +0000, James Wilkinson wrote:
Ian Wallace wrote:
Hello everyone. I've just recently upgraded my FC2 laptop to FC3 and to my dismay the PCM playback (xine, xmms, aplay) all produce staticy sounds. I've googled on the subject and tried the following to correct it:
(As an aside sound in FC2 was spotty on this same machine ... however during it's life time, and several kernels the sound did work at one point, it always worked on FC1).
*) Made sure that my volumes aren't muted etc. I hear the sound, it's just horrid.
Um. I don't have your hardware, but I suspect you've got something digital going down the wires that connect to your speakers.
Play something, and one by one mute everything that *doesn't* get rid of the music. When the noise goes, you've found your culprit...
James.
James - Thanks for the reply. I'll give that a shot. What tool should I be using to mute the channels? I'm not so savvy with the sound system ... do all the mixer's just control the same volume controls? So, kmix, aumix, aumix-minimal, etc? I'll play one of the distro waves/ogg files in /usr/share/sounds and see if I can get this to clear up. Lots of folks have mentioned turning of IEC958 (I think that was it) but there doesn't appear to be a way to do that (in some of the volume control programs that I've been looking at).
cheers ian
-- James Wilkinson | "Minis on the other hand are just the wrong size. Too Exeter Devon UK | small to work on directly and too large to put E-mail address: james | upside down on the workbench." @westexe.demon.co.uk | -- stevo at madcelt.org
On Sat, 2005-02-26 at 12:03 +0000, James Wilkinson wrote:
Ian Wallace wrote:
Hello everyone. I've just recently upgraded my FC2 laptop to FC3 and to my dismay the PCM playback (xine, xmms, aplay) all produce staticy sounds. I've googled on the subject and tried the following to correct it:
(As an aside sound in FC2 was spotty on this same machine ... however during it's life time, and several kernels the sound did work at one point, it always worked on FC1).
*) Made sure that my volumes aren't muted etc. I hear the sound, it's just horrid.
Um. I don't have your hardware, but I suspect you've got something digital going down the wires that connect to your speakers.
Play something, and one by one mute everything that *doesn't* get rid of the music. When the noise goes, you've found your culprit...
James.
I tried this, to no avail. Here's what I did.
1) Fired up FC 3 and logged into KDE. 2) Kicked off xmms with the KDE_Desktop1.wav (staticy noise can be heard from the speakers, I have it on repeat so it just keeps going). 3) I opened KMix at first and tried to adjust things. The only two controls that have any effect were PCM and Main Volume. 4) I then opened alsamixer and scrolled to the very far right. And reduced *everything* or muted it (if I could) moving back to the left. Nothing effects the sound until I get to WAV, PCM, and Main Volume. Every other control is at zero or muted.
Seems that the Toshiba's just don't want to play nicely with the sound control stuff I guess. I find it fascinating that in one of the FC2 kernels (I upgraded with yum) it started to work. Needless to say I was shocked, but at the next kernel upgrade it stopped working.
Thanks for the help.
cheers ian
-- James Wilkinson | "Minis on the other hand are just the wrong size. Too Exeter Devon UK | small to work on directly and too large to put E-mail address: james | upside down on the workbench." @westexe.demon.co.uk | -- stevo at madcelt.org
For the benefit of anyone else having this problem, I recv'd a message from Dan Corkill that suspending and then resuming (if you don't have it turned on you need to enable it in the BIOS) typically fixes this problem.
And indeed it did for myself, one suspend/resume and sounds (PCM/WAVE) are working like a charm. Neither Dan nor myself quite know why this causes sound to work ... but it does.
Thanks!
cheers ian
On Mon, 2005-02-28 at 09:03 -0700, Ian Wallace wrote:
On Sat, 2005-02-26 at 12:03 +0000, James Wilkinson wrote:
Ian Wallace wrote:
Hello everyone. I've just recently upgraded my FC2 laptop to FC3 and to my dismay the PCM playback (xine, xmms, aplay) all produce staticy sounds. I've googled on the subject and tried the following to correct it:
(As an aside sound in FC2 was spotty on this same machine ... however during it's life time, and several kernels the sound did work at one point, it always worked on FC1).
*) Made sure that my volumes aren't muted etc. I hear the sound, it's just horrid.
Um. I don't have your hardware, but I suspect you've got something digital going down the wires that connect to your speakers.
Play something, and one by one mute everything that *doesn't* get rid of the music. When the noise goes, you've found your culprit...
James.
I tried this, to no avail. Here's what I did.
- Fired up FC 3 and logged into KDE.
- Kicked off xmms with the KDE_Desktop1.wav (staticy noise can be heard
from the speakers, I have it on repeat so it just keeps going). 3) I opened KMix at first and tried to adjust things. The only two controls that have any effect were PCM and Main Volume. 4) I then opened alsamixer and scrolled to the very far right. And reduced *everything* or muted it (if I could) moving back to the left. Nothing effects the sound until I get to WAV, PCM, and Main Volume. Every other control is at zero or muted.
Seems that the Toshiba's just don't want to play nicely with the sound control stuff I guess. I find it fascinating that in one of the FC2 kernels (I upgraded with yum) it started to work. Needless to say I was shocked, but at the next kernel upgrade it stopped working.
Thanks for the help.
cheers ian
-- James Wilkinson | "Minis on the other hand are just the wrong size. Too Exeter Devon UK | small to work on directly and too large to put E-mail address: james | upside down on the workbench." @westexe.demon.co.uk | -- stevo at madcelt.org
On Tue, 2005-03-01 at 11:17, Ian Wallace wrote:
For the benefit of anyone else having this problem, I recv'd a message from Dan Corkill that suspending and then resuming (if you don't have it turned on you need to enable it in the BIOS) typically fixes this problem.
And indeed it did for myself, one suspend/resume and sounds (PCM/WAVE) are working like a charm. Neither Dan nor myself quite know why this causes sound to work ... but it does.
For what it's worth, I also have a Toshiba Tecra 8100. I'm still running FC2 on it, and I've had intermittent "scratchies" all along... sometimes sound is cracked & broken, other times it's great.
I'll try the "suspend/resume" next time I get the "scratchies" & post my results.
Jay
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Ian Wallace -
James Wilkinson -
Jay Moore