No sound from Asus soundcard [SOLVED]

[rocket5375]

Hi-I hope someone can help me. I have recently installed an Asus Xonar Essence ST soundcard.It works without any problem in Windows, but I have no sound at all in Linux (the system is dual-boot). I'm running a new install of PCLOS 2010, fully upgraded via Synaptic. I have opened alsaconfig as root- the card is listed-but it has made no difference. When I open Control>Sound Configuration, I notice that the integrated graphics card (Ati Radeon 4200) is listed as a sound device (RS 880 audio device). I have read that this may be because of the HDMI port ( post from TexStar about "blacklisting" the HDMI driver), but I'm not sure how to go about it in my system (or if it needs to be done).The Asus is listed as "C-Media Electronics Inc|CMI8788 [Oxygen HD Audio"-I assume this is the Asus. The driver is "Asus AVx00 driver (snd_virtuoso [ALSA]". I have run some of the tests recommended in the "Troubleshooter" , but the results don't mean a great deal to me. When I try to play a video with VLC, I get the warning "Potential ALSA version problem:
VLC failed to initialize your sound output device (if any).
Please update alsa-lib to version 1.0.23-2-g8d80d5f or higher to try to fix this issue". Alsa is up to date, as far as I am aware. I also notice that Kmix will not load, nor alsamixergui.
Thanks in advance for any offer of help.

[T6]

"I notice that the integrated graphics card (Ati Radeon 4200) is listed as a sound device (RS 880 audio device). I have read that this may be because of the HDMI port ( post from TexStar about "blacklisting" the HDMI driver), but I'm not sure how to go about it in my system (or if it needs to be done)"

yes, that sound card has a bridge from sound card to hdmi, you need to follow those instructions to blacklist that bridge, i have seen ati integrated cards with this bridge since the x300, this one is not the exception

this link

http://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php/topic,66982.0.html

the alsa we have is 1.0.23-1

could be necessary to have a so new module for this not that new sound car?

first try that blacklist procedure

[rocket5375]

Thanks for the quick reply. I have made changes to the modprobe conf file (and saved them) as suggested by TexStar, but still no sound. There has been a little progress-VLC is no longer showing the error message, and I can now open alsamixer, but Sound Configuration is still showing the graphics card as well as the Xonar. I have re-checked the modprobe file since making the changes-it seems to show something different every time I open it ! You will probably have gathered by now that I don't really know what I am doing-I'm not very comfortable with this editing/command line stuff. I have also run alsaconfig again. From the look of the modprobe file (see below), it seems to me that the "blacklisting" has not worked, but I did enter the changes as carefully as possible.

install scsi_hostadapter /sbin/modprobe pata_atiixp; /sbin/modprobe ahci; /sbin/modprobe ata_piix; /bin/true
install ide-controller /sbin/modprobe ide_generic; /bin/true
alias ieee1394-controller ohci1394
install usb-interface /sbin/modprobe ohci_hcd; /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd; /bin/true
options snd_hda_intel index=1

alias sound-slot-0 snd_virtuoso
alias sound-slot-1 snd_hda_intel

I now also have a second (green) modprobe conf file-is this a back up file ? The contents are shown below:

install scsi_hostadapter /sbin/modprobe pata_atiixp; /sbin/modprobe ahci; /sbin/modprobe ata_piix; /bin/true
install ide-controller /sbin/modprobe ide_generic; /bin/true
alias ieee1394-controller ohci1394
install usb-interface /sbin/modprobe ohci_hcd; /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd; /bin/true
alias sound-slot-0 snd_virtuoso
alias sound-slot-0 snd_virtuoso
alias snd-card-0 snd-hda-intel
alias sound-slot-0 snd-hda intel
options snd_hda_intel index=1

Where do I go from here ?

[T6]

"You will probably have gathered by now that I don't really know what I am doing-I'm not very comfortable with this editing/command line stuff"

you can open that file in kwrite but open it as root when opening it on dolphin(if you are in kde4)

it can ask and use root password, i am not a friend of console either

do you have a integrated sound card enabled on that box?  verify that your onboard sound card is disabled

[Phil]

Fancy beast....

http://techgage.com/article/using_the_asus_xonar_essence_stx_under_linux/

Do you have 2 sound cards enabled? The chipset on your box and the fancy beast? Perhaps in the bios disable the onboard card and leave the fancy beast enabled.

Just thoughts

[rocket5375]

The "fancy beast " is a fantastic card for the headphone user-great for music and movies (when it is working !) I had already been into the bios to disable the "Onboard Audio Function"-I assume that this is all I needed to do. Thanks for the link, Phil-I had already seen it. Nice to know that it works well under linux; there's just no information on how to install it ! I edited the modprobe conf file by opening Konqueror in super-user mode. Double-clicking the file automatically opened it in Kwrite. Can anyone tell me why I now have two modprobe conf files ? (Actually, one is modprobe conf, and the other is modprobe conf~).

[T6]

the second with the weird symbol is a backup file if the one you edited gives problems delete it and rename the second one by deleting the extra symbol

[herve49]

Hello All,

I had the same problem with this soundcard.

Here my modeprobe.conf and my modprobe.d/blacklist. that has resolved the problem.
Now i have sound in all the apps.

[root@zlinux etc]# cat modprobe.conf
install scsi_hostadapter /sbin/modprobe pata_jmicron; /sbin/modprobe ahci; /sbin/modprobe ata_piix; /bin/true
install ide-controller /sbin/modprobe ide_pci_generic; /sbin/modprobe ide_generic; /bin/true
install usb-interface /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd; /bin/true
alias pci:v000010ECd00008168sv00001043sd000083A3bc02sc00i00 r8169
alias eth0 r8169
alias sound-slot-1 unknown
alias sound-slot-0 snd_virtuoso
[root@zlinux etc]# cat modprobe.d/blacklist
blacklist ssb

blacklist ssb
blacklist vt1828s
blacklist snd_hda_intel
blacklist snd hda intel
[root@zlinux etc]#

Hope that will help

Hervé

[rocket5375]

Thanks Herve. I have added those lines to the blacklist file, and I think the modprobe file is OK, but still no sound. At least the graphics card is no longer appearing in Sound Configuration. Nothing is muted, as far as I am aware. Do the forth and fifth lines from the top in your modprobe file relate to the soundcard ? Here are my modprobe conf and modprobe.d blacklist files :

install scsi_hostadapter /sbin/modprobe pata_atiixp; /sbin/modprobe ahci; /sbin/modprobe ata_piix; /bin/true
install ide-controller /sbin/modprobe ide_generic; /bin/true
alias ieee1394-controller ohci1394
install usb-interface /sbin/modprobe ohci_hcd; /sbin/modprobe ehci_hcd; /bin/true
options snd_hda_intel index=1

alias sound-slot-0 snd_virtuoso
alias sound-slot-1 snd_hda_intel


blacklist ssb

blacklist ssb
blacklist vt1828s
blacklist snd_hda_intel
blacklist snd hda intel

Addendum: Success, at last. I opened alsamixer and suddenly realised that the analog output has been set to "speaker" instead of "headphones" all the time ! I'm not sure if any of the more advanced options are available, but at least I now have basic stereo sound. Thanks to all those who kindly offered advice. I was beginning to doubt that I would ever get the card to work.