[MOVED] Sound issue

Keep us posted!

I'm only getting sound out of my left hand speaker. I tried a new set of speakers yesterday thinking that I may have had a hardware problem. For all I know, it might have been that way for a while and I just didn't notice. The reason I think it's a software issue is that using the "Test Sound" check under System Settings/Sound, I get nothing on either side although the left speaker is working.

Edit: OK an update. By playing around with settings in System Settings/Sound, I am able to get a good "Test Sound" check on the left speaker but not the right which is not working. I noticed that the input on the input page keeps defaulting to the first one "Digital Input (S/PDIF)" and I can't get a sound check at all although the left speaker still works. When I change it to one of the "Analog input" choices, I can get a good "Sound Test" but on the left speaker only. Even though I can't get a sound test in "Digital Input," my left speaker actually does work.

Edit II: I booted up Windows XP and both speakers are working so I think it's likely a new operating system problem.

From "Advanced Options for Zorin," I've booted into "Recovery Mode" a couple times trying both 3.13.0-35 and 3.13.0-30, selected "Enable Networking" as Wolfman suggested and run "dpkg" to repair packages then hit Ctrl-Alt-Delete or "Resume Boot" but still have only the one speaker operating. I'm at a loss.

And in System Settings:Sound:Input, the setting keeps defaulting to "Digital Input (S/PDIF) where the "Sound Test" doesn't work at all.

Like I said, I tried a new set of speakers and since I've installed Zorin along side Window XP, I booted into XP and both speakers work there so I don't think it's a hard ware problem.

The support team haven't been able to address this. Does anyone have any ideas I can try?

Hi, does this help?

http://www.unixmen.com/2012003-howto-re ... on-ubuntu/

Keep us posted!

Keep us posted!

That didn't fix the problem:

My Alsamixer doesn't look anything like the example:

Second, going through the process deleted a number of icons in the "System Settings" including "Sound."

I've tried the "dkpg" again but now the right hand icons on the AWN bar aren't loading (connection, sound, time/date, name with drop down menu, etc). Is it possible to select a restore point from yesterday before we go on?

Thanks

I think the only 'restore' option pertains to the Desktop theme and nothing else unless you made a backup image. As for the right bit of the menu disappearing, this seems to be a recurring issue - right-click the panel and select 'Preferences' - move to top and back to bottom then it should appear once more. I would check what ALSA packages are installed using Synaptic Package Manager (Menu | System Tools | Administration):

There is a 'systemsettings' package not installed in Zorin in Synaptic - so not sure what to advise on that one - best thing to do is open synaptic and Mark all upgrades and apply - keep us posted!

Just had a closer look at that second screenshot - I am wondering if you have done an update to latest Ubuntu - this is OFF by default in Software Updater | Settings - can you check that for me?

Just had a closer look at that second screenshot - I am wondering if you have done an update to latest Ubuntu - this is OFF by default in Software Updater | Settings - can you check that for me?

I can't tell which switch you're asking about but all the boxes are checked on the Zorin Software page except "source code" which is marked: (-)

When I start Software Updater, it checks for updates. Then the window comes up "Failed to download repository information." When I click "OK" the window changes to "The software on this computer is up to date" or "No software updates are available."

Hi Jesse, I was looking at the icons and the open close on the window - the scheme looks like Ubuntu rather than Zorin - I need you to check here:

Hi Jesse, I was looking at the icons and the open close on the window - the scheme looks like Ubuntu rather than Zorin - I need you to check here:

I can't find Software Updater that looks like your first screenshot. When I select Software Updater, it immediately looks for updates to load. When it tells me "software is up to date", I select the settings button and get:

I can't select any of the boxes you have checked on your second picture. The checkmark disappears immediately. So odd.

I went ahead and reinstalled Zorin 9 yesterday and did the installation following Wolfman's post. Got the AWN bar back and all the icons in System Settings but still have the same audio glitch: that is sound from only in one speaker. My Alsamixer doesn't look anything like the example in my previous post. I tried a new set of speakers with the same outcome. XP, running on a different partition, plays both speakers so I feel confident it's not a hardware problem.

Am I the only person who ever complained about this? I'd be interested in hearing from other moderators or users if they ever encountered something like this before and any ideas they might have. As a reminder, you have to talk to me like I don't know anything. Be specific.

Thanks
Jesse

Hi Jesse, I haven't had a speaker issue as such but a whining noise as though 'line-in' active!

I should hasten to add that I have the full Gnome installed which is why I might have the ticks in mine and you don't in yours - that said, I could be totally off the wall! Gizmuntu?

I should hasten to add that I have the full Gnome installed which is why I might have the ticks in mine and you don't in yours - that said, I could be totally off the wall! Gizmuntu?

What does that mean having the full Gnome installed?

In Zorin 8, I had those three automatic download boxes checked but for some reason, they won't stay checked now.

If you open Synaptic Package Manager (Menu | System Tools | Administration | Synaptic) and in the search box enter 'gnome' you will see it is unchecked - Warning! You will be asked as to which Desktop Manager to install - ldm or gdm - I opted for the latter as I like the dark login screen (reminds me of PearOS that is no more!).

I would check what ALSA packages are installed using Synaptic Package Manager (Menu | System Tools | Administration):

OK still working the speaker problem and the fact that my Software Updater won't stay checked on the automatic updates you have listed on your screenshot.

Checked the Synaptic package screen and have the same Alsa settings check as you but don't have all the stuff listed in between on your screenshot: firmware loaders, OSS, source, tools, tools-gui
Alsaplayer - Alsa, common, daemon, CSD, GTK, jack, NAS, OSS, Text, sosd.

Even though it's not checked, could this be an issue with my speaker not working? Go back to the 4th post in this thread and see what my Alsamixer looks like - not much there.

Second, I haven't downloaded the full Gnome yet but I didn't do that with 8 and had the same checkmarks in Software Updater "Update" settings that you have: Important Security updates, Recommended updates and Unsupported updates. For some reason they won't stay checked. I don't mind getting the full Gnome if you think that will help. Was the full Gnome standard equipment on Zorin 8?

Hi, are your software sources set to 'Main Server'? sometimes this can cause an issue when installing updates.

Please advise.

Hi, are your software sources set to 'Main Server'? sometimes this can cause an issue when installing updates. Please advise.

After locating the Zorin software "download from" menu bar under "Software Updater" and "Settings", I changed the server from "US" to "Main" and have done updates every day for the last 2 or 3 days including booting up in "Recovery Mode", selecting "Networking" then doing a "dpkg" run to fix broken packages and rebooted with "Ctrl-Alt-Delete" like Wolfman suggests but it didn't help. I still can't check those boxes in Software & Update "Updates" and only have one speaker working.

Hi Jesse, there appears to be a few people suffering from sound issues in Ubuntu and even in earlier incarnations - one piece of advice I read on a thread suggests installing the latest alsa driver from launchpad:

https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/trusty/+source/alsa-driver

Download the .tar.bz2 package (middle one listed near bottom of article), install alien from Terminal:

Code:

sudo apt-get install alien

Then navigate to the tar.bz2 download folder and enter:

Code:

sudo alien [name of package]

- this will create a .deb package to install.

Next, if you don't have gdebi already installed, enter:

Code:

sudo apt-get install gdebi

Now right-click the newly created .deb package and select 'Open with ...' gdebi.

Let it run, run updates:

Code:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

then reboot machine.

Keep us posted

Then navigate to the tar.bz2 download folder and enter:

Code:

sudo alien [name of package]

- this will create a .deb package to install.

You lost me. I can call up the tar.bz2 debian folder in "Downloads" but don't I enter sudo commands in "Terminal"?
Also, what will the [name of package] be?

If you don't tell me specifically what to do, it's over my head. Thanks.

https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/trusty/+so ... an.tar.bz2

The above is what you download (let's say to Downloads) then you navigate to the Downloads folder in a Terminal:

1.

Code:

cd Downloads

2. then:

Code:

sudo alien alsa-driver_1.0.25+dfsg-0ubuntu4.debian.tar.bz2

This will create the .deb file in your downloads folder - it might appear with a red circle and white cross on it but ignore this. Then right-click and follow instructions I gave in earlier post.

This will create the .deb file in your downloads folder - it might appear with a red circle and white cross on it but ignore this. Then right-click and follow instructions I gave in earlier post.

jesse@Clientpro-385:~$ cd Downloads
jesse@Clientpro-385:~/Downloads$ sudo alien alsa-driver_1.0.25+dfsg-0ubuntu4.debian.tar.bz2
[sudo] password for jesse:
mkdir: cannot create directory ‘dfsg-0/debian’: File exists
mkdir dfsg-0/debian failed: at /usr/share/perl5/Alien/Package/Deb.pm line 299, <FILELIST> line 101.
jesse@Clientpro-385:~/Downloads$

What am I doing wrong Boss? I tried renaming the Alsa driver file in Downloads thinking Zorin couldn't name the folder and the file the same thing and then it tells me it can't find the file.

Hi, I will need a couple of days to try and get another install of this on my new drive which arrived yesterday - collected first thing - and I may be seeing someone who is having internet issuew in Windows this pm so please be patient!

Anyone?

Am I the only one having these glitches? For example, my Adobe Flash crashes if I minimize the streaming window.

Sorry getting back to you so late, I have had issues with my back hence my absence from the forum of late - I will see what happens when I install on my failing drive now that I have cloned to the new drive!

Sorry getting back to you so late, I have had issues with my back hence my absence from the forum of late...

Sorry to hear about your back. I've had a muscle in my back that goes off every once in a while since it's first spasm in 1990 and it's awful. That's when you realize that every nerve ending in your whole body is connected through your back.

I have similar issue with my ASUS N550JV-DB72T laptop. Cant get any sound from built in speakers, but if i plug in external speakers, they work. I use Zorin 9 Core, dual booted it with win 8.1 using non-tradidtional method. Alsa mixer didnt fix it. Not sure what to do next. Any help would be great. Im not sure, but i think sound card is Realtek.

Thanks,
Stan

I have similar issue with my ASUS N550JV-DB72T laptop. Cant get any sound from built in speakers, but if i plug in external speakers, they work. I use Zorin 9 Core, dual booted it with win 8.1 using non-tradidtional method. Alsa mixer didnt fix it. Not sure what to do next. Any help would be great. Im not sure, but i think sound card is Realtek.

Thanks,
Stan

Hi Stan, please could you start your own thread in order to get a reply to this please!

Hi Jesse, I was able to solve my sound issue. I checked which sound card i have (or in your case it could be a integrated chip), i went to their website and they had a linux driver, which i installed and it works. Make sure that after installing new driver you shut down your system (Do not restart!) and it should work. Check if it is compatible here: http://www.linuxcompatible.org/compatdb ... linux.html

HI Stan, thanks for your input - any joy Jesse?

...any joy Jesse?

Thanks guys.

Apparently, in Alsamixer my sound card is labeled:

Card: HDA ATI HDMI
Chip: ATI R6xx HDMI

In Terminal, it looks like there are two sound cards - is that right?

jesse@Clientpro-385:~$ cat /proc/asound/cards
0 [HDMI ]: HDA-Intel - HDA ATI HDMI
HDA ATI HDMI at 0xe0210000 irq 49
1 [CA0106 ]: CA0106 - CA0106
Audigy SE [SB0570] at 0x1000 irq 21

Is this making sense? On the link Stan gave me, I'm not seeing a Linux driver for these.

Hi Jesse,

It sure looks that way - do you have an on-board HDMI socket and one on the Video Card?

...do you have an on-board HDMI socket and one on the Video Card?

I'm not quite sure what you're asking.

There are 4 female receptacles (sockets?) on the back of the tower in pastel colors: blue, pink, black & green. A male jack is plugged into the green one which runs my computer speakers. There are two female receptacles (pink and green) on the front of the tower where I have the computer monitor's (it's a 27" Westinghouse digital TV set built to double as a computer monitor) speakers plugged into the green socket.

Does that sound like the answer to your question is "yes"?

Is the Audigy SE a video card with sound capability or is it strictly a sound card?

Hi Jesse, could you open your sound settings and capture the window of Sound settings and upload to the forum?

How to here:

http://www.veoh.com/watch/v385833212XzmANbj

...could you open your sound settings and capture the window of Sound settings and upload to the forum?

Here you go -

Hi Jesse, thanks for those invaluable screenshots - it is a known bug in Ubuntu 14.04 with your particular sound card - scroll down to 'runrickus' post here:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2217724

direct link to runrickus' post:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php? ... st12994878

Well worth to read the entire thread.

- it is a known bug in Ubuntu 14.04 with your particular sound card - scroll down to 'runrickus' post here:

Everything seemed to go fine until I got to step 5: make -jX

Clarification: The X in "-jX" is a number of CPU cores your computer has +1. So if you have 4 cores CPU you use -j5, and if that CPU has Hyperthreading, then it would be -j9. I hope you get the picture.

Under "About This Computer" the processor is listed as: Intel® Core™2 CPU 6420 @ 2.13GHz × 2

so I guess I would use 3 (Core 2 + 1) as in "make -j3", correct? But I don't know if my computer CPU has Hyperthreading.

UPDATE: I was able to fix it using this from agemini68 on the Ubuntu forum you linked. Thanks for the help!

1. In the terminal, type in alsamixer
2. Select your soundcard (press F6), mine was CA0106.
3. Look for stereo items, Bars with one channel muted (text beneath bars looks like "63<>0").
4. Make volumes equal (63<>63) using keyboard controls (UP/DOWN, Q/Z, E/C). Or use arrow keys
5. Exit (ESC), no need to save manually.

Got plenty of sound now. Also, I went back to using Google Chrome where I can watch Netflix now without a patch and deleted Pipelight which fixed a number of the little glitches I was experiencing.

Hi Jesse, hopefully someone else can answer you on that one - I've always been an AMD man myself - the one exception being the HP Mini 110 Atom Processor!

...hopefully someone else can answer you on that one...

Since I got halfway though Milos_SD's instructions for "How to Compile Pulseaudio from git" before I tried agemini's fix, could I undo what I've done so far by using the "sudo apt-get autoremove" command or would it be more involved?

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php? ... st12954078

Hi Jesse, If you know what packages you installed (there should be something in 'var log') you may need to name them - when you use 'autoremove' on its own it tends to remove earlier kernels - which are always useful if the current one baulks at anything for any reason - bit (BUT NOT THE SAME AS!) System Restore/Safe mode.