Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Thomas Hood]

Hello.  I am one of those responsible for packaging ALSA for Debian.

Does anyone have documentation of which machines require "External Amplifier"
to be on and which ones require EA to be off in order for sound to be emitted
in the simplest or most common machine configuration?

I have the same question about the "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack".

In Debian and Ubuntu we get complaints from users that sound "doesn't
work".  After some investigation it turns out that either EA or
AADOJ is set incorrectly.  Unlike other controls, it seems that there
is no one setting for these that is a "sane" value for all machines.  So
it seems that when our script is asked to set sane values, the script
will have to choose a value depending on the computer model.  But we have no
list of which models require the one setting and which models require the
other.  We thought that perhaps the ALSA developers have such a list.

What we would actually prefer is that the driver do this work and initialize
EA and AADOJ to "sane" values---if necessary depending on the computer model.
-- 
Thomas Hood


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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[James Courtier-Dutton]

Thomas Hood wrote:
> Hello.  I am one of those responsible for packaging ALSA for Debian.
> 
> Does anyone have documentation of which machines require "External Amplifier"
> to be on and which ones require EA to be off in order for sound to be emitted
> in the simplest or most common machine configuration?
> 
> I have the same question about the "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack".
> 
> In Debian and Ubuntu we get complaints from users that sound "doesn't
> work".  After some investigation it turns out that either EA or
> AADOJ is set incorrectly.  Unlike other controls, it seems that there
> is no one setting for these that is a "sane" value for all machines.  So
> it seems that when our script is asked to set sane values, the script
> will have to choose a value depending on the computer model.  But we have no
> list of which models require the one setting and which models require the
> other.  We thought that perhaps the ALSA developers have such a list.
> 
> What we would actually prefer is that the driver do this work and initialize
> EA and AADOJ to "sane" values---if necessary depending on the computer model.

Thomas,

There is no real answer to your question. All motherboards and sound 
cards that might contain the same sound chips, do not have the same 
connections with the outside world. So, for some, setting EA to 1 
enables sound, for others setting EA to 0 enables sound etc.
The only way we can overcome this is on a case by case basis. We add 
code to the driver so that it recognises a particular motherboard, and 
set it correctly for that particular motherboard.
So, the best way to fix this problem will be to raise an ALSA bug on 
https://bugtrack.alsa-project.org/alsa-bug/ or on the kernel bug tracker 
with full details of the motherboard and the sound chips involved, and 
it will eventually be fixed.

We would need the following:
The default settings, when not working:
amixer contents
cat /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0
cat /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0+regs

The settings when working correctly:
amixer contents
cat /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0
cat /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0+regs
lspci -vvn

James


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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Thomas Hood]

James Courtier-Dutton wrote:
> So, the best way to fix this problem will be to raise an ALSA bug on
> https://bugtrack.alsa-project.org/alsa-bug/ or on the kernel bug tracker
> with full details of the motherboard and the sound chips involved, and
> it will eventually be fixed.

OK

You told me what information is needed for "External Amplifier".  This was:

* The default settings, when not working:
  + The output of "amixer"
  + the contents /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0
  + the contents of /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0+regs
* The settings when working correctly:
  + The output of "amixer"
  + the contents /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0
  + the contents of /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0+regs
* The output of "lspci -vvn"

What information is needed in order to deal with the
"Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack" case?

-- 
Thomas Hood



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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Arnaud Patard]

Thomas Hood <jdthood@yahoo.co.uk> writes:

> James Courtier-Dutton wrote:
>> So, the best way to fix this problem will be to raise an ALSA bug on
>> https://bugtrack.alsa-project.org/alsa-bug/ or on the kernel bug tracker
>> with full details of the motherboard and the sound chips involved, and
>> it will eventually be fixed.
>
> OK
>
> You told me what information is needed for "External Amplifier".  This was:
>
> * The default settings, when not working:
>   + The output of "amixer"
>   + the contents /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0
>   + the contents of /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0+regs
> * The settings when working correctly:
>   + The output of "amixer"
>   + the contents /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0
>   + the contents of /proc/asound/card0/codec97#0/ac97#0-0+regs
> * The output of "lspci -vvn"
>
> What information is needed in order to deal with the
> "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack" case?
>
> -- 
AFAIK, the behaviour of the switch is consistent accross all the audigy
cards. If you're using Digital Speakers connected to the digital output
of the card, you have to set it. Otherwise, don't set it. It's setup
dependant. IMHO you can't do anything about that. [ IIRC, even the OSS
driver has this 'problem'. ]


Regards,
Arnaud Patard



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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Thierry Vignaud]

Arnaud Patard (Rtp) <arnaud.patard@rtp-net.org> writes:

> AFAIK, the behaviour of the switch is consistent accross all the
> audigy cards. If you're using Digital Speakers connected to the
> digital output of the card, you have to set it. Otherwise, don't set
> it. It's setup dependant. IMHO you can't do anything about that. [
> IIRC, even the OSS driver has this 'problem'. ]

some drivers have a sense mixer element.

cannot more drivers be patched in order to have such a behavior (if
possible)?



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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Thierry Vignaud]

James Courtier-Dutton <James@superbug.co.uk> writes:

> > Hello.  I am one of those responsible for packaging ALSA for
> > Debian.  Does anyone have documentation of which machines require
> > "External Amplifier" to be on and which ones require EA to be off
> > in order for sound to be emitted in the simplest or most common
> > machine configuration?
> > I have the same question about the "Audigy Analog/Digital Output
> > Jack".
> > In Debian and Ubuntu we get complaints from users that sound
> > "doesn't work".  After some investigation it turns out that either
> > EA or AADOJ is set incorrectly.  Unlike other controls, it seems
> > that there is no one setting for these that is a "sane" value for
> > all machines.  So it seems that when our script is asked to set
> > sane values, the script will have to choose a value depending on
> > the computer model.  But we have no list of which models require
> > the one setting and which models require the other.  We thought
> > that perhaps the ALSA developers have such a list.  What we would
> > actually prefer is that the driver do this work and initialize
> > EA and AADOJ to "sane" values---if necessary depending on the
> > computer model.

i second that. we have the same problem in Mandriva.
in the old days, we leave alsa as it and thus we got quite a lot of
complaints about non working sound (aka the mixer was fully muted by
alsa policy)

then we unmute everything the way we did for OSS drivers and set the
sound levels to 66%.

this resulted in quite some happy users but new complaints (though
less than before) b/c unmutting some mixer element was bad (larsen, no
sound, sound distortion, ...).
so we blacklisted some mixer elements we leave muted.

but some mixer elements (mainly external amplifier and
"*analog/digital output jack") are bug prone since if we enable them,
some users will be happy but others won't.
if we disable them, the later'll be happy but the former won't be
anymore.

> There is no real answer to your question. All motherboards and sound
> cards that might contain the same sound chips, do not have the same
> connections with the outside world. So, for some, setting EA to 1
> enables sound, for others setting EA to 0 enables sound etc.

in the future, we may switch to an ignore policy for such mixer
elements and let the driver put a sane default value.
then "bogus" sound-card owners should fill a bug report as you
resquested so that new subids entries get added to the drivers.
 
> The only way we can overcome this is on a case by case basis. We add 
> code to the driver so that it recognises a particular motherboard, and 
> set it correctly for that particular motherboard.
> So, the best way to fix this problem will be to raise an ALSA bug on 
> https://bugtrack.alsa-project.org/alsa-bug/ or on the kernel bug tracker 
> with full details of the motherboard and the sound chips involved, and 
> it will eventually be fixed.



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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Thomas Hood]

Thierry Vignaud wrote:
> i second that.

Here are the controls that are (currently) set in the ALSA initscript
in Debian.  I would appreciate it if you could give me a similar list
of controls that are set by Mandriva.

from /etc/init.d/alsa-utils:

        unmute_and_set_level "Master" "80%"
        unmute_and_set_level "Master Digital" "80%"   # E.g., cs4237B
        unmute_and_set_level "Playback" "80%"
        unmute_and_set_level "Headphone" "70%"
        unmute_and_set_level "PCM" "80%"
        unmute_and_set_level "PCM,1" "80%"   # E.g., ess1969
        unmute_and_set_level "DAC" "80%"     # E.g., envy24, cs46xx
        unmute_and_set_level "DAC,0" "80%"   # E.g., envy24
        unmute_and_set_level "DAC,1" "80%"   # E.g., envy24
        unmute_and_set_level "Synth" "80%"
        unmute_and_set_level "CD" "80%"

        mute_and_zero_level "Mic"

        # Intel P4P800-MX  (Ubuntu bug #5813)
        switch_control "Master Playback Switch" on

        # Trident/YMFPCI/emu10k1:
        unmute_and_set_level "Wave" "80%"
        unmute_and_set_level "Music" "80%"
        unmute_and_set_level "AC97" "80%"

        # DRC:
        unmute_and_set_level "Dynamic Range Compression" "80%"

        # Required at least for Via 823x hardware on DFI K8M800-MLVF
        switch_control "IEC958 Capture Monitor" off

        # Required on some notebooks with ICH4:
        switch_control "Headphone Jack Sense" off
        switch_control "Line Jack Sense" off

-- 
Thomas Hood


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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Arnaud Patard]

Thierry Vignaud <tvignaud@mandriva.com> writes:

> Arnaud Patard (Rtp) <arnaud.patard@rtp-net.org> writes:
>
>> AFAIK, the behaviour of the switch is consistent accross all the
>> audigy cards. If you're using Digital Speakers connected to the
>> digital output of the card, you have to set it. Otherwise, don't set
>> it. It's setup dependant. IMHO you can't do anything about that. [
>> IIRC, even the OSS driver has this 'problem'. ]
>
> some drivers have a sense mixer element.
>
> cannot more drivers be patched in order to have such a behavior (if
> possible)?

At least, on the audigy player/gamer, the connector used for the digital out is
also used for analog out (see
http://fr.europe.creative.com/support/downloads/download2.asp?manualID=807&Product_ID=237&regionID=3&Product_Name=Audigy+Gamer)
. Thus detecting if there's a cable connected or not to set the 'Audigy
Analog/Digital Output Jack' switch won't work.


Regards,
Arnaud



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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Thierry Vignaud]

Thomas Hood <jdthood@yahoo.co.uk> writes:

> > i second that.
> 
> Here are the controls that are (currently) set in the ALSA initscript
> in Debian.  I would appreciate it if you could give me a similar list
> of controls that are set by Mandriva.

cf http://cvs.mandriva.com/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/soft/sound-scripts/

the "initialize sound level script" is alsa_default.pl whose latest
version is:
http://cvs.mandriva.com/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/soft/sound-scripts/alsa_default.pl?rev=1.28&content-type=text/x-cvsweb-markup


it's called by reset_sound:
http://cvs.mandriva.com/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/soft/sound-scripts/reset_sound?rev=1.3&content-type=text/x-cvsweb-markup

reset_sound is called by an udev rule (alsa.rules which runs alsa.dev)
or by sound init script (if not using udev) on the first boot. It can
also be directly run by the end user to reinitialize its sound level
to what we set up on the first boot (ie if he messed up his config)



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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Takashi Iwai]

At Mon, 19 Sep 2005 15:03:42 +0200,
Thierry Vignaud wrote:
> 
> Thomas Hood <jdthood@yahoo.co.uk> writes:
> 
> > > i second that.
> > 
> > Here are the controls that are (currently) set in the ALSA initscript
> > in Debian.  I would appreciate it if you could give me a similar list
> > of controls that are set by Mandriva.
> 
> cf http://cvs.mandriva.com/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/soft/sound-scripts/
> 
> the "initialize sound level script" is alsa_default.pl whose latest
> version is:
> http://cvs.mandriva.com/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/soft/sound-scripts/alsa_default.pl?rev=1.28&content-type=text/x-cvsweb-markup
> 
> 
> it's called by reset_sound:
> http://cvs.mandriva.com/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/soft/sound-scripts/reset_sound?rev=1.3&content-type=text/x-cvsweb-markup
> 
> reset_sound is called by an udev rule (alsa.rules which runs alsa.dev)
> or by sound init script (if not using udev) on the first boot. It can
> also be directly run by the end user to reinitialize its sound level
> to what we set up on the first boot (ie if he messed up his config)

Maybe a good idea to add a small program/script to alsa-utils
package.  Calling amixer at each time is also not clever.
amixer should have the functionality to run commands sequentially,
e.g. reading from stdin.


Takashi


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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Thomas Hood]

Takashi Iwai wrote:
> Maybe a good idea to add a small program/script to alsa-utils
> package.

Yes, that would be nice.  Then we could all contribute to its
maintenance.  Note that alsaconf should run this script instead
of resetting mixer levels itself.

-- 
Thomas Hood


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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[James Courtier-Dutton]

Arnaud Patard (Rtp) wrote:
> Thierry Vignaud <tvignaud@mandriva.com> writes:
> 
> 
>>Arnaud Patard (Rtp) <arnaud.patard@rtp-net.org> writes:
>>
>>
>>>AFAIK, the behaviour of the switch is consistent accross all the
>>>audigy cards. If you're using Digital Speakers connected to the
>>>digital output of the card, you have to set it. Otherwise, don't set
>>>it. It's setup dependant. IMHO you can't do anything about that. [
>>>IIRC, even the OSS driver has this 'problem'. ]
>>
>>some drivers have a sense mixer element.
>>
>>cannot more drivers be patched in order to have such a behavior (if
>>possible)?
> 
> 
> At least, on the audigy player/gamer, the connector used for the digital out is
> also used for analog out (see
> http://fr.europe.creative.com/support/downloads/download2.asp?manualID=807&Product_ID=237&regionID=3&Product_Name=Audigy+Gamer)
> . Thus detecting if there's a cable connected or not to set the 'Audigy
> Analog/Digital Output Jack' switch won't work.
> 
> 
> Regards,
> Arnaud
> 

This sounds like we need to add an extra configuration that the user can 
do with the help of a simple command line or GUI tool.
This extra user supplied information will be "speaker arrangement".
I suggested this a long time ago, but never got round to deciding how 
best to do it. Maybe a new mixer control element that is present 
irrespective of the sound card being used, and that can also be read by 
the driver to configure itself.
The driver would present somehow to the GUI app the range of options the 
user has, and the user would then simply select the option they are using.
e.g.
1) SPDIF digital output
2) 5.1 Surround sound.
3) ... etc.

After selecting the option they think is right, there would be a simple 
click button saying "test" at which point it tries sending some sound 
out of the speakers.

We must, in all cases, identify which features are bugs in the drivers, 
and which have to be implemented as user space applications.

The "External Amplifier" setting is a driver bug, but requires special 
case quirks for each and every different sound card using the same sound 
chip. This setting should default to getting sound from the speakers, 
and not from the headphones.

The "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack" is directly related to 
"speaker-arrangement" as a single jack is shared between being an analog 
lfe/center speaker jack, and a spdif digital output jack.

The "External Amplifier" is only half the problem. There are 
motherboards with sound chips that if we send sound to the "front" 
channels nothing comes from the speakers on laptop A, but it works fine 
for laptop B. It turns out that sending sound to the "center/lfe" 
actually produces sound from the "front" speakers on laptop A.

So, in summary, instead of each distribution trying to write work 
arounds and scripts to get over the problem, they should in fact be 
raising bug reports with the alsa bug tracking system, so that they can 
be fixed.

I think that maybe there should be a kernel module option to get the 
sound cards to default to either "mute" or "50%" sound levels.
Then no scripts would be needed, and only a single module option would 
fix the problem for everybody.

So, please everybody, help us fix the problems instead of trying all 
sorts of workarounds!!!

James


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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Lee Revell]

On Mon, 2005-09-19 at 14:37 +0200, Thierry Vignaud wrote:
> (aka the mixer was fully muted by
> alsa policy)

This is not "ALSA policy".  This is ALSA refusing to put policy in the
kernel ;-)

Lee



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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Lee Revell]

On Mon, 2005-09-19 at 14:49 +0200, Arnaud Patard wrote:
> At least, on the audigy player/gamer, the connector used for the digital out is
> also used for analog out (see
> http://fr.europe.creative.com/support/downloads/download2.asp?manualID=807&Product_ID=237&regionID=3&Product_Name=Audigy+Gamer)
> . Thus detecting if there's a cable connected or not to set the 'Audigy
> Analog/Digital Output Jack' switch won't work.

The Windows driver probably has a timer check the SPDIF valid bits for
that channel every second and switches this setting accordingly.

Lee



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Re: Best default values for "External Amplifier" and "Audigy Analog/Digital Output Jack"

[Thierry Vignaud]

Lee Revell <rlrevell@joe-job.com> writes:

> > (aka the mixer was fully muted by alsa policy)
> 
> This is not "ALSA policy".  This is ALSA refusing to put policy in
> the kernel ;-)

this is still a policy per se. :-)



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