AC 97 sound not working (newbie)

[preatoria]

Hello everybody,

I am proud to announce that i am currently posting this from my first Linux Mint setup. It is nice to see how everything kinda works except for 1 thing.
My sound.

As you might realize, I am a complete newbie on the Linux environment. I thought why not give it a try and so I did. I tried debian before though but this is on laptop so i wanted GUI etc...

Now, where is my problem:
First i will tell you some stuff about my laptop where i installed this on.
It's a Targa Travelmate 820. Some cheap as laptop with nothing too fancy about it. Everything worked in windows although i had some problems with sound drivers in the beginning but i fixed that by downloading ac97 drivers. Anyway, now i installed this linuxmint and i am stuck when it comes to sound.

I seem to find 2 audio devices or whatever it might be.
See screenshots:
http://plingplingarzagar.mine.nu/Screenshot1.png
http://plingplingarzagar.mine.nu/Screenshot2.png

In device manager i find this:
http://plingplingarzagar.mine.nu/Screenshot3.png

Now, i downloaded some drivers from the realtek site for unix but i have no idea if it will work (which i doubt)
So i came to this forum for some help. I did not really know where to put the question so i just did it here, mods, move it if it's in the wrong section please.

Since i am a big newbie i would like you to be patient with me :/

Thanks in advance.

Kind regards.

lspci:

00:00.0 Host bridge: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 760/M760 Host (rev 03)
00:01.0 PCI bridge: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SG86C202
00:02.0 ISA bridge: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SiS963 [MuTIOL Media IO] (rev 25)
00:02.1 SMBus: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SiS961/2 SMBus Controller
00:02.5 IDE interface: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 5513 [IDE]
00:02.6 Modem: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] AC'97 Modem Controller (rev a0)
00:02.7 Multimedia audio controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] AC'97 Sound Controller (rev a0)
00:03.0 USB Controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] USB 1.0 Controller (rev 0f)
00:03.1 USB Controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] USB 1.0 Controller (rev 0f)
00:03.3 USB Controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] USB 2.0 Controller
00:04.0 Ethernet controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SiS900 PCI Fast Ethernet (rev 91)
00:0a.0 CardBus bridge: ENE Technology Inc CB1410 Cardbus Controller (rev 01)
00:0c.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): VIA Technologies, Inc. IEEE 1394 Host Controller (rev 80)
00:18.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] HyperTransport Technology Configuration
00:18.1 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Address Map
00:18.2 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] DRAM Controller
00:18.3 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Miscellaneous Control
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 661/741/760 PCI/AGP or 662/761Gx PCIE VGA Display Adapter

[Husse]

Check all settings for sound you find - it's quite often something has been overlooked.
I also see that you have an AC97 modem - this means a Win modem and they are intertwined with sound so check that the modem is turned on (yes often necessary for sound)

[preatoria]

Where can i check if it is on/off ?

[exploder]

Right click on the volume control in the panel and choose "open volume control", set your levels for Master, Headphones and PCM all the way up and see if you have sound.

Also, you can right click on the volume control and choose Preferences to check to see if your sound card is selected.

I have AC 97 sound and always have to do this to get my sound working right.

[preatoria]

Done, still nothing :/

[exploder]

I added to my post above.

Also, you can right click on the volume control and choose Preferences to check to see if your sound card is selected.

Have a look and see if your sound card is selected.

[preatoria]

Well, I have 3 sound cards there ... I do not understand that really :p
I got:
0: SiS SI7012 (alsa mixer)
1: SiS SI7013 Modem (alsa mixer)
2: Realtek ALC250 rev2 (oss Mixer)

0 had a filled circle. (a dot in it, it is checked, tagged whatever you like to call it)
1 not, 2 not (pretty logical if you can only chose 1 of those 3)

I would think it's the 3th that i need. Or am i completely wrong.
The problem is, if i check the 3the i don't find Master and stuff I only find PCM-2 and speakers

The 1: SiS SI7013 Modem (alsa mixer)
is not on the screenshots that i posted, it was there after i accepted some stuff with drivers.

[exploder]

I would think it's the 3th that i need.

You are right but it should say Alsa Mixer and Master.

[preatoria]

That's weird, any idea on how to fix that ?
If i select that i only get this:
http://plingplingarzagar.mine.nu/Screenshot2.png

If i go to preferences there, i get :
Volume, Speaker, Line-in, microphone, cd, pcm-2, video (all tagged)
in-gain
line-1
digital-1
phone-in
phone-out
(not tagged)

[exploder]

Can you post another screenshot so I can see your options?

Edit: I want to look at "Preferences".

[preatoria]

Okay,

http://plingplingarzagar.mine.nu/preferences1.png
Card 2

http://plingplingarzagar.mine.nu/preferences2.png
Card1

http://plingplingarzagar.mine.nu/preferences3.png
Card 0

[exploder]

Everything looks ok. I think the Alsa configuration is where the problem is. I will do a Google search and see if I can find the answer. Your card is a different revision than mine but it should work.I know there is a solution for this!

[preatoria]

Thanks for the help mate.
Really Appreciated


I got to go now, so if you need more details about stuff, send me pm or just post something here. I will answer asap.

[exploder]

The only thing I can think of is to go into the control panel, sound, and check out your settings there.

I can not remember the command to set up Alsa. A Google search did not yield anything helpful.

Hopefully we will get some more responses to this topic and get things going.

[Husse]

There may also be a hardware switch for the modem somewhere, probably on the bottom

[preatoria]

I tried to find a modem switch but can not find one actually.

Atm i am trying to install a driver for this sound. A friend of mine said to try this out. I am trying now, it's still installing. Let's hope it gets things going.

EDIT: checked the driver, nothing new, still no sound, nothing fixed

[preatoria]

I was thinking about what some threads on the internet say about the modem being turned on. My laptop doesnt have a switch on it for the modem to be turned on or off... Now, I booted up mint for the first time when i had vista installed on this laptop. Now, I can not remember if i actually downloaded/installed/putted on active hardware/inactive hardware or whatever in vista with the modem driver. I do not think that i manually installed it though.

My question is, does that matter ? and how it be changed (I installed mint after the first time i tested it out). So i can not boot up vista anymore :p (thank god). In my bios i don't even have an option to turn the modem on or off.

Kind regards.

[preatoria]

I am so stuck :/

Downloading KDE version as we speak, gonna try out that one.
I love this version too bad my sound doesn't work

[Husse]

I can not remember if i actually downloaded/installed/putted on active hardware/inactive hardware or whatever in vista with the modem

Ouch - I don't really understand why but it seems that you can inactivate sound, modem and wifi in Windows so it's still inactivated in Linux. As this is AC97 Windows may have a way to get sound with inactivated modem...
I've seen many posts, mostly about wifi but also sound, where people have booted into Windows and used (=activated) the device and it works when they boot up Linux again....

[preatoria]

Hm, so i guess i'll have to install a windows xp then.

I'll do that tomorrow or tonight.
But first i need to find how to instal xp next to mint.