Problem with sound and a small graphic problem

[vega2k]

Hello,
I'm kinda new to linux and need some help to get started and hope you could help me out.
I've installed Mint now for the first time and installed the graphic drivers for my nVIDIA GeForce 8800GT (compiled from source) and it works great, except one things. For some reason I cant turn on visual effects it just tells me "Desktop effects could not be enabled" and turn back to normal. Anyway to fix this?

And now to my biggest problem the audio.
I've have a on board audio witch by the manufacturer should be a Realtek ALC883 but mint detect it as a ALC662 and then the audio out works great but I cant use the microphone.

I've also tried to compile the drivers from Realtek but thats just break everything and no audio device is found anymore.
I'm really need the microphone to work because I use skype for all my phone calls.
The mother board is a ASUS P5GC-MX/1333.

Thanks in advance.

[Slapshot]

Hi Vega2k

First off mate I have an Nvidia 880GTS card and I used the ENVY program from the System menu and just let ENVY configure and set up everything and I have full effects and the Nvidia settings program in the System menu. Beats the heck out of compiling something and it's the latest driver from Nvidia. Works a treat.

On the sound I'm not very good but if you open a terminal window and type alsamixer then paste what it gives you, you will get the codec it needs to use the card. The name ALC883 is just the name realtek give to the chip and other manufacturers use the chip in different audio cards. I'm not sure but it sounds like a high definition audio chip on the motherboard, mine in the spec is listed as ALC883, but is actually a Nvidia high definition audio MCP51.

Hope this helps till someone more au fait with sound comes on.

[vega2k]

Thanks for the fast reply Slapshot, I did try to install the card drivers with ENVY but it told me that my card wasn't supported. But after a complete removal of ENVY I did reinstall of the drivers from nVIDIA and now the graphic and the effects works perfect. ^^

I get following output from alsamixer:
Card: HDA Intel
Chip: Realtek ALC662 rev1
View: [Playback] Capture All
Item: Headphone

[Slapshot]

Hi Vega2k

Sorry but I've been at work. There is a lot of bug fixes in the newest Alsa driver. Try following this tutorial to compile the latest Alsa version. BUT where it shows the 2 scripts to run don't use those but use the modifies ones posted in the comments number 10 further down. This will recompile the latest one. Check you have all the packages installed that it mentions to compile and it should work. After you may have to add to or change the /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base file with the following sentence: options snd-hda-intel model=3stack ) or the right one for your card or even try them all till one works correctly checking Alsa mixer every time to make sure any new channels like the mic channel aren't muted.

Here's the options for your chip:-

ALC662
3stack-dig 3-stack (2-channel) with SPDIF
3stack-6ch 3-stack (6-channel)
3stack-6ch-dig 3-stack (6-channel) with SPDIF
6stack-dig 6-stack with SPDIF
lenovo-101e Lenovo laptop
auto auto-config reading BIOS (default)


Here's the link:-

http://www.antonywilliams.com/2007/10/bash-script-to-automate-compiling-alsa.html

Hope this help mate

[vega2k]

Thanks for trying to help me I really appreciate it. ^^

I've tried the script from that site but I get a conflict with libasound2 (/usr/lib/libasound.so.2.0.0) and if I remove that packages I'm forced to remove every package in the system. =(

[Slapshot]

Hi Vega2k,

Sorry but this is now getting beyond me. But I would suggest re-installing the alsa fron synaptic so you get the older version not compile the new one if it gives problems and I found this link for you to try under the Ubuntu forums. The title of the thread is ALC883 microphone doesn't work and towards the bottom a couple of people have got it to work and they say they are happy.


http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=449731

Try this and I hope it makes you happy mate. Let us know how you get on in case others have this issue.