[SOLVED] No sound LMDE VIA VT8233/A/8235/8237 AC97

[Kittum]

EDIT ... In short the problem was a "broken BIOS" and I had to install a sound card, but here is the whole thought process.

I bought this motherboard used and it does look good and clean, but then again somebody sold it for a reason and I bought it cheep so this may be an issue of faulty hardware.
This is the first time that I have tried to use sound from this motherboard.

I just installed this board yesterday and loaded LMDE this morning with all 600 and some odd updates from these Repos.

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deb http://packages.linuxmint.com/ debian main upstream import backport 
deb http://ftp.debian.org/debian testing main contrib non-free 
deb http://security.debian.org/ testing/updates main contrib non-free 
deb http://www.debian-multimedia.org testing main non-free 

deb-src http://http.us.debian.org/debian stable main 
deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian stable main contrib non-free 
deb http://www.debian-multimedia.org lenny main non-free 
deb http://www.debian-multimedia.org squeeze main non-free 
deb http://backports.debian.org/debian-backports lenny-backports main

PulseAudio Volume Meter does show output during use of VLC and Totem but no sound from the speakers. The speakers tested good on an MP3 player.

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some-desktop kittum # lsb_release -rd
Description:	Linux Mint Debian Edition
Release:	1

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some-desktop kittum # uname -a
Linux some-desktop 2.6.32-5-686 #1 SMP Tue Jun 1 04:59:47 UTC 2010 i686 GNU/Linux

Gnome Version is 2.30.2

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some-desktop kittum # hwinfo --sound
25: PCI 11.5: 0401 Multimedia audio controller                  
  [Created at pci.318]
  UDI: /org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/pci_1106_3059
  Unique ID: Ssy1.xwlagyv6iZ6
  SysFS ID: /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:11.5
  SysFS BusID: 0000:00:11.5
  Hardware Class: sound
  Model: "VIA VT8233/A/8235/8237 AC97 Audio Controller"
  Vendor: pci 0x1106 "VIA Technologies, Inc."
  Device: pci 0x3059 "VT8233/A/8235/8237 AC97 Audio Controller"
  SubVendor: pci 0x1462 "Micro-Star International Co., Ltd."
  SubDevice: pci 0x0430 
  Revision: 0x60
  Driver: "VIA 82xx Audio"
  Driver Modules: "snd_via82xx"
  I/O Ports: 0xeb00-0xebff (rw)
  IRQ: 22 (8509 events)
  Module Alias: "pci:v00001106d00003059sv00001462sd00000430bc04sc01i00"
  Driver Info #0:
    Driver Status: snd_via82xx is active
    Driver Activation Cmd: "modprobe snd_via82xx"
  Config Status: cfg=new, avail=yes, need=no, active=unknown

/etc/asound.conf as seen here http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=141&t=58616

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pcm.pulse {
    type pulse
}
ctl.pulse {
    type pulse
}
pcm.!default {
    type pulse
}
ctl.!default {
    type pulse
}

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some-desktop kittum # lspci | grep audio -vvnn
1:00:00.0 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. K8M800 Host Bridge
2:00:00.1 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. K8M800 Host Bridge
3:00:00.2 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. K8M800 Host Bridge
4:00:00.3 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. K8M800 Host Bridge
5:00:00.4 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. K8M800 Host Bridge
6:00:00.7 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. K8M800 Host Bridge
7:00:01.0 PCI bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8237 PCI bridge [K8T800/K8T890 South]
8:00:0f.0 IDE interface: VIA Technologies, Inc. VIA VT6420 SATA RAID Controller (rev 80)
9:00:0f.1 IDE interface: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82C586A/B/VT82C686/A/B/VT823x/A/C PIPC Bus Master IDE (rev 06)
10:00:10.0 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev 81)
11:00:10.1 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev 81)
12:00:10.2 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev 81)
13:00:10.3 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82xxxxx UHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev 81)
14:00:10.4 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. USB 2.0 (rev 86)
15:00:11.0 ISA bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8237 ISA bridge [KT600/K8T800/K8T890 South]
17:00:12.0 Ethernet controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT6102 [Rhine-II] (rev 78)
18:00:18.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] HyperTransport Technology Configuration
19:00:18.1 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Address Map
20:00:18.2 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] DRAM Controller
21:00:18.3 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Miscellaneous Control
22:01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. K8M800/K8N800/K8N800A [S3 UniChrome Pro] (rev 01)

Many thanks in advance.

[Oscar799]

Moved here from Hardware Support

[Kittum]

One thing about trouble shooting linux is you tend to learn more stuff as you go.
I still have the no sound issue but I found some cool packages to use along the way.

Anyway back to business at hand. Here is some screen shots of the sound matter.

[Kittum]

Shots of Pulse audio.

Screenshot-Sound Preferences-2.png

[Kittum]

And one more of PA with and application running.

I was trying to come up with a creative way take a picture of no sound coming out of the speakers, but my wife made me spare you all from my goofy sense of humor.

[Kittum]

Since it is cold outside, I have a little bit of time to mess with this issue.

Keep in mind that I really don't know what I am doing, but-. From the few screen shots that I posted above, I feel that the software (PulseAuido, ALSA, ect.) is working fine. AND since I have had a fair share of faulty hardware issues lately, I am biased and inclined to think this is another faulty hardware issue.

I decided to poke around in the log files to see if there was a big red sign that said
"HERE IS THE PROBLEM". While there was not any big red signs, there was a few lines that gave me a few things to wonder about. Perhaps they are meaningless, good clues, or even the "smoking gun" - I have no idea. Perhaps you do.

This stuff came from the "messages" area of the "System Log Viewer". It seems to me that these are the logs created at boot up.

In this section I noticed "Phoenix BIOS detected: BIOS may corrupt low RAM, working around it.". This may or may not be normal but it got my attention.

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Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000] BIOS-provided physical RAM map:
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000]  BIOS-e820: 0000000000000000 - 000000000009f800 (usable)
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000]  BIOS-e820: 000000000009f800 - 00000000000a0000 (reserved)
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000]  BIOS-e820: 00000000000f0000 - 0000000000100000 (reserved)
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000]  BIOS-e820: 0000000000100000 - 000000003bff0000 (usable)
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000]  BIOS-e820: 000000003bff0000 - 000000003bff3000 (ACPI NVS)
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000]  BIOS-e820: 000000003bff3000 - 000000003c000000 (ACPI data)
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000]  BIOS-e820: 00000000fec00000 - 00000000fec01000 (reserved)
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000]  BIOS-e820: 00000000fee00000 - 00000000fee01000 (reserved)
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000]  BIOS-e820: 00000000ffff0000 - 0000000100000000 (reserved)
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000] DMI 2.3 present.
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000] Phoenix BIOS detected: BIOS may corrupt low RAM, working around it.
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000] last_pfn = 0x3bff0 max_arch_pfn = 0x100000
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000] x86 PAT enabled: cpu 0, old 0x7040600070406, new 0x7010600070106
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.000000] init_memory_mapping: 0000000000000000-00000000373fe000

I thought speakers were output devices. This one is listed as an input?

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Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    5.167808] input: PC Speaker as /devices/platform/pcspkr/input/input4

Here is something about the Via 82xx Audio.

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Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    6.031526] Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    6.031526] VIA 82xx Audio 0000:00:11.5: PCI INT C -> Link[ALKC] -> GSI 22 (level, low) -> IRQ 22 0000:00:11.5: PCI INT C -> Link[ALKC] -> GSI 22 (level, low) -> IRQ 22

This may be related to some stuff below.

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Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.080001] ACPI: bus type pci registered
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.084660] PCI: PCI BIOS revision 2.10 entry at 0xfb270, last bus=1
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.084662] PCI: Using configuration type 1 for base access

Here is a bunch of stuff that is supported then disabled. I may be normal but right among this schizophrenic behavior is "HPET not enabled in BIOS. You might try hpet=force boot option". I'll have to look that up.

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Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.095735] pci 0000:00:0a.0: PME# supported from D2 D3hot D3cold
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.095739] pci 0000:00:0a.0: PME# disabled
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.095956] pci 0000:00:10.0: PME# supported from D0 D1 D2 D3hot D3cold
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.095960] pci 0000:00:10.0: PME# disabled
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.096041] pci 0000:00:10.1: PME# supported from D0 D1 D2 D3hot D3cold
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.096044] pci 0000:00:10.1: PME# disabled
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.096109] pci 0000:00:10.2: PME# supported from D0 D1 D2 D3hot D3cold
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.096113] pci 0000:00:10.2: PME# disabled
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.096179] pci 0000:00:10.3: PME# supported from D0 D1 D2 D3hot D3cold
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.096183] pci 0000:00:10.3: PME# disabled
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.096249] pci 0000:00:10.4: PME# supported from D0 D1 D2 D3hot D3cold
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.096253] pci 0000:00:10.4: PME# disabled
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.096307] HPET not enabled in BIOS. You might try hpet=force boot option
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.096461] pci 0000:00:12.0: PME# supported from D0 D1 D2 D3hot D3cold
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    0.096465] pci 0000:00:12.0: PME# disabled

Hmm..."Broken BIOS detected", that can't be good.

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Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    1.125533] via-rhine.c:v1.10-LK1.4.3 2007-03-06 Written by Donald Becker
Dec 15 07:43:25 some-desktop kernel: [    1.125537] via-rhine: Broken BIOS detected, avoid_D3 enabled.

A quick Google of "broken BIOS" yielded this
"Via-Rhine Broken Bios (No internet)" http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=94854
"installing linux error/broken bios" Boot Failed. Somebody responded about "enable LBA mode if your BIOS supports it". http://www.computing.net/answers/linux/ ... 24031.html

There was one very interesting search result found at http://ubuntuforums.org/archive/index.php/t-629054.html
I will go ahead and post it here to avoid "404" errors for future users.

roachk71
January 4th, 2008, 08:34 PM
I've scanned through your dmesg output, and found one potential issue:


[ 26.016546] via-rhine.c:v1.10-LK1.4.3 2007-03-06 Written by Donald Becker
[ 26.016606] via-rhine: Broken BIOS detected, avoid_D3 enabled.
I have had a look into the forums for a couple of other distributions, and it would appear Mepis and others are having a problem with the latest 2.6 kernels and Via Rhine chipsets and BIOS, as well. If your motherboard's BIOS has an option for a Plug-n-Play (PNP) OS, try enabling that and see if that helps the problem any. This option tells the BIOS to allow the operating system to initialize non-boot devices instead of the bugged MB BIOS.

UPDATE: It would appear to indeed be a kernel bug (in the 2.6.18 - 2.6.22 kernels). Here's a link (http://lists.debian.org/debian-kernel/2 ... 00285.html) to the Debian lists page regarding poor Via SATA performance with this issue.

My advice, if this solution doesn't work (or there's no supporting BIOS option), is to revert to 6.06 LTS and stick with it until a few months after 8.04 LTS is released in April. The LTS (Long-Term Support) releases have their main focus in the stability department, whereas the others are usually technology preview and non-critical improvement releases, and many have stability issues to boot.

Another option would be using Windows to download and apply a firmware update to your BIOS chip (WARNING: This is very risky. If the power goes out or another problem interrupts the BIOS update, your machine could be unusable until the chip's replaced. Proceed with caution.)

Hmm and I am running the 2.6.32-5-686 kernel. Not that that is bad, but I am also running the VIA VT8233/A/8235/8237 AC97 chip set. This is not sounding like the most fortunate combination to have right now.

On to the next website, the one pointed out in the quote from above. http://lists.debian.org/debian-kernel/2 ... 00285.html

We see that this individual has a few things in common with my situation. A similar kernel and the same broken BIOS - via-rhine.c:v1.10-LK1.4.3 2007-03-06. These lines were taken from their "Kernel Log".

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-- Package-specific info:
** Version: Linux version 2.6.21-2-486 (Debian 2.6.21-6)

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via-rhine.c:v1.10-LK1.4.3 2007-03-06 Written by Donald Becker
via-rhine: Broken BIOS detected, avoid_D3 enabled.

There was also a list of issues that I don't have such as IDE, and Ether net issues. But there was one thing that got my attention. I an not sure what log this was copied from keep in mind that I have NOT found this in my logs, but I may not know where to look. In their post it was found under a subheading "** PCI devices:".

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00:11.5 Multimedia audio controller [0401]: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8233/A/8235/8237 AC97 Audio Controller [1106:3059] (rev 60)
	Subsystem: Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. Unknown device [1462:7181]
	Control: I/O+ Mem- BusMaster- SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B-
	Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B- ParErr- DEVSEL=medium >TAbort- <TAbort- <MAbort- >SERR- <PERR-
	Interrupt: pin C routed to IRQ 19
	Region 0: I/O ports at eb00 [size=256]
	Capabilities: <access denied>

[Kittum]

Follow up

Problem was resolved by getting and installing a cheap and simple sound card. In the CMOS I also disabled the on board AC97 controller. I thought about flashing the bios but dropped that idea after seeing that the sound card fixed my problem.

Case closed.

[solar10]

@Kittum: Nice to read I'm not alone.
After spending most of my sunday to install LM10 "Julia" (this part didn't take long) and trying to solve the "no sound" issue (the longest part), I came to the same decision: installing a cheap sound card and disable the onboard soundcard VIA 8235 of my old ASUS mb A7V8X.
From the experience I had with LM9, I immediately thought of adding audio group to my profile. Then unmute everything, uninstall the devilish pulseaudio, update, upgrade, reinstall ALSA, reconfig, recompile, ... nothing worked though the card is detected and well installed.
I'll check for the broken BIOS problem but today, I'll buy that cheap soundcard and hope I'll resolve the "no sound" in seconds after I plug it in the case.

[solar10]

Basix Sweex Surround sound-card installed. It works like a charm.

Solar10 - Love LM10