Intrepid Sound Fix

[Karl Larsen]

Nigel Henry wrote:
> On Monday 17 November 2008 21:00, Karl Larsen wrote:
>   
>> Frans wrote:
>>     
>>> On Mon, 17 Nov 2008 08:49:31 -0700, Karl Larsen wrote:
>>>       
>>>> Karl Larsen wrote:
>>>>         
>>>>> Steve Flynn wrote:
>>>>>           
>>>>>> On Sun, Nov 16, 2008 at 11:41 PM, Karl Larsen <k5di at zianet.com> wrote:
>>>>>>             
>>>>     I just discovered how the Alsamixer gets re-set to no sound. I
>>>> wanted to just re-boot to Grub but Intrepid stopped and would not go
>>>> past the init step of turning off alsa. I watched it for a few minutes
>>>> and hit the power off.
>>>>         
>>> Could you please post the _exact_ error message?
>>>
>>>       
>>>>     Later I booted up and no sound. Even the sound devise on the upper
>>>> edge of the screen had a red cross. You fix this by turning the master
>>>> up and then right clicking it and turning it on. But still no sound.
>>>>
>>>>     I started alsamixer and sure enough it was turned down to zero. So
>>>> turned that back up.
>>>>
>>>>     Conclusion: There is something wrong with the re-boot script and it
>>>> needs to be fixed or, there is something wrong with the alsamixer
>>>> software.
>>>>
>>>> Karl
>>>>         
>>> I don't think it is something wrong in the "re-boot script". I think if
>>> you shutdown you'll get the same error. I think the problem is in a
>>> script that stops alsa. Anyhow, not being able to shutdown properly seems
>>> to me quite serious.
>>>
>>> A workaround just for getting sound on reboot might be to use 'alsactl
>>> store' when you have sound (see 'man alsactl'). With luck the 'good'
>>> alsamixer settings will get restored when the system boots the next time.
>>>       
>>     I tested it Frans on my laptop Intrepid and the re-boot did the
>> trick of changing alsa settings and it did it again! It appears that
>> alsactl does work to put a file of the current alsamixer settings called
>> asound.state into  /var/lib/alsa/ but it was not used to re-set alsamixer.
>>
>> Karl
>>
>>     
>>> Good luck!
>>>
>>>     -Frans
>>>       
>
> Hi Karl, and a good evening at 23:07 PM here in Northern France.
>
> NoOp posted a couple of links that I found interesting, mainly the second one.
>
> When I reboot Ubuntu 8.10, Alsa hangs for about 5secs, but if I do an "sudo 
> ifdown" before the reboot,Alsa doesn't hang at all on the reboot.
>
> One of the posts on the link below gave a clue.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/alsa-utils/+bug/274995
>
> This reply in particular was interesting.
>
> <quote>
>
>  J wrote on 2008-10-19: (permalink)
>
> The trick works inserting "ifconfig wlan0 down" (or the active network 
> interface in use) at the begining of the stop) section 
> of /etc/init.d/alsa-utils.
> I'm sure it's not network-manager related, my laptop also hangs uninstalling 
> the package and starting wifi via wicd.
> Btw, if your alsa-mixer is always mute at system start, and does not remember 
> the last settings, the trick also fixes it.
> <end quote>
>
> I've already tested what was suggested above, and my 5sec delay for Alsa on 
> reboot is reduced to as good as nothing.
>
> OK. Now to edit the /etc/init.d/alsa-utils shellscript.
>
> Open a terminal, then sudo gedit, and navigate to /etc/init.d/alsa-utils.
>
> So far so good. Go to "Edit" > "Preferences" in Gedit, and check the box under 
> "Line Numbers, which says "Display line numbers". Close the window. Now click 
> on the "Search" menu on Gedit, and then on "Go to line". Enter in the box 
> 353, and you should end up with the cursor on line 353, which should read 
> stop).
>
> Use the right arrow to scroll along to the end of stop), then click enter. Do 
> a few spaces which will take you to the start of the next lines
>
> Now I don't know if you have a wired, or a wireless connection, but you will 
> need to add one of the following 2 lines to the /etc/init.d/alsa-utils 
> script.
> ifconfig eth0 down
> ifconfig wlan0 down
>
> This is how it should look after adding one of the 2 lines above.
>
>   stop)
>         ifconfig eth0 down
>  EXITSTATUS=0
>  TARGET_CARD="$2"
>  case "$TARGET_CARD" in
>    ""|all) TARGET_CARD=all ; log_action_begin_msg "Shutting down ALSA" ;;
>
> Save the changes, exit the editor, and reboot.
>
> Now when rebooted your Alsamixer settings should now be how you left them 
> before rebooting. "Hopefully".
>
> All the best.
>
> Nigel.
>
>   
    OH Nigel it is great. I did what you did on init.d and now it stops 
on a re-boot just like it should and it has no effect on the sound I 
fixed with your missive.

Thank you Nigel


Karl


-- 

	Karl F. Larsen, AKA K5DI
	Linux User
	#450462   http://counter.li.org.
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