Sound Card not detected

[Justbill 0]

I recently purchased a new computer, it is a :

 

Compaq Presario SR1426NX

2.93GHz Pentium 4

512MB PC2-3200 DDR SDRAM

160GB 7200 Serial ATA hard drive

 

Currently Running "CentOS 4"

 

This machine has the "onboard sound", which worked in winXP, but never worked in CentOS. I always got a message "no soundcard detected". So I purchased a "Soundblaster Live! 24-bit" soundcard, and I still get the "no soundcard detected" message! I tested the soundcard in winXP, and it works. I did also disable the onboard sound, in the BIOS. Any thoughts on why CentOS is not detecting the soundcard?

 

Thanks in advance

Justbill

[iamroot 0]

Hmm. That's weird. What version of CentOS are you using? I've only had sound card problems with RH8 so far. I've used onboard and SB Live! perfectly since then.

[Justbill 0]

I have what is supposed to be the latest version, CentOs4.1

 

Justbill

[danleff 0]

justbill, first of all, nice system!

 

Did you buy the SB card retail, or whitebox?

 

What I mean, is was the card in a retail box, or surplus, either in a "white box, or without the full retail package?

 

Some of these cards are legacy cards, believe it or not, bought cheaply, that are made just for Gateways or Dells. They are made for use in Windows.

 

If possible, look at the card and post what exact model/product ID number it is, say SBxxx or CTxxx.

 

However, this motherboard is Intel chipset board all around?

 

Does it have onboard graphics?

 

You can try moving the card into another PCI slot.

The other thing, is set PNP OS off in the bios.

[Justbill 0]

Hi Danleff!

 

I did buy the card retail from Circuit City, it is a "Sound Blaster Live! 24-bit", and it was a full retail package. It is model# SB0410 . I do have the "Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 900 with up to 128 shared video memory" (I am copying this from the originall box label, from the computer), so I do have the onboard graphics. I am a little confused on the "PNP OS" to off on the BIOS. I will try moving the card to another slot, and post back!

 

Thanks

Justbill

[Justbill 0]

Well, I moved the card to another slot, and turned the audio from "auto" to "disable" in the bios. I still get "no soundcaeds were detected" when I run "Soundcard detection". So I am at a loss here!

 

Justbill

 

[Justbill 0]

I just set Plug N Play to "no" in the Bios, and still got the same "no soundcards detected" message.

 

Justbill

 

[Justbill 0]

I have also tried to find out what is in here by typing:

 

"modinfo soundcore"

 

and the reply was "command not found"

 

I tried to cd to alsa, and it said no such file or directory.

 

Justbill

 

[Wilhelmus 1]

Originally posted by Justbill:

Quote:

"modinfo soundcore"

Have you tried modprobe?

Or does CentOs have this command?

 

[Justbill 0]

I don't seem to have the modprobe command

[danleff 0]

CentOS s based on Fedora/RedHat?

 

Are you trying to use the modinfo as root user?

 

In Fedora, I know that I need to point to the direct path to the command.

 

Do whereis modinfo and see what it returns.

 

If it returns;

 

/sbin/modinfo or /usr/sbin modinfo...then try the path to modinfo, such as;

 

/usr/sbin/modinfo soundcore

 

The other information that may help is in the lsmod command. This will tell you what modules are loaded and what modules are attached to soundcore.

 

It looks like your card does not use the older emu10k1 soundblaster module, but I am looking to find which one that it uses.

[Justbill 0]

Well, frustrating as this is going to be, I switched to FC4 last night. I still don't have sound through the sound card, I'm going to try the "onboard sound" tonight. Fc4 did however, recognize that the card was in there, so I'm thinking that I just need the driver, and instructions on how to install it. I got this info when I ran "soundcard detection":

 

VENDOR: Creative

Model: Labs SB Audigy LS

Module: snd-ca0106

 

Error: automatic detection of soundcard did not work

 

Thank You for all the effort you put into looking into the problem I was having with the soundcard and CentOS, as I said , I still don't have sound, I just thought that FC4, being the latest and the greatest offering from Fedora might give a better chance of autodetection and "working out of the box". And, really, when I installed CentOS, I did it because the originall install of FC4 on this machine failed, and I had to put something in, so I thought I would give it (CentOS) a whirl. FC4 is what I really wanted on this machine all along, and Wilhelmus helped me get it to install (in thread titled "Tried to Install FC4), so thats what I have on here now. Any help or thoughts about how to get the sound working in FC4, however, will be apreciated.

 

Thanks

Justbill

 

 

 

[Justbill 0]

OK danleff,

 

First off, I am running FC4 now (thought it might help with my sound problems)! I tried /sbin/modinfo soundcore (after whereis modinfo), and this is what I got:

 

[bill@68 ~]$ /sbin/modinfo soundcore

filename: /lib/modules/2.6.11-1.1369_FC4/kernel/sound/soundcore.ko

description: Core sound module

author: Alan Cox

license: GPL

alias: char-major-14-*

vermagic: 2.6.11-1.1369_FC4 686 REGPARM 4KSTACKS gcc-4.0

depends:

srcversion: E11490DC3F523551C4C2A6D

[bill@68 ~]$

 

I have not downloaded the emu10k1 soundblaster module, since I installed FC4. I can go ahead and do that, but when I tried to install that in CentOS, I wasn't able to find the correct directory (remember I have very limited experience with this command line stuff). I was not 100% sure if I had to make a directory (mkdir i believe), or what. I would like to attempt this again, but I would need some coaching (simple directions for the linux impaired :-)) I was able to change permisions on it (emu10k1), but when it came to the step of installing it to the soundcore (I believe) I could not find the propper directory (I did not know to point the direct path, and would still need to know precisely the direct path). If you can help me with this (or anyone for that matter), it would be greatly appreciated!

 

Thanks

Justbill

[danleff 0]

Hmmm...

 

Quote:

VENDOR: Creative

Model: Labs SB Audigy LS

Module: snd-ca0106

 

So, this is the apparent sound module that should be used.

 

Take a look here at the alsa directions. This is what the alsa matrix says for the SB0410

 

Try this as root user;

 

modprobe snd-ca0106;modprobe snd-pcm-oss;modprobe snd-mixer-oss;modprobe snd-seq-oss

 

..all on one command string.

 

 

[Justbill 0]

danleff,

 

I entered the command: modprobe snd-ca0106;modprobe snd-pcm-oss;modprobe snd-mixer-oss;modprobe snd-seq-oss , all as one line, like you suggested, as root. The machine accepted the command (didn't have any messages like "command not fount") and went right back to a prompt. I still don't have sound, I'll have to mess with it more this evening. Do I need to download the module snd-ca0106 ?

 

Thanks

Justbill

 

[danleff 0]

If you just got a return to the prompt, the drivers loaded correctly. They are already built into the kernel.

 

I wonder if the volume is turned down or muted.

 

Try going into the terminal as root user and typing in alsamixer.

 

You should get the mixer window. If it shows, try turning up the volume by clicking the mouse above each graphic bar, so that the volumes are up all the way.

 

If alsamixer does not come up. let us know.

 

if you are using kDE, also try looking at kmix. usually at start-->Multimedia-->kmix. Or type in kmix at the command prompt.

 

Does the speaker icon show at the bottom right of the task bar?

 

If you double-click the icon, does the mixer window come up and show a mixer window with volume bars?

[Justbill 0]

Hi danleff, and Thank you very much for all the help!

I HAVE SOUND! YIPEE!

I am using the Gnome desktop, we just like it. When I installed FC4, I selected "custom install" and installed "everything" so I have a lot of KDE stuff. The first time I try to burn with K3b (which I like better than any other burning tool I've seen so far), we'll see if it detects, or if I'll have to mess with kmix to get the KDE side of this going. Anyhow, Thanks Again! This forum, and the people here, are just the best!

 

Justbill

 

I did have to turn up each graphic bar, but I had to select with the right or left arrows and then type in a volume. It would let me go as high as 90, but not 100. the symbol above each bar was 0<>0, and I changed it to 90<>90

[Edited by Justbill on 2005-06-23 17:49:03]

 

[danleff 0]

Yep! I was trying to remember the key sequences for unmuting alsamixer. I have not done it for a while. Nice going!

 

I really have to update my sound soon. I will look at this card and give it a go. You made the right decision. Onboard sound just does not cut it sometimes.