HDA-Intel and Beeps

[kionez]

Hi all, there is the results of our reports:

http://kionez.org/thinkpad_beep/index.php

Obiuvsly, if anyone could add more data or another report, he should
send me an email and I'll be glad to update it.

Now we should start to compare them and try to solve..

If anyone wants to publish it into ThinkWiki or some other place, I add
a downloadable CSV, at the moment I have no time to create a wiki page.

Is there anyone subscribed to alsa-devel mailing lists?

I'm not so able to write in english, but if no-one can submit a
mail\request\bug to ALSA-developers I'll do it when I have some time (in
the weekend, i hope..), we have to write a clear and understendable mail.

Thanks to everyone!

k.



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[Elias Oltmanns-2]

kionez <kionez@...> wrote:
> Hi all, there is the results of our reports:
>
> http://kionez.org/thinkpad_beep/index.php
[...]
> Is there anyone subscribed to alsa-devel mailing lists?
>
> I'm not so able to write in english, but if no-one can submit a
> mail\request\bug to ALSA-developers I'll do it when I have some time (in
> the weekend, i hope..), we have to write a clear and understendable mail.

Have the alsa developers been notified or have they even responded yet?
If not, I've got something that might be of interest to you as well as
them. Finally, I started configuring my new X200s today. Remembering the
discussion about beeps on this list, I checked and did, indeed, observe
the same problem, i.e. no beeps generated through pcspkr or snd_pcsp,
respectively.

The simple workaround, it turned out, was to make sure that the
power_save parameter of the snd_hda_intel module was set to 0. On my
system I had to comment out the following line in
/etc/modprobe.d/asla-base.conf:

options snd-hda-intel power_save=10 power_save_controller=N

The correct solution, of course, would be for the alsa developers to
find a way that the sound card is woken up when pcspkr / snd_pcsp wants
to indulge in some beeping. I have verified that this works exactly as
expected when playing sounds through alsa by means of aplay, for
example.

Hope that helps,

Elias
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[Robert Tomsick]

On Wed, 2009-11-25 at 20:52 +0100, Elias Oltmanns wrote:

> kionez <kionez@...> wrote:
> > Hi all, there is the results of our reports:
> >
> > http://kionez.org/thinkpad_beep/index.php
> [...]
> > Is there anyone subscribed to alsa-devel mailing lists?
> >
> > I'm not so able to write in english, but if no-one can submit a
> > mail\request\bug to ALSA-developers I'll do it when I have some time (in
> > the weekend, i hope..), we have to write a clear and understendable mail.
>
> Have the alsa developers been notified or have they even responded yet?
> If not, I've got something that might be of interest to you as well as
> them. Finally, I started configuring my new X200s today. Remembering the
> discussion about beeps on this list, I checked and did, indeed, observe
> the same problem, i.e. no beeps generated through pcspkr or snd_pcsp,
> respectively.
>
> The simple workaround, it turned out, was to make sure that the
> power_save parameter of the snd_hda_intel module was set to 0. On my
> system I had to comment out the following line in
> /etc/modprobe.d/asla-base.conf:
>
> options snd-hda-intel power_save=10 power_save_controller=N

That is indeed interesting.  It is worth noting that the above
workaround has a non-zero cost w/ regards to battery life.  Informal
testing (i.e. me mucking about with powertop) reveals an approx. 0.25W
increase if you leave the sound hardware on all the time.  For me that's
not really worth it, but YMMV.

Good to see that we've narrowed down the bug though.  Nice detective
work!

-Rob

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[Kevin Locke]

On Wed, 2009-11-25 at 20:52 +0100, Elias Oltmanns wrote:
> Finally, I started configuring my new X200s today. Remembering the
> discussion about beeps on this list, I checked and did, indeed, observe
> the same problem, i.e. no beeps generated through pcspkr or snd_pcsp,
> respectively.
>
> The simple workaround, it turned out, was to make sure that the
> power_save parameter of the snd_hda_intel module was set to 0.

Kudos on figuring this out.  Very interesting.  Testing this solution
on my T60p didn't work, unfortunately, but the root of the problem may
still be related.  Looks like the alsa-base.conf currently shipped in
Debian testing doesn't set power_save (and adding a line to set it to
0 explicitly had no effect).

You may want to let your distro know, so they can consider the effects
of setting power_save by default (although if you are using Ubuntu
there are already a few other problems reported, e.g. #382140 and
#452343).

I added a note to the ALSA bug report, in case it may help the ALSA
developers to track down the problem.  Not sure if you might want to
report an additional bug about this (presumably unintended) side
effect of power_save or wait for the existing beep bug report to be
solved.

Again, well done and thanks,
Kevin
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[Elias Oltmanns-2]

Kevin Locke <kevin@...> wrote:

> On Wed, 2009-11-25 at 20:52 +0100, Elias Oltmanns wrote:
>> Finally, I started configuring my new X200s today. Remembering the
>
>> discussion about beeps on this list, I checked and did, indeed, observe
>> the same problem, i.e. no beeps generated through pcspkr or snd_pcsp,
>> respectively.
>>
>> The simple workaround, it turned out, was to make sure that the
>> power_save parameter of the snd_hda_intel module was set to 0.
>
> Kudos on figuring this out.  Very interesting.  Testing this solution
> on my T60p didn't work, unfortunately, but the root of the problem may
> still be related.  Looks like the alsa-base.conf currently shipped in
> Debian testing doesn't set power_save (and adding a line to set it to
> 0 explicitly had no effect).

There are various places to modify this parameter (including the kernel
config, I think). So, you may want to check

$ cat /sys/module/snd_hda_intel/parameters/power_save

in order to make absolutely sure that this parameter hasn't been
tampered with. If you change this parameter on the fly, it will only
take effect after you have accessed the card through alsa, e.g. by
calling

# alsactl restore

Regards,

Elias
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[Kevin Locke]

On Thu, 2009-11-26 at 08:01 +0100, Elias Oltmanns wrote:

> Kevin Locke <kevin@...> wrote:
>> On Wed, 2009-11-25 at 20:52 +0100, Elias Oltmanns wrote:
>>> Finally, I started configuring my new X200s today. Remembering the
>>> discussion about beeps on this list, I checked and did, indeed, observe
>>> the same problem, i.e. no beeps generated through pcspkr or snd_pcsp,
>>> respectively.
>>>
>>> The simple workaround, it turned out, was to make sure that the
>>> power_save parameter of the snd_hda_intel module was set to 0.
>>
>> Kudos on figuring this out.  Very interesting.  Testing this solution
>> on my T60p didn't work, unfortunately, but the root of the problem may
>> still be related.  Looks like the alsa-base.conf currently shipped in
>> Debian testing doesn't set power_save (and adding a line to set it to
>> 0 explicitly had no effect).
>
> There are various places to modify this parameter (including the kernel
> config, I think). So, you may want to check
>
> $ cat /sys/module/snd_hda_intel/parameters/power_save
>
> in order to make absolutely sure that this parameter hasn't been
> tampered with.

Good point.  If I had not explicitly set it to 0 by adding the
options line to alsa-base.conf it would have been non-zero (60), but
with that line added it reports 0.  No beeps in either case.

Kevin
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[kionez]

#include <Elias Oltmanns.h>   // created 25/11/2009 20:52
> Have the alsa developers been notified or have they even responded yet?

AFAIK no, I have no free time in this period, if someone wants to fill a
bug to alsa-devel, every data I collect is on my website. [1]

Anyway, i'll test your workaround and i'll report my results..

thanks!! :)

k.

1: http://kionez.org/thinkpad_beep/index.php



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