Only getting sound when using headphones with Linux Mint 4.0 on an m9750

i bought a laptop in december of last year, and decided it was finally time to put Linux on my machine. i used to dual boot ubuntu (edgy then to feisty) but i decided to give mint a try. i have an alienware m9750, though, i'm at work right now so i can't tell you the exact model of my audio card or drivers but i chose the default audio card from the alienware website (Intel® High Definition 7.1 Audio). the weird thing is, i can play any and all sounds when my headset is plugged in, but i get nothing when i'm playing through the laptop speakers. i know linux is weird with their audio drivers, like one thing works well for a single application, but when multiple applications are processing sound, only select things are processed.


if any of you have suggestions, please let me know.

 

Well it appears that you are not the only one. Here's an Ubuntu forums thread which states that a user with your laptop has the same problem, and that nobody has found a satisfactory solution as of yet. Here's an Ubuntu forums thread that suggest a user with your laptop, was somewhat successful with your setup configuring alsa like this;

and using the following as the [model_name];

Code:

3stack-dig
6stack-dig
arima
targa
asus-a7j
asus-a7m
w2jcASUS

You can read just his post here. BTW, you need to edit that file with superuser rights, like with sudo or an su session.

Basically the bottom line is that alsa support of the Intel HDA sound chip isn't where it needs to be.. yet..

 

thanks man. my old pc that ran ubuntu had speakers that worked fine, but if i tried to use pidgin and watch youtube videos, either one or the other would produce sound. i think i had to switch between alsa and oss for processing the sound.

but, thanks for the help.

 

have you looked into pulseaudio? i can play sound from different applications simultaneously. one of the cool things about to be implemented is sound focus, for lack of a better description. basically, the sound will adjust to whatever you focus your attention to, lowering the sound of the application you leave. so if you're listening to music in xmms, and you want to check out a youtube video, xmms' volume will lower and you'll get full volume, or whatever the mixer is set to, in youtube until you return back to xmms. obviously, this will be customizable but the main point is sound in multiple apps, at the same time, is feasible with pulseaudio.

 

it wasn't the mixing that was the problem. the sound just doesn't play through my laptop speakers.