Since I didn't get copied on this reply (I just saw it after searching the BTS), I didn't get a chance to follow up to it earlier. I'd appreciate being CCd in the future, thanks.
Cesare Leonardi <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Benjamin A. Okopnik wrote: > > The frequency of how often this happens varies: sometimes, it's every > > single boot until I remove the laptop battery; at other times, it's only > > about one boot out of every five. It seems to be related to IRQ problems > > (booting the laptop without its battery, and inserting it after the > > boot, results in the problem nearly disappearing - it only happens in ~1 > > of every 20 boots.) > > I think you are excluding an hardware problem because on the same > machine you also run Wind0ws (or something else) and it sounds good, right? This machine initially came with Wind0ws, and I used it that way for a two-week long road trip, until I could get to a high-speed connection. The sound worked fine during that time. > The sporadic nature of the problem seems suspicious, in particular > because your machine has a very common (and tested) chipset. As you can > see on http://www.linux-on-laptops.com/acer.html, people using your > laptop seems to have audio that just works. > I have a Sony laptop with a i855 chipset that works too. > > Have you tried to upgrade your Acer BIOS? Yes - that was one of the first things I looked for when I discovered this problem. > And, do the problem comes indifferently (and with similar probability) > after a reboot or a complete poweroff? At this point, rebooting or cold-booting produces a problem about 80% of the time. The only "cure" (works ~99% of the time) is to remove the battery and disconnect the adapter from the machine for a few seconds. > Have you tryed with some linux live CD (Ubuntu, Knoppix) to see if > something behaves differently? But i suspect it is not a > kernel/distibution problem... If you believe that this would give you usable data, I'll be happy to download a few of these and try them out. Since I have a relatively slow connection, I'll have to get to a fast one somewhere which is a bit of a hassle, so I'm a bit reluctant to just do so without an explicit request. > Have you contacted the Acer support or visited their website to see if > there are some broken model or some known problem? Acer's tech support's brains instantly freeze up solid as soon as I mention Linux. I have not found any definite reports of similar behavior, but I suspect that this is due to a) the vague definition of what constitutes this problem (i.e., it's hard to come up with a definitive set of strings to describe the problem uniquely for a Web search) and b) the low numbers of these laptops out there. What little I have found in this regard pointed in the general direction of ACPI problems; I got an ACPI data compiler, fixed the errors in the ACPI data, and recompiled it, but this does not appear to have helped. Incidentally, I have recently run 'lspci' with the sound hardware both working and not working; here's the diff: ---------------------------------------------------------------------- r !diff /tmp/lspci_sound /tmp/lspci_no_sound 109c109 < Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- Stepping- SERR- FastB2B- --- > Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster- SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- ParErr- > Stepping- SERR- FastB2B- 111d110 < Latency: 0 119c118 < Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME- --- > Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME+ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Here it is with a '-p' added for more context: ---------------------------------------------------------------------- *** /tmp/lspci_sound 2006-08-29 22:19:28.000000000 -0400 --- /tmp/lspci_no_sound 2006-08-29 18:15:08.000000000 -0400 *************** *** 106,114 **** 00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corporation 82801DB/DBL/DBM (ICH4/ICH4-L/ICH4-M) AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 03) Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Unknown device 0061 ! 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- - Latency: 0 Interrupt: pin B routed to IRQ 21 Region 0: I/O ports at e000 [size=256] Region 1: I/O ports at e100 [size=64] --- 106,113 ---- 00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corporation 82801DB/DBL/DBM (ICH4/ICH4-L/ICH4-M) AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 03) Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Unknown device 0061 ! 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 B routed to IRQ 21 Region 0: I/O ports at e000 [size=256] Region 1: I/O ports at e100 [size=64] *************** *** 116,122 **** Region 3: Memory at f0000600 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=256] Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 2 Flags: PMEClk- DSI- D1- D2- AuxCurrent=375mA PME(D0+,D1-,D2-,D3hot+,D3cold+) ! Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME- 00:1f.6 Modem: Intel Corporation 82801DB/DBL/DBM (ICH4/ICH4-L/ICH4-M) AC'97 Modem Controller (rev 03) (prog-if 00 [Generic]) Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Unknown device 0061 --- 115,121 ---- Region 3: Memory at f0000600 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=256] Capabilities: [50] Power Management version 2 Flags: PMEClk- DSI- D1- D2- AuxCurrent=375mA PME(D0+,D1-,D2-,D3hot+,D3cold+) ! Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME+ 00:1f.6 Modem: Intel Corporation 82801DB/DBL/DBM (ICH4/ICH4-L/ICH4-M) AC'97 Modem Controller (rev 03) (prog-if 00 [Generic]) Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Unknown device 0061 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Regards, * Ben Okopnik * Editor-in-Chief, Linux Gazette * http://LinuxGazette.NET * -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
