[gentoo-user] How to Fix Extraoardinarily Loud Alsa?

[gentoo-user] How to Fix Extraoardinarily Loud Alsa?

[Hunter Jozwiak]

Hi,

I finally got the base install of Gentoo done, but I've come across a
really interesting probleing. After installing Alsa and enabling its
daemon, I had copied the asound.conf from the distro I was using on to
the system. Unfortunately, this give the side effect that ALSA is
extremely loud (I would guess top volume), and none of the sliders
seem to work. I am using my Intel high definition audio card. Has
anyone come across a similar issue? If so, how did you go about fixing
it?

Re: [gentoo-user] How to Fix Extraoardinarily Loud Alsa?

[Alexander Kapshuk]

On Tue, Nov 1, 2016 at 3:55 PM, Hunter Jozwiak <hunter.t.joz@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I finally got the base install of Gentoo done, but I've come across a
> really interesting probleing. After installing Alsa and enabling its
> daemon, I had copied the asound.conf from the distro I was using on to
> the system. Unfortunately, this give the side effect that ALSA is
> extremely loud (I would guess top volume), and none of the sliders
> seem to work. I am using my Intel high definition audio card. Has
> anyone come across a similar issue? If so, how did you go about fixing
> it?
>

You may want to give /usr/bin/alsamixer a try, which comes with
media-sound/alsa-utils.
See the manpage for sample usage.
man -k alsamixer
alsamixer (1)        - soundcard mixer for ALSA soundcard driver, with ncurse...

[gentoo-user] Re: How to Fix Extraoardinarily Loud Alsa?

[Ian Zimmerman]

On 2016-11-01 09:55, Hunter Jozwiak wrote:

> I finally got the base install of Gentoo done, but I've come across a
> really interesting probleing. After installing Alsa and enabling its
> daemon

?

alsa itself doesn't need any daemon, it is a kernel API mediated by a
library (libasound).  Do you mean pulseaudio or something?

> Unfortunately, this give the side effect that ALSA is
> extremely loud (I would guess top volume), and none of the sliders

?

What sliders?  You seem to be talking about some GUI program to control
alsa, not about alsa itself.

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Re: [gentoo-user] Re: How to Fix Extraoardinarily Loud Alsa?

[Peter Humphrey]

On Tuesday 01 Nov 2016 08:40:52 Ian Zimmerman wrote:
> On 2016-11-01 09:55, Hunter Jozwiak wrote:
> > I finally got the base install of Gentoo done, but I've come across a
> > really interesting probleing. After installing Alsa and enabling its
> > daemon
> 
> ?
> 
> alsa itself doesn't need any daemon, it is a kernel API mediated by a
> library (libasound).  Do you mean pulseaudio or something?

Yes; I have no alsa demon running and my sound is fine, just using the basic 
alsa - not jack or anything fancy.

$ sudo rc-update -s -v | grep alsa
            alsasound |                                            
$
 
> > Unfortunately, this give the side effect that ALSA is
> > extremely loud (I would guess top volume), and none of the sliders
> 
> ?
> 
> What sliders?  You seem to be talking about some GUI program to control
> alsa, not about alsa itself.

Sounds like alsamixer, the one Alexander mentioned.

-- 
Regards
Peter

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: How to Fix Extraoardinarily Loud Alsa?

[Walter Dnes]

On Tue, Nov 01, 2016 at 08:40:52AM -0700, Ian Zimmerman wrote

> What sliders?  You seem to be talking about some GUI program to control
> alsa, not about alsa itself.

  alsamixer uses a "TUI" (Text User Interface).  It works at the command
line in an xterm or even in true text mode, without X installed or
active.  You have to install alsa-utils with the "ncurses" USE flag
enabled to get alsamixer built.

-- 
Walter Dnes <waltdnes@waltdnes.org>
I don't run "desktop environments"; I run useful applications

Re: [gentoo-user] How to Fix Extraoardinarily Loud Alsa?

[Marc Stürmer]

Am 2016-11-01 14:55, schrieb Hunter Jozwiak:

> I finally got the base install of Gentoo done, but I've come across a
> really interesting probleing. After installing Alsa and enabling its
> daemon, I had copied the asound.conf from the distro I was using on to
> the system. Unfortunately, this give the side effect that ALSA is


The sound levels are not stored in the asound.conf. Aside this, ALSA 
comes per default with muted volumes, so that you don't blow your ears 
when powering your loud speakers the first time on.