Fixing sound problems in Ubuntu 9.04 (Module snd_hda_intel is in use)

I had installed Ubuntu 9.04 on my dell laptop and strangely there was a problem: there was no sound!!

Although, there was sound on Ubuntu 8.04 so I did not expected this to happen in the version 9.04. The sound problem was also there in Fedora 11. The error I got was Module 'snd_hda_intel' is in use. After trying Ubuntu 8.04 live CD I got sound, so I decided to install Ubuntu 8.04 and wait for a fix on Fedora 11. After installation I found out Ubuntu 8.04 did not detected that my laptop has wifi and there was no option to connect to my wireless network. Now, I had sound but no wireless internet on my laptop even when it was wifi enabled :-(

I then decided to upgrade it to Ubuntu 9.04 and see if I can get the sound to work. After installing Ubuntu 9.04 wifi started working but no sound as it was in Fedora 11. So, it appears there is something in the kernel which does not lets the sound to play.

After googling for a couple of days I found something to fix the sound problem on Ubuntu 9.04. I am not sure if this will work for Fedora 11 or not.

Below are the solutions I found on http://www.ubuntuforums.org/

1. By gkgarg24, http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1136670&page=2

Hey Guys,

I was also having same problem after upgrade to ubuntu 9.04. I am running it on Dell Inspiron 1420n. I did the following steps after searching through forums.

1>Run the following commmand

sudo gedit /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base

2>Add the following text to it.

options snd-intel8x0 ac97_quirk=1 buggy_irq=1 enable=1 index=0
options snd-hda-intel model=3stack enable=yes
options snd-hda-intel model=auto position_fix=1 enable=yes

3>Save the file.

4>Rune the following commend :

sudo /etc/init.d/alsa-utils restart

5>If this does not work try rebooting machine. Sound should be back again.

Hope this helps!

2. By babusar, http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1136670&page=4

I had this same problem when upgrading from 8.04 to 8.10 on my laptop and the same thing has happened again when upgrading to 9.04. I've found a work around that has worked for both these upgrades. This is taken from Bug #286610:

you can fix it easily yourself by adding

options snd-hda-intel model=laptop enable=1 index=0

to the file /etc/modprobe.d/options. If you don't know how: Press Alt+F2, type for example

gksu gedit /etc/modprobe.d/options

press enter, write the options line above in it, save, reboot and everything should be fine.

It's worked fine for me on my HP 6735s laptop. Hope it helps.

Michael

3. By 4thfloorstudios, http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1136670&page=2

Ok, found out what is working to at least hear anything

- Boot with kernel 2.6.27-11

- Set all audio devices to "OSS"

I had tried all three and the one which worked for me was the last one, booting into kernel 2.6.27. Magically there was sound when I booted into kernel 2.6.27 instead of kernel 2.6.28. If you do not have the option to boot into kernel 2.6.27 then you can download it from

http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v2.6.27/

Make sure the volume is not muted and is high enough to hear something.

Please note Ubuntu and Fedora both does not has MP3 support built into it. You will need to download free software to play MP3's on both Fedora and Ubuntu.