Alsa broken on v17 rpi2

Troubleshooting
1

Hi,
Since I updated to v17 my apps are giving me alsa errors and it doesn’t look like i have a sound card anymore.
Also, boot up shows audio isn’t initializing.
I’ve re-run the sound config & made sure Alsa was installed via the software installer.
Same with apt-get.

Any ideas?

Thanks.

2

Hi Nitrogen,

Are you using the inbuilt RPi soundcard?

Also, please run the following:

apt-get install -y alsa-utils

Then paste results of:

aplay -l
cat /etc/asound.conf
cat /DietPi/config.txt | grep 'dtoverlay'
3

yes.
Onboard sound.

Alsa tool allready installed.

root@DietPi:~# aplay -l
aplay: device_list:268: no soundcards found…

cat /etc/asound.conf
cat: /etc/asound.conf: No such file or directory

root@DietPi:~# cat /DietPi/config.txt | grep ‘dtoverlay’
dtoverlay=rpi-bcm2835
root@DietPi:~#
root@DietPi:~# Fourdee
bash: Fourdee: command not found
root@DietPi:~# Site Admin
bash: Site: command not found
root@DietPi:~#
root@DietPi:~# Posts: 684
bash: Posts:: command not found
root@DietPi:~# Joined: Tue Feb 06, 2007 12:36 pm
bash: Joined:: command not found

4

got it.
searched for the “no soundcard…” message aplay gave me and found if I added:
dtparam=audio=on to /boot/config.txt and rebooted everything worked.

Thanks for getting me that far.

5

I’ve not seen “dtparam=audio=on” option before, must be a new one. There’s so many undocumented options that can be used in config.txt, wish the RPi guys would list them “all”.

Thanks for letting us know :slight_smile:

If you have some spare time, could you run the following and paste result for me please:

uname -a

I just want to see if a recent kernel update has caused this on the RPi. Will also see if i can replicate this on my RPi 2.

Thanks Nitrogen.

6

Hi,

Would interested me too.

As far as I know, it is new on: =>> 4.4 kernel



You can do a Kernel and Firmware update and test it:

BRANCH=next rpi-update

or
160501-0001.gif

7

K-Plan, legend as always, great find :slight_smile:

I’ll integrate this new option into DietPi, as well as keeping /etc/modules code in there: https://github.com/Fourdee/DietPi/issues/327

8 
root@DietPi:~# uname -a
Linux DietPi 4.4.9-v7+ #884 SMP Fri May 6 17:28:59 BST 2016 armv7l GNU/Linux
root@DietPi:~#
9

There she is 4.4 :smiley: Thanks for confirming Nitrogen.

As of v118, DietPi will also update the dtparam=audio setting accordingly, when changing soundcards.

10

Hi Nitrogen,

Thanks for your acknowledgement and assistance.

cu
k-plan