# snd_hda & front panel



## hedgehog (Oct 19, 2010)

Greetings. I have Asus M2N-E motherboard and I want to setup sound on the front panel. Unfortunately, there is a problem:


```
$ cat /dev/sndstat 
FreeBSD Audio Driver (newpcm: 64bit 2009061500/amd64)
Installed devices:
pcm0: <HDA Analog Devices AD1988B PCM #0 Analog> (play/rec) default
pcm1: <HDA Analog Devices AD1988B PCM #1 Analog> (play)
pcm2: <HDA Analog Devices AD1988B PCM #2 Digital> (play)
```


```
$ mixer 
Mixer vol      is currently set to  60:60
Mixer pcm      is currently set to  99:99
Mixer speaker  is currently set to  66:66
Mixer line     is currently set to  66:66
Mixer mic      is currently set to  66:66
Mixer cd       is currently set to  79:79
Mixer mix      is currently set to  81:81
Mixer rec      is currently set to  75:75
Mixer igain    is currently set to   0:0
Mixer ogain    is currently set to  74:74
Mixer monitor  is currently set to  58:58
Recording source: monitor
```


```
$ mixer -f /dev/mixer1 
Mixer vol      is currently set to  62:62
Mixer pcm      is currently set to  61:61
Mixer mix      is currently set to   0:0
Mixer igain    is currently set to   0:0
```

If I'm correct, /dev/mixer1 and *pcm1* are related to the front panel and there is no recording source available. Sound and microphone works while headset is connected to the rear panel. Sound works via /dev/dsp1.0 when headset is connected to the front panel, but microphone doesn't. I don't know what kind of front panel I have :] There is 2x USB, green sound out and pink sound in ports. I tried to switch between AC'97 and HDA in the BIOS front panel settings, but it didn't help.


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## hedgehog (Oct 19, 2010)

Crap, it's difficult to be so stupid.
`$ mixer =rec mix`

In my case this option switched microphone to the front panel and it's working. One more question: why does mixer lose microphone settings after reboot? I can't switch recording source in KDE mixer's GUI, I can do so only using command line tool. But after reboot recording source is being set back to MIC and microphone doesn't work neither in front nor in rear panels. I have to set it to Monitor (rear) or Mix (front) after each reboot. Kinda annoying :]


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## luna (Oct 20, 2010)

Check /var/db/mixer0-state, it should contain mixer settings from previous boot. The file is populated by /etc/rc.d/mixer.


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## darcsis (Oct 20, 2010)

Today I tried to make the front panel work under FreeBSD. Under OpenSolaris everything is OK, but FreeBSD won't stream any sound to the front panel. After some research I found this sysctl oid works for snd_hda driver, for which hw.snd.default_unit will control where sound be directed.
if hw.snd.default_unit=0, sound goes to the rear panel, hw.snd.default_unit=1, sound goest to the front panel. I don't know what is going behind all this, but it works...


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## mav@ (Oct 20, 2010)

If you read snd_hda(4) man page, you can make real magic with your sound card.


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