[pulseaudio-discuss] Volume too loud in headphones with Intel HDA

[Ludovic Courtès]

Hi,

The document at http://pulseaudio.org/wiki/PulseAudioStoleMyVolumes
didn’t really answer my question, so here we go.

I’m using PA on a Dell Latitude D430 laptop that has an Intel HDA sound
card [0] with a “headphone” jack.  When actually plugging in headphones
in that jack, the volume is too loud, and pavucontrol doesn’t allow me
to make it softer: if the master or per-application volume slider is
moved below a certain threshold (around 20), it becomes completely
silent.

The only way I’ve found to work around it is via alsamixer, which does
allow me to choose a volume between mute and the minimum I can reach
with PA.

What am I missing here?

Thanks,
Ludo’.

[0] FWIW, here’s the beginning of the output of ‘dbverify’:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
Opening plughw:Intel for PCM. 
Plug PCM: Linear Integer <-> Linear Float conversion PCM (S32_LE)
Its setup is:
  stream       : PLAYBACK
  access       : RW_INTERLEAVED
  format       : FLOAT_LE
  subformat    : STD
  channels     : 1
  rate         : 44100
  exact rate   : 44100 (44100/1)
  msbits       : 32
  buffer_size  : 8192
  period_size  : 256
  period_time  : 5804
  tstamp_mode  : NONE
  period_step  : 1
  avail_min    : 256
  period_event : 0
  start_threshold  : 1
  stop_threshold   : 8192
  silence_threshold: 0
  silence_size : 0
  boundary     : 4611686018427387904
Slave: Route conversion PCM (sformat=S32_LE)
  Transformation table:
    0 <- 0
    1 <- 0
Its setup is:
  stream       : PLAYBACK
  access       : MMAP_INTERLEAVED
  format       : S32_LE
  subformat    : STD
  channels     : 1
  rate         : 44100
  exact rate   : 44100 (44100/1)
  msbits       : 32
  buffer_size  : 8192
  period_size  : 256
  period_time  : 5804
  tstamp_mode  : NONE
  period_step  : 1
  avail_min    : 256
  period_event : 0
  start_threshold  : 1
  stop_threshold   : 8192
  silence_threshold: 0
  silence_size : 0
  boundary     : 4611686018427387904
Slave: Hardware PCM card 1 'HDA Intel' device 0 subdevice 0
Its setup is:
  stream       : PLAYBACK
  access       : MMAP_INTERLEAVED
  format       : S32_LE
  subformat    : STD
  channels     : 2
  rate         : 44100
  exact rate   : 44100 (44100/1)
  msbits       : 32
  buffer_size  : 8192
  period_size  : 256
  period_time  : 5804
  tstamp_mode  : NONE
  period_step  : 1
  avail_min    : 256
  period_event : 0
  start_threshold  : 1
  stop_threshold   : 8192
  silence_threshold: 0
  silence_size : 0
  boundary     : 4611686018427387904
  appl_ptr     : 0
  hw_ptr       : 0
Opening hw:Intel for control.
Using element 'Master'.
Element volume range is 0..31 (-46.50..0.00 dB).
Testing volume steps 30 vs. 31.
Testing dB steps -1.50 vs. 0.00.
Attenuation factor is 0.8414 (-1.50 dB).
Playing 1s of audio at amplitude 0.7500, mixer set to 30 (-1.50 dB).
Mixer set, sleeping 0.5s
Sleeping 0.5s...
Playing 1s of audio at amplitude 0.6310, mixer set to 31 (0.00 dB).
Mixer set, sleeping 0.5s
Sleeping 0.5s...
Looping. Press C-c to quit.   
Playing 1s of audio at amplitude 0.7500, mixer set to 30 (-1.50 dB).
Mixer set, sleeping 0.5s
Sleeping 0.5s...
Playing 1s of audio at amplitude 0.6310, mixer set to 31 (0.00 dB).
Mixer set, sleeping 0.5s
Sleeping 0.5s...
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---