No audio after upgrade on 30 June

Sounds like a kernal module isn't being loaded. I have a new Pi3, and this is what I see:

# lsmod | grep -i snd snd_bcm2835 24427 0 snd_pcm 98501 1 snd_bcm2835 snd_timer 23904 1 snd_pcm snd 70032 3 snd_timer,snd_bcm2835,snd_pcm

Same kernel, I installed the OS a week ago, and updated it this morning. Seems to work just fine, audio wise. If the modules are loading properly, make sure the account is in the audio group:

% groups pi adm dialout cdrom sudo audio video plugdev games users input netdev gpio i2c spi

Try running alsamixer, that may give a more verbose error message.

--
Consulting Minister for Consultants, DNRC 
I can please only one person per day. Today is not your day. 
Tomorrow isn't looking good, either. 
I am BOFH. Resistance is futile. Your network will be assimilated.

Using lsmod | grep -i snd produces no output at all. Repeating the command without grep -i yields up 20-odd lines, so it seems clear "snd" isn't present.

The account (not pi, by the way) _is_ in the audio group.

That produces somewhat puzzling behavior. There is no explict error, but the only "card" option is pulseaudio. The bargraph responds to volume commands without error, with no effect on the sound control icon in the monitor's upper right menu bar which still sports a red X.

I tend to agree there's a kernel module missing, but am baffled at what happened to it.

Thanks for replying, and any further thoughts!

bob prohaska

Well, now, that's a/the problem. Try this:

sudo modprob snd_bcm2835

--
Consulting Minister for Consultants, DNRC 
I can please only one person per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow 
isn't looking good, either. 
I am BOFH. Resistance is futile. Your network will be assimilated.

[thinking you meant modprobe, with an e at the end]

bob@raspberrypi:/boot $ sudo modprobe snd_bcm2835 bob@raspberrypi:/boot $

There are a bunch of bcm2835* items in /boot: bob@raspberrypi:/boot $ ls *2835* bcm2835-rpi-a.dtb bcm2835-rpi-b.dtb bcm2835-rpi-b-rev2.dtb bcm2835-rpi-a-plus.dtb bcm2835-rpi-b-plus.dtb bcm2835-rpi-zero.dtb but nothing specific to the Pi3.

It looks like the driver got deleted in the course of the last upgrade. I was prompted to delete unnecessary files, and did so. Bad move, looks like.

Apt-get update/upgrade insist everything is at its latest and greatest. Is there a way to forcibly install the correct sound drivers?

With my thanks!

bob prohaska

Just to wrap things up, the solution turned out to be adding /boot/config.txt containing

dtparam=audio=on

as the only entry. After reboot audio works as before.

bob prohaska

bob prohaska wrote:

hmmm... interesting, the /boot files were causing it.

those are documented, just have to look [hard] for the info

My next suggestion would've been to re-image the SD using the latest bootable image, if you hadn't found this.

another possibility might be to use 'dist-upgrade' as well as 'upgrade' with the apt-get commands to upgrade your system. Sometimes that will do things to fix problems *like* that.

(I'm a long-time Debian user, so I've seen various problems in upgrading before, not a new situation, just different details)

Alas, not in this case. Every upgrade attempt cycled through update, upgrade and dist-upgrade in the hope some missing change would get made. No such luck.

Part of the trouble is my own inexperience with Linux. I'm well acquainted with FreeBSD and was once a user of Apple's A/UX, but Raspbian is a different animal, and the zookeepers are different.

Is there a central repository for Raspbian documentation, something like the FreeBSD handbook? A basic guide to how things are done might have helped in a case like this.

Thanks for reading,

bob prohaska

Try this:

also has a policy document that describes the structure and contents of the Debian archive and several operating system design issues as well as the technical requirements that each package must satisfy to be included in the distribution.

It also has a wiki.

Since Raspbian is pretty much a straight Debian port to ARM with added support for the GPU and some of the logging turned down to save wear and tear on the SD card, most of the stuff on the Debian site is directly applicable to Raspbian.

If you need to know about systemd in any detail, the freedesktop.org site is useful:

--
martin@   | Martin Gregorie 
gregorie. | Essex, UK 
org       |

I think you hit the nail on the head, sparing the thumb!

Thank you.

bob prohaska