[Alsa-user] Support for Gigabyte GA-7N400-L1 mobo with Realtek ALC650?

[<als...@am...>]

Hello,

I own a Gigabyte GA-7N400-L1 AMD motherboard
(home page at:
http://www.giga-byte.com/MotherBoard/Products/Products_GA-7N400-L1.htm
detailed specs at:
http://www.giga-byte.com/MotherBoard/Products/Products_Spec_GA-7N400-L1.htm
full manual (PDF) available from:
http://www.giga-byte.com/Motherboard/Support/Manual/Manual_GA-7N400-L1.htm)

According to the specs (I'm trying to dig what I suspect to be
the important parts, I'm a total newbie when it comes to such level
of hardware):

1. Chipset is nVidia nForce2 SPP Memory/AGP/PCI controller (PAC)
2. nVidia nForce2 MCP Integrated Peripheral Controller (PSIPC)
3. On-Board sound:
    3.1 Realtek ALC650 CODEC
    3.2 Line Out/2 front speaker
    3.3 Line In/2 rear speaker (by s/w switch)
    3.4 Mic In/center & subwoofer (by s/w switch)
    3.5 SPDIF In/Out
    3.6 CD In/AUC In/Game port

(I'm just copying from the specs, 95% of the above doesn't make any
sense to me).

I tried to install alsa-source 0.9.6 on debian unstable (because that's
what's available as a debian package). kernel modules compilation works
fine (with "ALSA_CARDS=all" for a start) "alsa start" recognizes the
sound card as requiring the intel8x00 driver.

The output of "lsmod" is:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Module                  Size  Used by    Not tainted
snd-seq-oss            29632   0  (unused)
snd-seq-midi-event      3584   0  [snd-seq-oss]
snd-seq                38384   2  [snd-seq-oss snd-seq-midi-event]
snd-pcm-oss            38436   0  (unused)
snd-mixer-oss          13304   0  [snd-pcm-oss]
snd-intel8x0           18916   0
snd-pcm                60868   0  [snd-pcm-oss snd-intel8x0]
snd-timer              15140   0  [snd-seq snd-pcm]
snd-ac97-codec         40888   0  [snd-intel8x0]
snd-page-alloc          6164   0  [snd-intel8x0 snd-pcm]
snd-mpu401-uart         3600   0  [snd-intel8x0]
snd-rawmidi            14080   0  [snd-mpu401-uart]
snd-seq-device          4224   0  [snd-seq-oss snd-seq snd-rawmidi]
snd                    30212   0  [snd-seq-oss snd-seq-midi-event 
snd-seq snd-pcm-oss snd-mixer-oss snd-intel8x0 snd-pcm snd-timer 
snd-ac97-codec snd-mpu401-uart snd-rawmidi snd-seq-device]
------------------------------------------------------------------------

relevant parts of "lspci -vvv" are:

------------------------------------------------------------------------
00:01.0 ISA bridge: nVidia Corporation nForce2 ISA Bridge (rev a4)
         Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology: Unknown device 0c11
         Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle+ MemWINV- VGASnoop- 
ParErr- Stepping- SERR
- FastB2B-
         Status: Cap+ 66Mhz+ UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- 
<TAbort- <MAbort- >
SERR- <PERR-
         Latency: 0
         Capabilities: [48] #08 [01e1]

00:01.1 SMBus: nVidia Corporation nForce2 SMBus (MCP) (rev a2)
         Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology: Unknown device 0c11
         Control: I/O+ Mem- BusMaster- SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- 
ParErr- Stepping- SERR
- FastB2B-
         Status: Cap+ 66Mhz+ UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- 
<TAbort- <MAbort- >
SERR- <PERR-
         Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 5
         Region 0: I/O ports at c000 [size=32]
         Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2
                 Flags: PMEClk- DSI- D1- D2- AuxCurrent=0mA 
PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot+,D3cold+)
                 Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME-


00:06.0 Multimedia audio controller: nVidia Corporation nForce2 AC97 
Audio Controler (MCP)
  (rev a1)
         Subsystem: nVidia Corporation: Unknown device 4144
         Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- 
ParErr- Stepping- SERR
- FastB2B-
         Status: Cap+ 66Mhz+ UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- 
<TAbort- <MAbort- >
SERR- <PERR-
         Latency: 0 (500ns min, 1250ns max)
         Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 11
         Region 0: I/O ports at b000 [size=256]
         Region 1: I/O ports at b400 [size=128]
         Region 2: Memory at e0001000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
         Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2
                 Flags: PMEClk- DSI- D1+ D2+ AuxCurrent=0mA 
PME(D0-,D1-,D2-,D3hot-,D3cold-)
                 Status: D0 PME-Enable- DSel=0 DScale=0 PME-

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

simply running "aplay" with this setup or any other sound program
results in the program playing as if everything is ok but no sound
comes out.
I ran alsamixer and unmuted and raised the volume for all channels.

What else can I do?  Is this hardware supposed to be supported?

Thanks very much,

--Amos