Hello.
Recently I decided to give another try to linux so I can migrate from windows and installed a fresh version of plasma KDE.
Out of the box it detected my sound card and the quality is amazing, even better with easyeffects but I have one annoying problem that is the bass. I like some bass in my EQ settings but when I set high bass the sound start to sound like crap and with crackling like it is lower quality.
Tried everything I could like setting the sampling rate to 192k (the max supported by my card) and changed the quantum values to:
Minimum Quantum: 512
Maximum Quantum: 8192
Default Quantum: 2048
But it still did not resolved the bass problem and the crackling in some musics with a lot of instruments, music like the ones from the first album of Royal Blood. It sound like crap, but some other album musics like Untitled from Rammstein sounds a little better for some reason.
Some key information:
inxi -Fazyc0
Audio:
Device-1: Intel Cannon Lake PCH cAVS vendor: Gigabyte driver: snd_hda_intel
v: kernel alternate: snd_soc_skl, snd_soc_avs, snd_sof_pci_intel_cnl
bus-ID: 00:1f.3 chip-ID: 8086:a348 class-ID: 0403
Device-2: NVIDIA TU106 High Definition Audio driver: snd_hda_intel
v: kernel pcie: gen: 3 speed: 8 GT/s lanes: 4 link-max: lanes: 16
bus-ID: 01:00.1 chip-ID: 10de:10f9 class-ID: 0403
Device-3: Creative Labs CA0132 Sound Core3D [Sound Blaster Recon3D /
Z-Series BlasterX AE-5 Plus] driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel pcie: gen: 1
speed: 2.5 GT/s lanes: 1 bus-ID: 03:00.0 chip-ID: 1102:0012 class-ID: 0403
API: ALSA v: k6.9.12-1-MANJARO status: kernel-api with: aoss
type: oss-emulator tools: alsactl,alsamixer,amixer
Server-1: JACK v: 1.9.22 status: off tools: N/A
Server-2: PipeWire v: 1.2.2 status: active with: 1: pipewire-pulse
status: active 2: wireplumber status: active 3: pipewire-alsa type: plugin
tools: pactl,pw-cat,pw-cli,wpctl
~ lspci | grep -i audio ✔
00:1f.3 Audio device: Intel Corporation Cannon Lake PCH cAVS (rev 10)
01:00.1 Audio device: NVIDIA Corporation TU106 High Definition Audio Controller (rev a1)
03:00.0 Audio device: Creative Labs CA0132 Sound Core3D [Sound Blaster Recon3D / Z-Series / Sound BlasterX AE-5 Plus] (rev 01)
~ lsmod | sort ✔
ac97_bus 12288 1 snd_soc_core
acpi_pad 24576 0
aesni_intel 360448 0
coretemp 20480 0
crc16 12288 1 ext4
crc32c_generic 12288 0
crc32c_intel 16384 2
crc32_pclmul 12288 0
crct10dif_pclmul 12288 1
cryptd 28672 2 crypto_simd,ghash_clmulni_intel
crypto_simd 16384 1 aesni_intel
crypto_user 20480 0
dm_mod 229376 0
e1000e 376832 0
ee1004 16384 0
ext4 1155072 1
fat 106496 1 vfat
gf128mul 16384 1 polyval_generic
ghash_clmulni_intel 16384 0
gigabyte_wmi 12288 0
hid_generic 12288 0
i2c_dev 28672 0
i2c_i801 45056 0
i2c_nvidia_gpu 12288 0
i2c_smbus 20480 1 i2c_i801
intel_cstate 20480 0
intel_pch_thermal 20480 0
intel_pmc_bxt 16384 1 iTCO_wdt
intel_pmc_core 122880 0
intel_powerclamp 20480 0
intel_rapl_common 40960 1 intel_rapl_msr
intel_rapl_msr 20480 0
intel_tcc_cooling 12288 0
intel_uncore 266240 0
intel_uncore_frequency 12288 0
intel_uncore_frequency_common 16384 1 intel_uncore_frequency
intel_vsec 20480 1 intel_pmc_core
ip_tables 36864 0
iTCO_vendor_support 12288 1 iTCO_wdt
iTCO_wdt 16384 0
jbd2 204800 1 ext4
joydev 24576 0
kvm 1368064 1 kvm_intel
kvm_intel 430080 0
loop 45056 10
mac_hid 12288 0
mbcache 16384 1 ext4
mei 204800 5 mei_hdcp,mei_pxp,mei_me
mei_hdcp 28672 0
mei_me 57344 2
mei_pxp 20480 0
Module Size Used by
mousedev 24576 0
mtd 110592 3 spi_nor
nfnetlink 20480 1
ntfs3 335872 1
nvidia 60583936 776 nvidia_uvm,nvidia_modeset
nvidia_drm 126976 22
nvidia_modeset 1605632 45 nvidia_drm
nvidia_uvm 6701056 0
pcspkr 12288 0
pinctrl_cannonlake 36864 0
pmt_class 16384 1 pmt_telemetry
pmt_telemetry 16384 1 intel_pmc_core
polyval_clmulni 12288 0
polyval_generic 12288 1 polyval_clmulni
pps_core 32768 1 ptp
ptp 45056 1 e1000e
qrtr 57344 2
rapl 20480 0
rfkill 40960 3
roles 16384 1 typec_ucsi
sha1_ssse3 32768 0
sha256_ssse3 36864 0
sha512_ssse3 53248 0
snd 155648 25 snd_hda_codec_generic,snd_seq,snd_seq_device,snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_hwdep,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec,snd_hda_codec_realtek,snd_sof,snd_timer,snd_compress,snd_soc_core,snd_pcm
snd_compress 28672 2 snd_soc_avs,snd_soc_core
snd_hda_codec 212992 9 snd_hda_codec_generic,snd_soc_avs,snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_soc_hda_codec,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec_realtek,snd_soc_hdac_hda,snd_soc_skl,snd_sof_intel_hda
snd_hda_codec_generic 110592 1 snd_hda_codec_realtek
snd_hda_codec_hdmi 98304 1
snd_hda_codec_realtek 208896 2
snd_hda_core 143360 12 snd_hda_codec_generic,snd_soc_avs,snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_soc_hda_codec,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_ext_core,snd_hda_codec,snd_hda_codec_realtek,snd_sof_intel_hda_common,snd_soc_hdac_hda,snd_soc_skl,snd_sof_intel_hda
snd_hda_ext_core 36864 7 snd_soc_avs,snd_soc_hda_codec,snd_sof_intel_hda_common,snd_soc_hdac_hda,snd_sof_intel_hda_mlink,snd_soc_skl,snd_sof_intel_hda
snd_hda_intel 65536 6
snd_hda_scodec_component 20480 1 snd_hda_codec_realtek
snd_hrtimer 12288 1
snd_hwdep 20480 1 snd_hda_codec
snd_intel_dspcfg 40960 5 snd_soc_avs,snd_hda_intel,snd_sof,snd_sof_intel_hda_common,snd_soc_skl
snd_intel_sdw_acpi 16384 2 snd_sof_intel_hda_common,snd_intel_dspcfg
snd_pcm 200704 15 snd_soc_avs,snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec,soundwire_intel,snd_sof,snd_sof_intel_hda_common,snd_compress,snd_soc_core,snd_sof_utils,snd_soc_skl,snd_hda_core,snd_pcm_dmaengine
snd_pcm_dmaengine 16384 1 snd_soc_core
snd_seq 131072 7 snd_seq_dummy
snd_seq_device 16384 1 snd_seq
snd_seq_dummy 12288 0
snd_soc_acpi 16384 3 snd_soc_acpi_intel_match,snd_sof_intel_hda_common,snd_soc_skl
snd_soc_acpi_intel_match 98304 3 snd_sof_intel_hda_common,snd_soc_skl,snd_sof_pci_intel_cnl
snd_soc_avs 237568 0
snd_soc_core 462848 7 snd_soc_avs,snd_soc_hda_codec,soundwire_intel,snd_sof,snd_sof_intel_hda_common,snd_soc_hdac_hda,snd_soc_skl
snd_soc_hdac_hda 28672 2 snd_sof_intel_hda_common,snd_soc_skl
snd_soc_hda_codec 28672 1 snd_soc_avs
snd_soc_skl 245760 0
snd_soc_sst_dsp 40960 1 snd_soc_skl
snd_soc_sst_ipc 20480 1 snd_soc_skl
snd_sof 462848 3 snd_sof_pci,snd_sof_intel_hda_common,snd_sof_intel_hda
snd_sof_intel_hda 20480 1 snd_sof_intel_hda_common
snd_sof_intel_hda_common 258048 1 snd_sof_pci_intel_cnl
snd_sof_intel_hda_mlink 36864 2 soundwire_intel,snd_sof_intel_hda_common
snd_sof_pci 24576 2 snd_sof_intel_hda_common,snd_sof_pci_intel_cnl
snd_sof_pci_intel_cnl 12288 0
snd_sof_utils 16384 1 snd_sof
snd_sof_xtensa_dsp 16384 1 snd_sof_intel_hda_common
snd_timer 53248 3 snd_seq,snd_hrtimer,snd_pcm
soundcore 16384 1 snd
soundwire_bus 139264 3 soundwire_intel,soundwire_generic_allocation,soundwire_cadence
soundwire_cadence 45056 1 soundwire_intel
soundwire_generic_allocation 12288 1 soundwire_intel
soundwire_intel 81920 1 snd_sof_intel_hda_common
spi_intel 36864 1 spi_intel_pci
spi_intel_pci 12288 0
spi_nor 172032 0
squashfs 94208 5
typec 110592 1 typec_ucsi
typec_ucsi 73728 1 ucsi_ccg
uas 36864 0
ucsi_ccg 36864 0
usbhid 86016 0
usb_storage 90112 1 uas
vboxdrv 659456 3 vboxnetadp,vboxnetflt
vboxnetadp 32768 0
vboxnetflt 40960 0
vfat 24576 1
video 77824 1 nvidia_modeset
wmi 36864 3 video,gigabyte_wmi,wmi_bmof
wmi_bmof 12288 0
x86_pkg_temp_thermal 16384 0
xhci_pci 24576 0
xhci_pci_renesas 24576 1 xhci_pci
x_tables 65536 1 ip_tables
I also tried to mess with some settings in alsamixer but no sucess either.
I hope someone can help me because the audio problem was always a drawback for me to go back to Windows, but I do not want to do that this time and instead, try to resolve.
