Try adding yourself to the audio group.
vim /etc/group
Hi,
I have installed Knoppix on my Toshiba laptop. This has an onboard soundchip which is recognised; this is some output from 'lspci -v':
00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp. 82801BA/BAM AC'97 Audio (rev 03)
Subsystem: Toshiba America Info Systems: Unknown device 0001
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 0, IRQ 11
I/O ports at ce00 [size=256]
I/O ports at cdc0 [size=64]
The strange thing is that the sound only works when I login as root. When logged in on my user-account the silence is deafening
Does anyone have any idea where to start looking?
Oh, when I ran 'sndconfig' the chip was detected also. But then I got a message like 'error writing config file'. Sadly it did not say which error or which file. I'm pretty sure I ran this only from my user-account. Could that have anything to do with it?
TIA
- - Edwin
Try adding yourself to the audio group.
vim /etc/group
Thanks for the suggestion.Originally Posted by fingers99
I tried it, but allas, it does not work. In fact now I am a member of the audio group and root is not (and has never been ). But root has sound and I still have silence.
Regards,
- - Edwin
As root in a console window /etc/init.d/alsa-autoconfig to create the devices for the ALSA sound system. When you re-boot the sound levels will be lost edit the file /etc/init.d/bootmisc.sh and add the line aumix -w 75 -v 75 to have the mixer levels automatically set this also as root. You may also want to check this thread to get the most out of the sound system.Originally Posted by Edwin
Well, my install did not have alsa, so I installed it but then there was no alsa-autoconfig. I wrestled with this for a few hours and then I saw the light:Originally Posted by Stephen
Start -> Control Center -> Sound and Multimedia. Enabled 'Start aRts soundserver at startup' and 'Run soundserver with realtime priority'. That did the trick; problem is solved.
Thanks to all who responded,
- - Edwin

Dell EMC PowerEdge R740 8 Bay Server w/ 32GB RAM 2x GOLD 6132 2x 1600W PSU H730p
$499.88
Microsoft Windows Server 2025 Standard 64Bit 16 Core-50 CALs DVD With Key Sealed
$41.19
VMware vCenter Server 8 STANDARD Perpetual License Key VC-STD-C (Legacy Pack)
$1599.95
DELL POWEREDGE R340 Server | Xeon E-2126G 64GB RAM PERC H330 (Onboard)
$399.95
Dell PowerEdge C4130 1U AI GPU Server | 2x E5-2680 v3 | 32gb Ram | 2x 1600W
$484.99
Dell Poweredge R730xd 12LFF 2*2660v4 4*1Gbe h730 2x 750W Server CTO
$308.00
Dell PowerEdge C4130 1U AI GPU Server | 2x E6-2699 v3 | 128gb RAM | 2x 1600W
$1029.99
Supermicro 2U GPU Server SYS-2029GP-TR 2x Xeon 6130 32C 6x PCIe 3.0 x16 Slots
$745.00
MICROSOFT WINDOWS SERVER 2025 RDS 50 CAL NEW Factory Sealed
$136.87
Dell EMC PowerEdge R440 Xeon silver 4215 2.5GHz 16 GB ram 2x 550W PSU No HDD
$275.00