Enabling sound on a chromebook cb3 (chtmax98090) running lubuntu 20.04

Question

This question has been asked before in this forum but the answers given were for an older distribution and doesn't apply (or work) in lubuntu 20.04. the answers I tried to follow were for 17.10 and 15.10. Somebody did ask for help regarding 20.04 but there never was an answer so I am asking also. Please and thank you for your time in helping me out.

Edit: I realized I didn't actually state this as a question: I am having an extremely difficult time getting sound to work on my laptop, can any one help please?

Answer 1

For the chtmax98090 in Linux Mint 20.3 (which uses Ubuntu 20.04 LTS as its base), I was able to activate the sound by replacing the SOF Intel firmware binary and topology files with those from The SOF Project and switching to Linux Kernel 5.13 series (later kernels would likely work, 5.6/5.8/5.11 did not). You may also need to add/update the UCM2 profiles for ALSA.

I used the SOF v2.0 release (NOTE: v2.0 lists kernel 5.8 as a minimum requirement), although it also seemed to work with SOF v1.8 and v1.9 when I tried them. Download the release archive, unpack it, and change directory to the unpacked directory in the terminal. Perform the following commands:

mkdir intel-sof-backup
sudo mv /lib/firmware/intel/sof* intel-sof-backup/
sudo ./install.sh v2.0

(NOTE: Each release archive has a 0-byte release/tag file that needs to be passed to install.sh as a parameter, as shown above.) You can also install the files manually; check the project page for instructions. The script uses rsync to copy a couple of folders where they need to go while preserving symlinks.

Restart the computer.
At this point, the sound hardware should be recognized and the volume adjustable. If you didn't load the newer kernel, sound may playback at a slower rate, causing a very noticeable change in pitch.

If it's still NOT working, try upgrading alsa-ucm-conf to at least version 1.2.4, or download the source package and extract the folders "ucm2/codecs/max98080" and either "ucm2/Intel/chtmax98090" or "ucm2/chtmax98090" and place them in the matching location in "/usr/share/alsa/ucm2/", then reload ALSA or simply restart.

Also, based on some bug-tracker conversations I was reading and various commits, this SoC's audio will hopefully work out-of-the-box in Ubuntu 22.04 LTS.

Answer 2

OK, so after trying out numerous different Linux distros, including Mint, Lubunto, Bohdi, Debian, you name it, I probably tried it, the only distro I have gotten to work is Manjaro/xfce. Not only did the demo version work, it also installed and updated with the soundcard still working. So this can be marked as solved and I thank all those who at least gave this a read.

Edit: You don't understand the answer, or the solution? Not sure how this can be made easier to understand. Apparently, in all the different distros of linux I tired, there is a bug in the kernel or maybe in alsa, I don't know but for some reason, while sound does get output to HDMI, the sound card always reports as "Dummy Output". I can select the soundcard in alsa-mixer but that doesn't get it to work.

I read in one of the post (somewhere) regarding this problem that they were able to get sound on an Acer CB3-131-whatever with the Bay-trail CPU if they installed Manjaro/Arch. So I googled Manjaro, clicked on Manjaro/xfce link, downloaded it, installed the iso on a usb drive, ran the trial, clicked on the speaker icon in the panel and instead of dummy output, it gave me a speakers and a microphone volume level. I went to youtube, clicked on a video and Lo and behold, I had sound coming from the speakers. I didn't have to screw around with pulseaudio this or alsa-mixer that, it just worked right out of the box. So I installed it, updated it and the sound still works and comes out of the speakers, no magic required.

As I really wasn't expecting anyone to answer, due to the lack of response the previous person got who asked for help for this problem, after a day of not getting any response, I figured I was on my own, which is usually how I solve my own problems anyway. Yes it may not be ubuntu, or maybe it is, I don't care, my interest in all this was, my Chromebook reached EOL so it was a case of either use as was, with a Chromebook that might have allowed an unscrupulous person to hack an unsecure OS, throw it in the trash or get something else running on it that has security updates from time to time.

Manjaro is based on Arch, so it's not Ubuntu, but at this point I don't give a rat's behind as I only use this laptop to play silly Facebook games for an hour while I watch(?) TV, so yeah, I probably didn't even need the sound in the first place but my OCD or whatever said that sound is supposed to come from the speakers when sound is there and I was determined to make that happen. BTW, for the record, I probably would have even tried to install Windows ( now I will be banned for good ) if I didn't have such a tiny little eMMC drive (16 GB) to work with.

So take this post as you will, if you find something of use in it, good for you, if not, Meh, no worries.

Answer 3

This worked for me (Chromebook CB3-532): https://github.com/rgvxsthi/Braswell-EDGAR-Linux-Fixes