Microphone does not work on new Dell Inspiron 7590

Solution 1:

You might try an OEM kernel image (or the linux-oem package, there is also a tools and modules package) as these sometimes have better support of OEM Hardware (especially Laptops) and as far as I recall, Dell is contributing there or actively supporting it.

#should install everthing basic you need
sudo apt-get install linux-oem
#or for a >= 5.0 Kernel
sudo apt-get install linux-oem-osp1
#Might want to install oem tools but try it without first if they are not automatically installed

If the OEM-Kernel does not help you you might try checking the differences between your 19.10 and 18.04 manufacturer image or if the problem still persists when booted from a live or USB stick using the manufacturer image.

If the problem persists with the officially supported image, then the driver really might not support using it the way you want.

OEM Kernel Image

Certified HW Ubuntu Inspiron 7590

Solution 2:

Be sure to use an application that can record audio. See the message in Puva, recording tab. Try gnome-sound-recorder. You can find it in Synaptic. Also be sure that your web-browser is capable of recording.

Solution 3:

1. First check the mic sound level. To check the sound level install alsamixer. To do that use following commands:

   **sudo apt-get install alsa-utils**
   
   **sudo apt-get install alsamixer**
   

2. Once alsamixer is installed then run following command to run it

   **alsamixer**
   

3. Then press F6(Function key to check the sound cards) and select appropriate sound card and press enter key.

4. The screen will show volume level for Master, Speaker, Headphones and MIC (Depending on the system, this list may vary). Make sure MIC volume is not zero.

Solution 4:

There is a way to fix this.

I have the same laptop and I'm also running 19.10. As the OP, I also managed to solve this problem. I'm writing this answer as a "how to" guide, just to help others having the same problem as we had. The oem kernel proposed by @Ritualmaster is tested and at least in my 7590+ubuntu19.10 configuration, is not working.

The problems:

• The sound(speakers, line in-out, dmic) is fully working using sof, but the ucm configuration files needed are not in the master branch of the project nor in Ubuntu's installation.

• Ubuntu's update to 5.3.0-42 kernel breaks sof causing failure to the sound system, leaving a DummyOutput device for sound output.

So I'll try to document the required steps for the solution:

1. Blacklist "snd-hda-intel" and "snd-soc-skl" modules in order to let the linux kernel to load the sof driver. The driver is already installed as it is part of the kernel since 5.2 (I think).

sudo touch /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-snd.conf
sudo echo "blacklist snd-hda-intel" >> /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-snd.conf
sudo echo "blacklist snd-soc-skl" >> /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-snd.conf

2. Fetch the sound card configuration files from the sof project repository. This step requires git. So if you don't have it, install it via sudo apt install git. The configuration files are not in the master branch and so both the existence and the contents of them is not guaranteed. For that reason we will checkout the files exactly in the right version manually.

cd ~
git clone https://github.com/thesofproject/alsa-ucm-conf.git
cd alsa-ucm-conf
git checkout -b inspiron f083700
sudo cp -r ucm/sof-skl_hda_card /usr/share/alsa/ucm/

3. If you have installed the kernel update "5.3.0-42", you also have to make sure you are booting to the previous "5.3.0-40" version every time. One simple way for doing this is editing grub. Find /etc/default/grub and delete line GRUB_DEFAULT=0. Then add the lines below

GRUB_SAVEDEFAULT=true
GRUB_DEFAULT=saved

Now update grub and reboot

sudo update-grub
sudo reboot

4. Assuming you are using inspiron 7590 ;) make sure you press F1 when the dell logo appears while booting, in order to bring up the grub menu. From this menu select advanced and then 5.3.0-40. Bringing up the grub menu is not necessary every time, only once. In the previous step we have set grub default selection to "saved". That means it will continue to boot the last selected version from now on.

That's it. Hopefully the system will boot and the sound cart will be detected just fine.

For example in my pulseaudio volume control: and

Note 1: If mic level is still low, you can raise it in alsamixer.

Note 2: If there is a better way of selecting kernel to boot let me know.

Useful links:

• Arch wiki - https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Dell_Inspiron_15_(7590)
• sof inspiron issue - https://github.com/thesofproject/linux/issues/1877
• Ubuntu certified HW - https://certification.ubuntu.com/hardware/201903-26879