Only sound on left speaker - Acer Travelmate 5735z

[Xinixs]

Got a new laptop, great buy. However, I am having some issues. Will post them separately.

First one is that I only have sound on the left speaker. lspci gives:

00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 03)

Tried setting different models (acer, lenovo, auto) in /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf but no luck so far. Google did not help me much either. Any ideas?

TIA

EDIT
Never mind. Bloody thing does the same thing under windows. Nice, will probably mean being weeks without a laptop.....

[woodsmoke]

Re: Only sound on left speaker - Acer Travelmate 5735z

any chance it is the plug type or that the socket is fritzy?

woodsmoke

[Xinixs]

Re: Only sound on left speaker - Acer Travelmate 5735z

Nah, I don't think so. It is the internal speaker. Moreover, the left speaker also emits sound that is directed to the right speaker, so I guess it is a wire issue on the main board.

Anyway, called the shop and they have a great service. They will pick up the laptop (I ordered it online), check if it is indeed a hardware issue and then ship me a new one. Considering this is Spain, I am pleasantly surprised it all goes so smoothly (at least, that's how it sounds).

To be on the safe side I restored the windows bootloader and restored the NTFS partition to its original state. Don't want to get the lame excuse that the problem was caused by using a non-supported OS :P

[woodsmoke]

Re: Only sound on left speaker - Acer Travelmate 5735z

okydoky
I'm sure that the devs would like to hear the results of things, so if you could post for them when things are finished, I'm sure they would appreciate it.

woodsmoke

[Xinixs]

Re: Only sound on left speaker - Acer Travelmate 5735z

Will do, though currently it looks like it is a strict hardware issue.

Once I get the machine fully up and running I'll file a report. Guess it'll mostly be minor niggles, such as having to manually install the bcmwl drivers (weren't those open sourced yet, why can't they be installed by default??), and the screen brightness not being adjustable.

Gotta love Linux though. Had to recover Windows (from the recovery partition... is it so expensive to include a C, jeez), and it took me almost two hours, half of which was taken up by crapware installation. Somewhere we took a wrong turn and we are lost on a road that leads to nowhere....

[Guest]

Re: Only sound on left speaker - Acer Travelmate 5735z

I got my Travelmate yesterday and noticed exactly the same thing. As if there is only one speaker in the pc.
Did you already hear back from the tech support? Did they confirm it is a hardware issue?

NB. The model number of my new notebook is Acer TravelMate 5735Z-452G25Mnss.

[Xinixs]

Re: Only sound on left speaker - Acer Travelmate 5735z

I believe I have the exact same model.

I have not heard back from them yet. But since it also happens in windows I am pretty sure it is a hardware issue. If you check in Windows, you can hear that right channel sound also comes through the left speaker. I guess this model has a board problem.

Once I hear something I will let you guys know.

Must say I regret having bought an Acer. There is an HP on offer in another place at the same price with good specs. And it is an HP, which I trust more than Acer....

[Xinixs]

Re: Only sound on left speaker - Acer Travelmate 5735z

OK, you are never gonna believe this....

The laptop ONLY HAS ONE SPEAKER!!! It's Acer's way of saving a couple of cents on a machine. Apparently, many Acer machines in the low end range come with one speaker.

In itself, I don't even care, laptop sound is crappy anyway most of the time and you need to plug in an earphone or hook up external speakers if you need to get some decent audio. It's just... my, a speaker... how much does that cost? If they made the power cable 5 centimeters shorter they could probably save more....