Comment # 9 on bug 981878 from John Walker

(In reply to Takashi Iwai from comment #8)
> OK, as expected the another machine has a completely different codec
> (Realtek), and this works easily.
> 
> OTOH, this one, Alienware Area 51-R2, has Creative CA0132 codec, and this is
> known to work only on limited machines, unfortunately.  You can find many
> bug reports regarding this on the net.  A part of the reasons is that
> Creative did lots of vendor-specific extensions, and the binary firmware
> blob we have matches only to certain models.  I guess yours doesn't.
> 
> Some Alienware models seem working with minor adjustment, and my patches
> does apply to your model.  Alas, it doesn't seem working.
> 
> That said, currently your new hardware isn't supported by upstream, mostly
> due to the reason above.  You can try the latest kernel in OBS
> Kernel:stable, but I bet it won't work, either.  Currently there is little
> hope for this kind of devices, unfortunately.
> 
> One remaining question is: did you try the output from the headphone jack? 
> When you plug there, try to toggles some mixer switches appearing in
> "alsamixer -c0".  CA0132 chip doesn't support the simultaneous outputs from
> both headphone and others, and this is switched via the mixer switch.

Apologies for not replying sooner. I've been away fr a couple of days.

I tried plugging the headphones in, with very strange results. It would help if
I understood the switches in alsamixer, but here goes:

If I plug the headphone jack right in, it switches the speakers off but I get
no sound from the headphones. I do get distorted sound through the head[phones
if I push the jack part way in, but this is as quiet as the sound I get from
the speakers and they don't turn off. I suspect that this is sound from the
speakers coming through the headphones.

When I plug in the headphones the "Surround" and the "S/PDIF" switches
automatically mute in alsamixer and the red and white colours disappear from
above the "Master" switch. When I remove the jack, the "Surround" switch
automatically unmutes, but not the "S/PDIF" switch.

Does this make sense to you?

AS far as the chip is concerned, you say there is little hope for it being
supported. Does this mean that sound will never work on this machine? Or are
there possible workarounds?

I'm just wondering whether to try the alternative kernel you suggest. I'm still
puzzled as to what OBS is, but, if I know, I'd at least give it a try. The
machine was expensive and I'd rather not have the sound not working if there���s
at all a possibility.