Internal mic not working on my DELL studio 1425

Question

I just installed Ubuntu 11.04 and my internal mic (next to the webcam) is not being detected. I tried recording the sound with sound recorder and also tried with skype but it failed.

Recording works when I use an external mic.

I have tried playing around with alsamixer but it did not help. Is there any way to fix this?

Answer 1

using pavucontrol (installed as explained in a differ answer) in the "configuration" tab the selected profile for "internal audio" was "Analog Stereo Output". I changed it to "Analog Stereo Duplex" and the problem was solved

Answer 2

Try running alsa-mixer in terminal and look for internal mic in that program (it uses curses-like ui, left-right to change channel, space to turn on/off, up and down to adjust volume). I don't have that particular Dell, but it helped on a few laptops I had.

Answer 3

I would strongly recommend that you install PAVU sound mixer
Install from Software Center:

Or install it in a terminal:

sudo apt-get install pavucontrol

Then hit alt + f2 and type pavucontrol and up should come the launcher for PAVU which you can use to make sure your sound control and inputs are all correct.

Under input you will see probably see the internal mic named and either muted or turned right down. See if that will help if you try to change the levels. You should see it react to external noises ( ie you!) with the monitor responding to you coughing or tapping the keyboard.

You can of course use gnome-volume-control as well which is what you will find if you click the volume bar at the top of your panel and select 'sound preferences'