Re: [REGRESSION] Speaker pop/chirp on Meteor Lake ALC287 (17aa:231e) -- 6.12.73 to 6.12.85

[Mike Karcic]

I tested both setups on top of Debian's 6.12.90 source tree. 

1. I applied the 46c862f5419e patch, but the chirp was still there on every audio transition.
2. I did a full revert of 630fbc6e870e, and the chirp is completely gone.

My hardware is a Lenovo ThinkPad (Meteor Lake), ALC287, subsystem 17aa:231e.



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On Wednesday, May 27th, 2026 at 3:44 PM, Sean Rhodes <sean@starlabs.systems> wrote:

> What about 630fbc6e870e? If so, 46c862f5419e looks relevant.
> 
> On Wed, 27 May 2026 at 15:25, Mike Karcic <mikekarcic@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >
> > Speaker pop/chirp regression on a Lenovo ThinkPad with Meteor Lake and
> > Realtek ALC287 (subsystem ID 17aa:231e). The chirp occurs on speaker
> > power state transitions when audio starts or stops. It is not present
> > on kernel 6.12.73 and is present on 6.12.85. A desktop with ALC897
> > (subsystem ID 1f660202) on kernel 6.19.14 is unaffected, so this is
> > codec/fixup-specific.
> >
> > Tested on the same LMDE (Debian 13) installation with multiple kernels
> > selectable from GRUB. All userspace, firmware, and configuration are
> > identical between tests. Cold boot between kernel switches is required,
> > as warm reboot can carry codec register state forward. The kernel is
> > not tainted on any tested version.
> >
> > Bisection results (Debian package versions):
> >   6.12.48  -- no chirp
> >   6.12.73  -- no chirp
> >   6.12.85  -- chirp present
> >   6.12.86  -- chirp present
> >   6.12.90  -- chirp present
> >
> > Also broken: 6.19.14-101.fc44.x86_64 (Fedora/Aurora 44)
> >
> > The regression window (6.12.73 to 6.12.85) includes two commits
> > targeting speaker pop on the Star Labs StarFighter (ALC233, SSID
> > 7017:2014) that touch patch_realtek.c:
> >
> >   1cb3c20688fc ("ALSA: hda/realtek: Fix speaker pop on Star Labs StarFighter")
> >   Fixes commit ("ALSA: hda/realtek: Sequence GPIO2 on Star Labs StarFighter")
> >
> > These are quirk-gated to SSID 7017:2014 and should not run on
> > 17aa:231e, but they are the most prominent sound changes in the
> > regression window. The actual culprit may be a different commit
> > in the 6.12.74-6.12.85 range. I was unable to narrow further as
> > Debian does not publish intermediate point-release packages.
> >
> > I can build and test vanilla kernels for a proper bisection if
> > guided, and I can test proposed fixes.
> >
> > Hardware:
> >   Lenovo ThinkPad, Meteor Lake
> >   Codec: Realtek ALC287
> >   Subsystem ID: 17aa:231e
> >   PCI: 0000:00:1f.3
> >   Machine driver: skl_hda_dsp_generic
> >   Codec fixup: "ALC287: picked fixup for PCI SSID 17aa:231e"
> >
> > Unaffected hardware (same 6.19.14 kernel, no chirp):
> >   Desktop, Realtek ALC897, Subsystem ID: 1f660202
> >
> > Controlled variables (identical across all tested 6.12 kernels):
> >   SOF firmware: 2.12.0.1 (firmware-sof-signed 2025.01-1)
> >   Topology: intel/sof-ace-tplg/sof-hda-generic-2ch.tplg
> >   Topology ABI: 3:29:1 (Kernel ABI: 3:23:1 on all tested)
> >   ALSA UCM: alsa-ucm-conf 1.2.14-1
> >   PipeWire: 1.4.2, WirePlumber: 0.5.8
> >   power_save: 10, hda_model: (null)
> >   Desktop: KDE Plasma 6 (Wayland)
> >
> > Eliminated causes:
> >   - Topology files in sof-ipc4-tplg/ and sof-ace-tplg/ are
> >     byte-identical (confirmed via binary diff). Path irrelevant.
> >   - SOF firmware version (same 2.12.0.1 on all tested kernels).
> >   - Topology ABI mismatch (3:29:1 vs 3:23:1 present on working
> >     kernel too).
> >   - power_save (10 on all kernels).
> >   - PipeWire/WirePlumber (identical versions on all kernels).
> >   - Desktop environment (KDE on all; a KDE install triggered a
> >     kernel update which was the actual cause of the regression
> >     appearing).
> >
> > dmesg (6.12.48, working):
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3: Firmware paths/files for ipc type 1:
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3:  Firmware file:     intel/sof-ipc4/mtl/sof-mtl.ri
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3:  Firmware lib path: intel/sof-ipc4-lib/mtl
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3:  Topology file:     intel/sof-ace-tplg/sof-hda-generic-2ch.tplg
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3: Booted firmware version: 2.12.0.1
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3: Topology: ABI 3:29:1 Kernel ABI 3:23:1
> >   snd_hda_codec_alc269 ehdaudio0D0: ALC287: picked fixup for PCI SSID 17aa:231e
> >   snd_hda_codec_alc269 ehdaudio0D0: autoconfig for ALC287: line_outs=1 (0x17/0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0) type:speaker
> >
> > dmesg (6.19.14, affected):
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3: Digital mics found on Skylake+ platform, using SOF driver
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3: DSP detected with PCI class/subclass/prog-if 0x040380
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3: hda codecs found, mask 5
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3: using HDA machine driver skl_hda_dsp_generic now
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3: Firmware paths/files for ipc type 1:
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3:  Firmware file:     intel/sof-ipc4/mtl/sof-mtl.ri
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3:  Firmware lib path: intel/sof-ipc4-lib/mtl
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3:  Topology file:     intel/sof-ipc4-tplg/sof-hda-generic-2ch.tplg
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3: Booted firmware version: 2.14.1.1
> >   sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl 0000:00:1f.3: Topology: ABI 3:29:1 Kernel ABI 3:23:1
> >   snd_hda_codec_alc269 ehdaudio0D0: ALC287: picked fixup for PCI SSID 17aa:231e
> >   snd_hda_codec_alc269 ehdaudio0D0: autoconfig for ALC287: line_outs=1 (0x17/0x0/0x0/0x0/0x0) type:speaker
> >
> > Note: The kernel is not tainted on any tested version.
>