So there’s a really bizarre thing that happens to my computer only when Linux is installed on it. You see, the audio jack begins to glow red. I don’t mean an LED nearby. I mean there is a red light coming from inside the jack. I never knew there was even a light in there to begin with, and I certainly don’t know why it’s glowing red
https://octodon.social/media/R0R51eAnS34xM-Vh1wc
@jordyd
my old laptop did it too
@catoutofbed I prefer to think it’s the spirit of Steve Jobs returning to tell me he knows my free software sins
@jordyd
s/pdif probably
uses a toslink cable
@catoutofbed that’s wild
@catoutofbed Do you have any idea what the driver might be called?
@jordyd
search for s/pdif i guess?
i never really looked into it
@jordyd They're coming to get you and that's your only warning
Update: the glowing has stopped. I think I will live tonight
Update: it appears ALSA supports my sound card and is functioning properly... then who was sound card?
@jordyd i'm not sure if i've ever seen that, but i wonder if it's:
a) a feature that other drivers don't bother to activate
b) an activity led or some such on a component adjacent to the jack? i guess this one is pretty unlikely.
@brennen
Jess (@catoutofbed) knows. Something about ummmm... optical... audio...?
@catoutofbed @jordyd oh shit, that's wild. i didn't know there was an optical plug that was the same form factor...
@catoutofbed @brennen and here I thought you were an expert in optical audio things
@jordyd fwiw I think I saw that when running Windows on my MBP a few years ago as well, never really understood why either 😅
@jordyd "I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that"
@jordyd without knowing your specific chipset, there might be something in pauvcontrol (or alsamixer if you’re oldschool) about an optical output that you could disable.
(incidentally the old airport express has the same thing happen, just... normally)
@jordyd it's cursed
@jordyd oh, that's just a demon. pretty straightforward. you need a young priest, old priest, etc.
@jordyd Did you know you can listen to it blink? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%2FPDIF
@hackerfriendly Someone told me but they didn't phrase it in quite as cool a way
@jordyd That indicates the socket supports S/PDIF over TOSLINK: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S/PDIF
@jordyd optical audio out possibly
source: i have similar macbook with debian on it, same thing happening.
@jordyd I had this issue on my Mac mini. It's because the jack thinks you're using optical out. If you go into alsamixer and turn it off, the light should also turn off.
@jordyd
it's a digital audio output, optical