[plug] My new PC - a little disappointed...

[Mike Holland]

Blake Munro wrote:

> Gigabyte M750SLI-DS4 mainboard (with Nvidia chipset)

Doesn't that have onboard graphics?  Did you try it as a temporary fix?

> Firstly, the mainboard has a Realtek ALC889A sound chip on board. The 
> audio was extremely distorted and crackly, thus rendering it as useless
 > ... https://bugtrack.alsa-project.org/alsa-bug/view.php?id=3765

Odd. I have the Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H, same as in that link, and no 
problems. nForce 630i/ALC889A .  Current Ubuntu.

Its the same mobo as in the bug-link you gave, but works perfectly
with stereo or s/pdif out.

>  I tried to stick with good, popular brands but it appears 
> that Ubuntu is still a little bit behind in terms of bleeding edge hardware.

  I thought Ubuntu was one of the more bleeding edge distros, depending 
a little on which repositories you enable.

> Any help would be very appreciated.

Have you installed windows? That might show its not a hardware problem.

Mike