Make the sound louder in Lubuntu
- by Andrew
I have a Toshiba r835 running Lubuntu 11.10. Turning the volume slider up all the way doesn't give very loud sound. I've tried typing alsamixer in a terminal and turning up all the levels there to maximum, but the speakers are still fairly quiet. Is there a simple way to increase maximum volume in software? 
I understand that there are physical limits to the sound the laptop's speakers can produce, but I suspect my maximum volume is limited by software.
EDIT:
This is exactly the type of solution I'm looking for. However, it doesn't work for me. What I did:
sudo pico /etc/asound.conf
This file does not exist, so I create a new one, containing:
pcm.!default {
      type plug
      slave.pcm "softvol"
  }
  pcm.softvol {
      type softvol
      slave {
          pcm "dmix"
      }
      control {
          name "Pre-Amp"
          card 0
      }
      min_dB -5.0
      max_dB 20.0
      resolution 6
  }
I reboot the machine, and type alsamixer. I use my left/right arrow keys to inspect the various volume options. I expect to see a new option, called Pre-Amp, but I don't see one. This fix seems to work for other people. Why doesn't this fix work for me?