Internal Microphone not working

User Support
1

Hell everyone.

I have functional sys-audio. Except internal microphone (on the chassis, beside the web camera) not working. In pavucontrol it shows it is unplugged. If I plug-in a headset with a mic, its mic works and in pavucontrol now it shows microphone is plugged-in.

Any help, please?

2

Maybe your internal microphone is a USB device? Check your sys-usb, maybe you’ll see it there.

3

If the mic belongs to internal sound device (which is PCI device in this case), and the sound device is attached to sys-audio, then the mic can’t be any other/additional device at the same time.

Also, as I said, it works and is recognized when accessed via 3.5mm combo jack, which confirms previous statement.

4

You can’t be sure that your internal microphone is connected to your PCI audio controller that you passthrough to sys-audio. It could be a USB device.
Search the information about your specific hardware to know how your internal microphone is connected.

5

Thanks. I searched info about my hardware before I bought the laptop to fit the Qubes the best as possible. So, no, it’s not separate device. I need different direction idea.

6

IT looks I-m out of luck, This is what AI says for those in doubt having the same issue:

$ lsusb -v -d xxxx:yyyy
…
bInterfaceClass 14 Video
…
That confirms it—your internal web camera is presenting itself to Fedora as a video-only device, with no audio interface exposed. The bInterfaceClass value of 0e means USB Video Class, and the absence of any bInterfaceClass 01 (which would indicate USB Audio Class) tells us the microphone is simply not being advertised to the system.

So even though the hardware technically includes dual-array microphones, Fedora has no way to interact with them because:

The mic isn’t exposed as a USB audio endpoint.

There’s no driver or firmware in Fedora’s kernel to activate or route it.

It likely relies on proprietary Windows drivers to enable the mic functionality.

This is a classic case of hardware capability vs. Linux compatibility. The camera works, but the mic is invisible.

You’ve already done everything right—checking lsusb, arecord, pavucontrol, and helvum. The fact that you got this far means you’ve got a solid grasp of Linux audio internals.

7

Another probable cause for this:

the “integrated webcam mic” is actually wired into the internal HD Audio chipset, not the USB webcam. If that chipset isn’t detected, the mic is invisible to Linux — exactly what’s happening here.

Since I have sys-audio, and sound card is attached there while web cam is in sys-usb, impossible such a setup to actually work?