Hi. If anyone managed to get the ASUS A8NSLI SE ALC850 chipset working and producing sound, please share the proper AppleAC97Audio.kext or the knowledge of how to do so. I tried all the AC97 kexts I could get my hands on, inserted my card's proper dev id (0x005910DE), yet I could NEVER get it to produce sound. Not in Tiger, not in Leopard... The card is recognized and appears in the preferences pane, yet it will not render sound.

Would it be possible to make it work with Azalia, or is this chipset not supported by it? Would it be possible to create a string, just as for graphics cards (I believe Azalia is needed for that as well...)?

Couple of followup questions for you HCE:

Have you tried changing what ports the sound uses in the BIOS?
Have you double checked that in the Midi configuration utility that yours is setup for 2 speaker? The other options are not supported properly under OSX.
I have the exact same chipset and ID and mine works fine. Make sure you remove any extra sound kexts ie. AppleAzaliaAudio, ALCinject, HDAaudio etc... There could be another kext conflicting with your AppleAC97Audio.
Make sure your hooked up into the green port on your motherboard(I know its the obvious but best to double check everything)

I checked everything you suggested except the BIOS changing of the port. It's set to default settings so I thought it couldn't be the problem. Since you can get sound out of your board, what port are you using for it? Thanks for the BIOS suggestion.

I dont recall what mine is set at(that computer is currently offline), but I know at some point I did change it from auto. There were only like 2 options, so try both.

I'm not sure if this is correct, but I assume you are referring to the Midi Port Address. It has two values: 300 and 330. Tried both with same result: no audio output. On a sidenote, could it be we are using different BIOS versions? I'm using the factory default 0502. Did you flash yours to another version?

Doesn't hurt to try a new version, but I doubt that will have any impact on the Audio chipset.

I have the same board, and I've got sound since right after the installation (zeph's rev2). However, I wonder why the multichannel doesn't work - anyone knows the reason and(or the fix?

Btw, the bios settings don't change much for me. I had them changed several times trying to work out the 6.1 (in vain), and was never left without sound.

I have 4 boards with an ALC 850 and it worked with every OS X installation I had, even in 4 and 6ch mode (but only stereo used). It also works with Logic 8.
Is the output greyed out in the prerefences pane, can you adjust the volume with f.e. additional keys on a multimedia keyboard? A friend also often said he had no sound - but he used the wrong jack Have you checked this - it's the green (lime) one.

BTW: It isn't enough to exchange the kext, you have to use some more terminal commands. Replace the AC97 Audio kext and enter this in Terminal:

Quit Terminal, then delete /System/Library/Extensions.mkext (and Extensions.kextcache in Tiger) and reboot. Some friends of me also hadn't problems with their audio, this always worked. We mostly have the same boards, Asus A8N-SLI Premium, so it's not too much different than yours.

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2 Opteron systems: OSx86 10.5.8, Andy's 9.8.0 kernel, Asus A8N-SLI Premium, Opteron 185 o'clocked @ 2 x 2,95 GHz (2nd system 2.6 GHz), ATI Radeon HD2600XT 256MB Dual-Monitor 2x HP L2035, 4 GB RAM, Griffin FireWave as main audio device, Marvell + nForce LAN, Asus U3S6 USB3/SATA6 card, 5,5 TB harddisk, Firewire 800 card, Apple Remote + eHome IR receiver, 2x Wacom serial graphics tablet, Canon Pixma iP4700, Logitech Internet Navigator wireless keyboard/mouse combination.

My Audio stuff: M-Audio Transit USB (default audio), M-Audio ProFire 610, M-Audio ProFire Lightbridge (34 channels) using Creamware A16 ADAT converter • MIDI: M-Audio Midiman 4x MIDI interface • Behringer Audio Mixers: Xenyx 1002, Xenyx 1002FX, Xenyx 1202FX, Eurorack UB1002FX, Eurorack MX1804FX, Eurorack MX262A • FX devices: Lexicon MPX100 DSP, Behringer DSP-1000 Virtualizer, Behringer MiniFEX 800 DSP, Behringer Multicom Pro MDX4400 compressor • RETRO: MSSIAH midi/sequencer/synthesizer cardridge for the C64 (Dual-SID), Steinberg M.S.I. MIDI Interface for C64

@naquaada
I have a 5.1 sound system connected via 3 jacks (using the 3 slots on the back of the motherboard). in windows, this would allow the sound to split properly to the different channels. what happens in my zeph's rev 2 case is that I get sound through the front left and right speakers properly, and a veeeery faint sound (almost like my imagination's own sound! )from the other speakers (including subwoofer). Also, this happens nomatter the choice in the MIDI preference pane of enabling 2, 4 or 6 channels. What I have to do is to keep me with 2ch, because if I select 6 ch, occasionally my sound disappears (I read somewhere it had to do with a channel rotation, somehow). So I got stereo just fine, but I'm keeping myself from watching a good DVD with surround . Oh, and I can use the media buttons to change the volume just fine!