Sound under Ubuntu not working

[sedrosken]

On my laptop, I now have a custom configured install of Ubuntu server with MATE and etc. Version is 14.04. I thought you guys could help me! I have the Alsa info right here: http://www.alsa-project.org/db/?f=40b5d306a3a1c2da439fbd89526f2c6a910b31c2

and I have tried uninstalling alsa-base and pulseaudio and reinstalling. Nothing works. Rhythmbox freezes up when I try to play a music file. Could this be an issue with my gstreamer codecs?

 

[Chewy509]

Most likely... Ensure you have all the required gstreamer libraries installed, and ensure your user has access to the audio subsystem. (I can't remember the correct group membership required on Ubuntu).

Also have you unmuted your device? (Alsa be defualt on installation will mute all output channels).

 

[sedrosken]

After another reboot and playing with the volumes, it is working. Rhythmbox still crashes on trying to play songs on its first run of that boot cycle (all subsequent instances of the program execute without issue). I've tried clearing my library cache (/~/.local/Rhythmbox directory; proposed solution is to delete that directory and then repopulate the library) but it still does this.

And the PulseAudio program mutes the audio on reboot by default, is there any way I can fix that?

My user is the only one on the system.

 

[Chewy509]

IIRC, it's alsa muting by default. Use alsamixer to unmute the primary channel, then save the alsa state. Reboot and you should be fine.

Out of interest, did you have these issues under Arch, or has installing Ubuntu proven to be more difficult due to oddities in the defaults?

 

[sedrosken]

Arch was confusing to set up... Mostly because I had to do everything by hand. I used the beginner's guide, which helped a lot.

Setting up Ubuntu was easy and painless as always, though during its short run on the P4 I had go-arounds with GRUB because both HDDs were GPT. I had to wipe the whole MBR and write a new MBR table to them. I also had a few issues on my laptop with making the built in wireless card work, but that's not anything new. In any case, it's good that I have a USB one with a universally recognized chipset.

Once set up Ubuntu was rather daunting, mostly because of the different syntax with certain commands. Arch is very simple when compared to a GUI-less Ubuntu, that much is for sure.

As for Rhythmbox, after many reboots it is finally working properly again.

And saving the current config with ALSA, how do I go about that?

I guess now wouldn't be the time to realize that I mistakenly used the i386 version. Well, I'm going to be going somewhere with unlimited internet access soon. I'll get to putting the x86-64 version on there then. School lets out for summer break tomorrow, today and tomorrow are half days. What with finals happening this week too I didn't think we'd pull it off, but somehow we're doing fine. Our school was very liberal with snow days and now it's time to pay the price.

 

[sedrosken]

Arch was confusing to set up... Mostly because I had to do everything by hand. I used the beginner's guide, which helped a lot.

Setting up Ubuntu was easy and painless as always, though during its short run on the P4 I had go-arounds with GRUB because both HDDs were GPT. I had to wipe the whole MBR and write a new MBR table to them. I also had a few issues on my laptop with making the built in wireless card work, but that's not anything new. In any case, it's good that I have a USB one with a universally recognized chipset.

Once set up Ubuntu was rather daunting, mostly because of the different syntax with certain commands. Arch is very simple when compared to a GUI-less Ubuntu, that much is for sure.

As for Rhythmbox, after many reboots it is finally working properly again.

And saving the current config with ALSA, how do I go about that?

I guess now wouldn't be the time to realize that I mistakenly used the i386 version. Well, I'm going to be going somewhere with unlimited internet access soon. I'll get to putting the x86-64 version on there then. School lets out for summer break tomorrow, today and tomorrow are half days. What with finals happening this week too I didn't think we'd pull it off, but somehow we're doing fine. Our school was very liberal with snow days and now it's time to pay the price.