Debian Sound Issues

X11 · Post by **X11** » Tue Dec 15, 2009 2:38 pm

I just installed debian last night and I cannot get sound to work. This is really confusing me, it used to be a hell of a lot simpler to get sound working on Linux.

The modules are loaded, and alsa appears to be working because alsamixer works. This laptop being incredibly odd requires an option "External Amplifier" be turned off in the mixer for sound to work. I am in the group sound, and can run alsamixer without being root. However, gnome's mixer cannot see the sound device, although the sound configuration gui under preferences does none of th tests make any noise.

So, the modules are loaded, alsa is fine, and so on. I am laying blame on pulseaudio, the daemon is clearly running...

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john@debian:~$ pulseaudio 
E: pid.c: Daemon already running.
E: main.c: pa_pid_file_create() failed.

See, it even says its running, so what is its problem? I know nothing about it or why it even exists. Jackd seemed perfectly fine.

This might tell you something however...

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john@debian:~$ killall pulseaudio
john@debian:~$ pulseaudio 
W: main.c: setrlimit(RLIMIT_NICE, (31, 31)) failed: Operation not permitted
W: main.c: setrlimit(RLIMIT_RTPRIO, (9, 9)) failed: Operation not permitted
ALSA lib control.c:909:(snd_ctl_open_noupdate) Invalid CTL front:0
ALSA lib control.c:909:(snd_ctl_open_noupdate) Invalid CTL front:0

X11 · Post by **X11** » Tue Dec 15, 2009 2:41 pm

Suddenly after killing and running pulseaudio again, I see a mixer with one volume control that was muted. However, the volume control on my panel appears does nothing and won't even let me open preferences. The mixer sees pulseaudios filthy presence but not the panel. Why do we put up with this?

How do I fix this?

After unmuting that channel on the suddenly magically working mixer there is still no sound.

X11 · Post by **X11** » Tue Dec 15, 2009 2:53 pm

And a reboot magically fixes everything, man I feel like a phallus. I should have just restarted whatever services are related. And my gnome mixer looks like a normal linux mixer, thank god, status quo. For a second there I thought I might have change.