Basic troubleshooting

There is a troubleshooter that checks for some of the most common problems. Press Alt+F2, then enter this command:

ubuntu-bug audio

Preliminary checks

1. Is your sound system plugged in and switched on? I spent an hour trying to diagnose a sound issue when the problem was that I had switched off the speakers to answer a phone call and forgot that I had done so.

2. Is your speaker or microphone muted? Check here:

   • Check for muted speaker

   • Check for muted microphone

Advanced troubleshooting

If the basic troubleshooting does not help, here are some additional things to try. However, when trying these steps, remember where you were so you can easily go back in case something goes wrong. Also, should you ever need to do anything in this section for your sound to work (for a new installation), you should report a bug using "ubuntu-bug audio".

1. For mixer problems, you can try controlling the mixers at ALSA level.

Reporting Sound Bugs

Please do not report problems on this page; use the normal support channels instead. See http://www.ubuntu.com/support

If you feel you have encountered a software bug, the way to report it is to run the following terminal command:

ubuntu-bug audio

This will submit a detailed bug report with information about your current system.

If the above fails for some reason, you can file a bug report, then upload alsa-info information according to these instructions.

Triaging sound bugs

In general, no-sound/low-sound/headphone-no-sound/no auto-mute/etc. bugs should be:

• Filed against the linux source package.

• Add the kernel-sound tag

• Subscribe (do not assign) the Ubuntu-audio team (not the ubuntu-audio-dev team)

Only assign bugs to the "alsa-driver" source package if the reporter is using the alsa-source binary package with module-assistant OR is requesting a blacklist or slots/index modification.

• Do not mark bugs as duplicates unless you're 100% sure that both the hardware, software, and symptom match exactly. Slightly different hardware very often requires slightly different fixes. If in doubt, file a new bug.

Here's an article of how to determine whether you have the same hardware as the original bug reporter.

Further Information

The Ubuntu Audio Developer's team maintains a set of Audio relevant wiki pages here.

CategoryDocumentation CategoryBugSquad CategoryDebugging