Ubuntu 13.04 has been released with lost of eye-candy and performance boost. As it happens with every Ubuntu release, you install or upgrade to a newer Ubuntu version and run in to a number of problems. But then, there is always a way to overcome these big little problems. One of the most common problem faced is no sound after installing Ubuntu 14.04.
While there could be several reasons for no sound in Ubuntu 14.04, I will share the trick which worked for me. Lets see in steps how I fixed and how you can fix it.
Steps to fix no audio in Ubuntu 14.04:
First step, just to verify, check if the sound is not muted. Once you verify this, go to Sound Settings:
In the Sound Settings, you’ll find that you have practically nothing here except a dummy output. Quite frustrating. It means that your sound card is not even recognized. Puff!
No worries. The one shot solution which fixed the sound problem for me on my Intel powered Dell Inspiron N4010 is to force reload Alsa. To do that, use the following command in terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T):
sudo alsa force-reload
The output will be like this.
You may think that it is hanged or still in processing but it takes only couple of seconds. You can simply close it afterwards by using Ctrl+C. Now, you need to reboot your computer. If at the next start up, you hear the login sound at the lock screen, you know it worked like a charm.
First Alternate method to fix no sound in Ubuntu 14.04:
If the above problem did not fix it for you, try reinstalling Alsa and Pulse audio in the following manner:
sudo apt-get remove --purge alsa-base pulseaudio
sudo apt-get install alsa-base pulseaudio
And force reload Alsa again:
sudo alsa force-reload
Restart and enjoy the world of sound, again.
Second Alternate method to fix no sound in Ubuntu 14.04:
Open the terminal and edit speech-dispatcher file by using the following command:
sudo gedit /etc/default/speech-dispatcherIn here, change RUN=yes to RUN=no
Reboot and enjoy sound.
If it fixed your sound problem, you may want to fix brightness issue as well. Fixing the sound problem is definitely one of the must to do things after installing Ubuntu 14.04. Any questions, suggestions or a world of thanks to keep me motivated can be dropped in comment section. Stay tuned for more Linux tutorials and tips.
Happy to say “FIRST ALTERNATE METHOD TO FIX NO SOUND IN UBUNTU 14.04” worked perfectly. Thanks as always to all contributors to this thread.
Thanks to Abishek, Ryan and the other contributors!
After going through the original steps with no luck, I deleted .config/pulse. After reboot, pulse was re-created and I could then find Multimedia and Audio and Video Settings in System Settings -> Hardware. (This is KDE Mint 17 Quiana. The sound just quit some time after upgrading.) Initially “Test” did nothing. After a cold boot (shut down and remove the power cord – for a laptop also the battery if you can) sound was working fine as if it always had!
I suddenly get no sound on my laptop (no speakers, no headphones, no line sounds…) on ubuntu 14.04.
Finally after an hour trying a lot of things I found It was a VLC conflict. I fixed it following these steps:
Open VLC,
Go to Preferences
then to Sound
click in the reset preferences button.
Close VLC
Hope it helps someone.
Thank you! That was all I needed to do.
In my UBUNTU 16.04 sound is not working.
i tried these methods.
before volume button was visible in top right corner, but not now.
i upgraded from 14.04, sound was working there
can you guide me to fix this problem.
It works for me. But, I still can’t hear the system alert sound
I’m running Linux Mint Rosa. I agree with the last post.
Rename (that’s safer) /.config/pulse to /.config/tmp_pulse.
Reboot.
Start up Firefox and pull up hulu or youtube and check if it worked.
Did for me…
I performed the sudo alsa force-reload. {didn’t work}
Checked the config folder and it was already =no {!}
Renamed pulse folder and rebooted. {worked after a few secs}.
If it works then go back and delete the renamed folder.
After HOURS of searching I figured out the problem myself. There are those who would tell you to remove the ~/.pulse directory of course there is no ~/.pulse directory to remove. Instead if you remove ~/.config/pulse (because it has been completely borked) reboot and you have sound again — at least I did.
Yes I tried everything to no avail until I deleted the .config/pulse directory. Thanks a million
Ryan thanks a million. Removing ~/.config/pulse directory, followed by reboot, fixed my problem in Ubuntu 14.04. No other solutions worked.
My problem was that all audio, regardless of source, played one octave lower pitch and about half the proper speed.
1st and 2nd solution did not work for me and Ubuntu 14.04.3
Actually I never could reinstall alsa base and pulseaudio which I had removed.
So I am really not impressed with this article… Now I am stucked…
I had headphones working, speakers were not. After trying this tutorial, now I don’t have any sound at all.
Going backwards…
These two commands destroyed my system (linux mint 17.2) . After rebooting I got some sort of mdm error and the graphical interface would not work. had to reinstall OS.
sudo apt-get remove –purge alsa-base pulseaudio
sudo apt-get install alsa-base pulseaudio
I recommend removing this from your article!
I use mint 17.3. After a lot of trying, the sudo apt-get remove — purge alsa base pulseaudio is exactly what did the trick. After the remove my head phones were detected and also after a suspended session (before it was not recognized after wake up).
After the reinstall I has all control back. For me this was perfect.
it works ty
It worked. Thanks for the help.
No nothing worked for me! Oh Wel, back to Google.
The only solution that worked for me was reinstalling (actually upgrading) my Linux kernel. Hope this works for those which, like me, none of the codes above worked. I just followed this on 29/01/2016:
https://mintguide.org/system/517-install-linux-kernel-4-3-stable-on-linux-mint.html
None of the alternatives works. It was working perfectly. But then Linux Mint 17.3 “Rosa” crashed completely after trying to add printer Epson L355. Now I get no sound at all. I tried all the above suggestions, none of them works (always get errors on the Terminal) and always the same “Dummy Output” after rebooting. I’m really disappointed with this Linux Distro…
Fixed Static Sound Problem on Acer Netbook (originally running Windows XT)
OK, I updated two older Acer Laptop Netbook Computers to Linux Mint 17.3 (Rosa), from a DVD purchased on the net in December of 2015. Both machines were updated from the same DVD (via USB plug-in, as there have no built-in players).
The installation on the newer Acer Aspire One 512 (which had been running Windows 7.1) went without a hitch. Not a single sound problem. Perfect. Took about 15 minutes. This was actually performed AFTER one month of nightmare issues with the older machine (see below), so it was done with some trepidation. ) I was amazed that there were no sound problems.)
After the updates via wireless, some OTHER problems were introduced with the wireless updates; it took me a couple of days to get back to normal – but issues were unrelated to static sound problems, as described below.
HOWEVER, the older Acer Aspire One netbook, which had been running Windows XT is another story. After installation, any sound file played (mp3) was accompanied by static, pauses, glitches, etc, to the extent of being unlistenable.
Web searches revealed MANY such issues (especially with Acer Netbooks), with many fixes (none of which worked for me).
However, with persistence (I am an old, stubborn, retired codger), after a month of this and that (yada yada), I found ONE SOLUTION the static sound problem re: the Acer Aspire One which originally had the Windows XP O/S (not model 512).
It was related to increasing the buffer size to the maximum setting of 10000 (that is ten thousand) in the AUDACIOUS 3.4.3 program (Ubuntu Package) – from its original setting of zero.
Voila: Perfect sound. This is no doubt only one of several solutions. But as the other solutions were machine-specific, but not to my machine, I can live with it.
I now recall having a similar problem about 20 years ago with a Windows machine – buffer issues which were eliminated by increasing the buffer size.
I was able to play an mp3 file and listen to the quality of sound changes while tweaking the various settings in the preferences page of the Audacious program.
The sound is perfect in the virtual player too – but not the original default player – Banshee (I removed this program as I was not able to โun-defaultโ it). What a โCluster Fโ this program was (too much like iTunes; wants to do everything, but nothing well).
Anyhow, the other specifics of the preferences set-up page in Audacious 3.4.3 (which solved my sound problems after installation of Linux Mint 17.) are as follows:
PCM Device: Plugin:CARD=MID.DEV=0
Mixer Driver: default
Mixer Element: Master
(check in box for โWork around drain hang up)
Output Settings = Alsa Output
Bit Depth = 16
Buffer Size = 10000 (increased by me from zero)
Able Replay Gain (reset to this from its original unset state)
Adjust levels:
Amplify all files -0.6 dB
Amplify all unplugged files -0.6 dB
Playing MPG-1, Layer 3, 44kHz 256bps
________
I hope this helps someone, somewhere, at sometime, and is meant as partial karmic payback to those who helped me along the way in the distant past (still a long ways to go, as I suspect will always be the case).
Now, to address the same message received on BOTH machines as start-up re: running in Software Rendering Mode (whatever that is, as it is NO WHERE elsewhere referenced, and net research has thus far been futile).
Allen Simco
alsimco.wordpress.com
It worked. Thanks for the help. Happy New Year.
I did exactly what you told. It didn’t work for me (Linux Mint 17.2 Cinnamon). Your first alternative even deleted my desktop-manager Cinnamon. If someone read me and that happened to you, simply press CTRL+ALT+F1 on your login screen, then enter your user / pass. After that, type
sudo apt-get install cinnamon
Restart your computer with
sudo reboot
After that, you can login again.
My fix was to update the kernel. You can do that in mintUpdate, under “View”, click “Linux kernels”. Select the lastest “recommanded”.
Restart.
It should be fine now. I’m on HDA Intel ALC1150.
Many thanks to you, sir, for having posted this fix. I tried both these methods with LM 17.2 and neither worked, but I found myself without a desktop. I was able to install cinnamon and get my desktop back.
Unfortunately, my sound still does not work. :-(
My sound was working under Mint 17.1, then I reloaded my system from scratch to Mint 17.3 and the sound does not work. I followed the steps above and still no sound. My desktop never failed. Still searching for answers.
Hi,
I just wanted to testify that First Alternate method worked in Lubuntu 14.04 64 bits on a Lenovo G50-45.
Thanks a lot !
Renaud
hi,
actually after ma ubuntu 12.04 LTS installation my sound was working bt suddenly while shut down i got a message as etc/speech-dispatcher error then i tried the second alternate not nthng seems to be changed:(
can anyone help to resolve the issue???
I had this very issue and got a bunch of spurious error mesages around virtualbox. I did all of the above steps to no avail. In fact, doing the force reload broke my install. I could get bootup and get to the login screen, but then it would just send me right back to it. Then I got the idea to reinstall, and when I tried to uninstall it, apt-get said “Package Cinnamon not found”. Sure enough, when I reinstalled Cinnamon, it fixed it, sound and all.
the command:
sudo apt-get remove –purge alsa-base pulseaudio
Uninstalled many of my system softwares! the whole System Settings is gone. Fortunately
Startup Disk Creator was not, so I was able to create a bootable USB before ending the current session. DO NOT run this.
Author, I strongly suggest you take this down!!!!
This bit me too. But if you look in /var/log/apt you’ll find a handy log file telling you which packages were removed, and you can add them back with apt-get.
MY FIX: Running Linux Mint KDE 17.2 here. I had the no sound while on youtube. My FIX: I had to go into audio settings and change my audio device to prefer the Tahiti (AMD Radeon 7970) on all options, Video, Communication, Games and etc… I am using 1080p monitor via via HDMI. after doing this, I can confirm as of 10/22/2015, audio on youtube via firefox and google chrome. is working smoothly even after several reboots just to see if settings stick..
The above didn’t work for me, it was a Kernel mismatch, this did https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Audio/UpgradingAlsa/DKMS
Upgraded linux kernel to recommended version on old Dell Vostro 220 using Linux Mint Rosa. Sound driver would frequently not be recognized on startup so I had to type “sudo alsa force-reload” everytime it happened.
Finally found a solution with the link you provided. Thanks a lot!
all failed
The second method worked for my HP 3115M no sound on lubuntu problems. Much thanks!
In my sound settings had nothing, not even dummy output. Then I tried the first and the second alternate method and I could not fix the sound, and worse, now I can not find the sound setting anymore.If you can help, I will be thankful!!
In my sound settings had nothing, not even dummy output. Then I tried the first and the second alternate method and I could not fix the sound, and worse, now I can not find the sound setting anymore.If you can help, I will be thankful!
Hallo Abhishek. After my Linux laptop had bin connected to my tv via hdmi the sound disappered. i followed your steps – got to nr 2, rebooted, and now – sadly – i can’t login? I can get to my loginscreen, but when i type in my password i just get a quick flash of the terminal and the back to the login screen. I can enter the terminal via ctrl+alt+f1-6, but when i try to “startx” I just end up with a blackscreen and a mouscourser… I have ofc. tried: sudo apt-get update/upgrade/upgrad-dist and a hole lot of other commands for removing, instaling and reinstaling drives (sound and video mostly) to no avail apparently… It seems to problem might be linked to the speech-dispathcer (got some erro about it erly on in the process..).
I got a Lenovo ideapad U430p
Intel i5 core
Linux mint 17.2 cinnamon
Do u got any idea what might be the problem?
amixer -c 0 cset iface=MIXER,name=’Headphone Playback Volume’ 100%
mine is ubunutu 14 version perfectly worked, but I am afraid I have to do the same tricks again after a suspend or sleeping mode.
Hi
I have Ubuntu 14.04.2 LTS. I installed it on a dual boot machine (along Windows 7) a couple of months ago. I always had sound until today. For some reason my sound is no longer working. I tried everything in the article, but nothing works.
In fact, when I apply “sudo alsa force-reload”, I get a pop up window that says:
“Couldn’t restart playback. Failed to open output device: pa_stream_writable_size() failed:Connection terminated”
Any ideas ?
Thanks in advance
Galto
Dear Abhishek,
Let me inform you that your First Alternate method worked like a charm in Ubuntu 15.04 (Kernel 3.19.0-15-generic)
After upgrading to this kernel my Lenovo G50-45 (AMD A8) was unable to play any sound even if in sound settings I was able to test the speakers and hear the outcome.
Best regards for your great Job
Good to hear that Enas.
hi,
i have a sound problem in kubuntu,headphone was not working in it then i edit /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf
and write following two lines:
options snd-hda-intel model=eapd probe_mask=1 position_fix=1
options snd-hda-intel model=laptop position_fix=1 enable=yes.
( these lines were missing )
Now it works but sound quality is bad .Also internal speaker show distrotion when set at high volume..
pls help!
It worked! Thanks so much!
Welcome
Kind of a newbie with Linux but have been around pc’s for many years.
Had a problem with wine and somehow lost my audio. Tried everything I could find and finally upgraded by iso to Ubuntu 14.10. Audio worked until reboot. When I checked the system reverted back to Trusty Tahr 14.04 and audio was gone. Tried upgrading again to 14.10 through Software and Updates but still no sound. Tried all recommendations on this page and still no audio.
Audio Device is: Intel Corporation NM10/ICH7 Family High Definition Audio Controller (rev 01) when I look for audio 2 instances of this device show up, players assume it is there but no sound comes out of the headset.
difficult to say for me… last time i had audio issue it was becausse of HDMI enabled by default: https://itsfoss.com/fix-sound-ubuntu-1404/ try this
Rolled back from Kernel 3.13.0-39-generic to 3.13.0-37-generic solved the problem. Keep the trusty update of this kernel version
The First One is Working For Me! Thank You!!!!!
Kubuntu 14.04
Welcome Mihai
Thanks for the info, but can you tell me how it is useful that the commands that you’ve provided remain in black, even after you’ve selected them? This means that there’s no way to confirm that you’ve selected the text which many of your visitors obviously would want to copy and paste into the terminal?
It’s browser dependent. On Firefox the commands are still showed as black even after selection while on Chrome it’s better.
Thanks. sudo alsa force-reload just fixed it for me. Sound went out after an update of software this morning.
ok when check my sound I get a blank screen but since doing the fix problem I hear in my log in screen it says ( front center) this I hear but nothing else getting really frustrated with this, Help.
i need some help ! i have sound problem ! sund notification only shows dummy output !! can somebody help ??
sudo alsa force-reload
Unloading ALSA sound driver modules: (none loaded).
Loading ALSA sound driver modules: (none to reload).
speech dispatcher is set to run=no
Reinstalling alsa and pulseaudio was the solution. Thanks! ;D
I forgot,i use kubuntu 14.04 lts amd 64.
I ran into a problem with an update to Linux Mint 17.2. I keep my system up to date, so I’m not sure which update caused the problem.
The sound goes dead when I wake up my computer from sleep/screen lock. Sound always works after rebooting.
Your solution of using a force-reload of alsa works great as a work-around. I’m grateful.
John Goold
St. John’s NL Canada
For the Hp Entertainment Series with nvidia grafic and intel hda ich8 soundcard,i reinstalled alsa, edit /etc/pulse/default.pa adding the command set-sink-port(source;-https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=150035),reboot in grub;- boot with acpi=noirq(otherwise it conficts with open GL and you see only one cpu instead of two,hardware censors fail).Thanks for you solution.
Hi, my sound problem seems to be one that doesn’t want to be fixed. I have tried numerous fixes, kills, loads, reloads, updates and reboots it’s not funny. One thing I notice though is that in system settings/sound the output volume is not working ( it’s set all the way to the left and unable to move to the right )and the “play sound through” box is not showing any device. Of note, my graphic card went bad early this week and I replaced it with a new Nvidia graphic card and that’s when this whole mess got started. Does this has anything to do with sound as well? If so, any idea how to fix it.
Thanks
None of them worked.
None of those methodes worked for me. I had to do this:
run alsamixer on command line
it shows “card: pulseaudio”
F6
select your sound. for me it was “HDA Intel”
Scroll to right with the “arrow right” key
If anything has MM written, push the M button to unmute it
When you find Line, put the volume to max with “arrow up” key and M to unmute
Push ESC to exit
then do the sudo alsa force-reload
and finally pulesaudio -k
Thank you!!!!
I followed this because the auther stated it would work for Linux Mint. It didn’t worked, but created other problems. Thank you.
It has worked for Linux Mint as well. You can see that in comments.
What other issues did it introduce?
I’ve got a problem with Mint 17 Mate 64-bit. Playing MP3’s through Audacious or Totem is missing the piano. I hear bass, lead instrument, drums, etc. but not piano. It worked an earlier version I had installed about 2 years ago. The files work fine on my other systems, netbooks and laptops I haven’t upgraded. I’ve got sound, yes, but this puzzles me. I have no problems with sound in YouTube and Adobe Flash. Is Ubuntu’s possibly not getting PulseAudio right a problem? How do I fix this particular problem? Otherwise I like Mint. My only other resolve may be to go to the Mint Mate Debian distro, but I’d like to give Mint Mate Ubuntu a fair chance. Any clues to help me fix this problem will be most appreciated, thanks in advance.
I found the problem. This is with the Hal Leonard Jazz Play Along CD backing tracks. I installed “QasMixer” (desktop mixer with features similar to alsamixer) and found that Analog Front right channel in the AlsaMixer to my CA0106 had been turned almost all the way down. Why it was apparently set to this I don’t know. I didn’t have access to this through the PulseAudio Volume Control. This is the 64-bit version of Mint 17 XFCE. OTOH, I have the 32 bit version on my laptop, it had no problems.
Your first alternative just messed up my ubuntu. In settings I have lost nearly all icons and I am currently fixing basic things that worked before.
Had same problem, dixed with:
sudo apt-get install ubuntu-desktop
none of these worked for me… all it seemed to do is remove the little “sound” icon froom the top..
Same here… sound icon is gone….
The issue on my PC is that it does this after every reboot. I’ve tried every suggestion here, but no cigar. I have to force an ALSA reload to get any sound out of the system, but setting speech-dispatcher to not run doesn’t work, as it’s already set that way. Furthermore, even after I reload ALSA, I still have to go into alsamixer and change output from speakers to headphones. My sound card is an Asus Essence STX, which the system detects as the AV200 chipset at the start, but no sound will come out until after ALSA has been reloaded.
Thank you for breaking my linux mint 17.
When i start my computer. comes only loading logo and then black and mouse cursor T_T.
and i can move mouse cursor.
Same thing happened to me after completing the First Alternate Method. This forum post could save you: http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=90&t=174554#p899993
Hi, none of the solutions worked.
sometimes this occurs completely at random.
Even if I reboot, sound card does not work. Yet when I boot to Windows and then back to Ubuntu, sound card works again.
Or if I shut down the PC and turn off the PSU and log in again.
if you happen to have the Via 8251 chipset just add pci=nomsi to the grub boot configuration. This fixed the dummy output issue and restored the ability to access SATA drives.
Hello. My sound works. However I have a Plantronics USB Headset that I simply cannot hear anything through. Built-in speakers work, 3.5 mm audio port works, usb thumb drive works. However my usb headset isn’t so much as being recognized by the operating system. Do you have any thoughts on the matter that could help me please?
Unfortunately, no experience with USB headset but I found this on Ask Ubuntu that could help:
http://askubuntu.com/questions/447718/no-sound-on-usb-headset-how-to-manage-soundcards-and-audio-devices
Thank you very much for your effort nonetheless. It’s much appreciated.
i was having problem with sound in 14.04 after switching to GNOME from UNITY.Didn’t found appropriate answers from askubuntu,stackoverflow.But this really made my day.Thanks!
Welcome Maurice.
Disabling speech-dispatcher worked for me. Thanks a lot.
1. You might want to add Lubuntu 14.04 to this article title if it is applicable?
2. If not applicable, do you have any straight forward steps (planning a future article?) to help LUBUNTU 14.04 (LTS) users?
I think it should be working the same in Lubuntu as well.
Just added pulse audio and or Alsa, one or both of which did not come with original download of Lubuntu 14.04. Sound now working?
Was that a question or information :)
Just wanted to inform folks that when I downloaded Lubuntu, it did not automatically supply sound for my computer. I had to download an extra package to make my sound work.
The sentence “Sound now working?” is a puzzle to me. Why would Lubuntu supply an OS without sound? Why would Lubuntu not clearly state this fact and supply directions on how to get sound in it’s downloads information? Maybe I’m making too big of deal of this? The above is meant to be informational.
oh… okay… that question mark confused me :)
None of that worked. That window is starting to look good
i have sound problem for headphones in ubuntu 12.04 and above all ubutnu until 14.04 LTS, my iball headphones work fine on ubuntu 11.10 & below version. Aslo work good on windows os. My Laptop is lenovo 300Y410 9QQ. After connecting headphone it play cracks or noise sound on everyting like increasing sound or decreasing, also during movies,music everything.
Try adjusting the headphone pin. Put it a little out in the laptop instead of putting it all in. It worked for me this way in my old laptop which I thought was broken after a rough drop. Did not think it could be a software problem :(
Funny…..
My Lenovo ThinkPad running Linux Mint 32-bit 17 Cinnamon has sound out of the box….
It is not funny. Most of the installs have sound out of the box. Afterall, it is not a feature to have no sound in Linux ;)
Thank you for your ‘fix your sound in Mint 17’ article. We had greatly reduced volume and were frustrated. Would you believe, it was as simple as reading your post and going to the Control Center and raising the Master Volume. Regardless, you get the credit – we can hear our PC again.
My Husband and I are avid readers. We read Westerns mostly in the cattle drive era. Actually, my Husband listens while I read. Works for us. I grew up reading and have enjoyed Agatha Christie’s works.
Kind Regards,
Mrs. M
โTo every problem, there is a most simple solution.โ Agatha Christie in The Clocks :)
plugging and then unplugging my headphones/earphones worked for me
Following an update of linux I lost sound with only “Dummy Output” in my list of sound devices as shown in the article.
“sudo alsa force-reload” resuted in “Nothing to reload”
I moved on to the First Alternate Method and (after re-boot) my sound was fixed. Thankyou.
Just a side note for info/research… The no sound problem wasn’t my only problem. Videos played with VLC, and Gnome Video player played with black screen (and obvs no sound). This problem went away as soon as I fixed the sound so I assume the sound issue must have been crashing the media playback in general.
Thanks a lot!
welcome Maria
I’m running a fresh install of Ubuntu 14.04. I tried the alsa force reload and it didn’t work. Then I tried the first alternate method and not only did it not work, but the System Settings page is now mostly empty, only five icons left in there. Looks like I’ll have to reinstall from scratch.
If it is not too late, here is how to fix that missing system icons: https://itsfoss.com/fix-missing-system-settings-ubuntu-1404-quick-tip/
I fix it . Some thing wrong when i upgrade my system to new linux-kernel3.11.20 … . But problem might be a ” udev ” – this is a dynamic module loader . i update system with command apt-get dist-upgrade , and new version of udev might conflic. http://alsa.opensrc.org/MultipleCards#Loading_the_kernel_modules_for_multiple_cards.
so i manual load alsa module with config file , and it work . i can’t remmenber command :(
solution is downgrade udev . :)
got my music!
added pulseaudio volume control and was able to see what was muted … it was set for the internal speakers (of which there arent any) not the plugins
Glad that you fixed it :)
hi abhishek
i tried your suggestions but it didnt work for me on lubuntu 13.10. but for the last alternate fix you mentioned, there is no such file set up in /etc/default/speech-dispatcher. there is some issue about speech-dispatcher and ‘locale c’ i thought, but i dont know if that is the problem. i really love lubuntu, but i need my music!
Thanks you saved my day :)
Nice. Fixed it in a jiffy. Thanks. :)
Welcome Michael.
I had a sound problem after installing the intel grapics installer, this resolved the problem. Thanks. Flavour 13.10 64bit
Welcome
My Ubuntu sound is not working.when i tried to solve it, they are asking sudo alsa hp password which i don’t know .what should I do?
sudo requires you to enter your admin password.
hey any solution for non working sub woofer on ubuntu 13.10. works fine on windows 8. it does not work on 13.10 which I installed in dual boot.
yup, first method worked
after trying everything and nothing seemed to work I thought of checking if the sound card worked with headphones. It did and after unplugging them the sound came from the pc speakers as if nothing had ever failed. Wizardry? I don’t know but the easiest solution was the one.
How can i put sudo alsa force-reload to startup
My problem is there is NVIDIA HDMI -which seems to block out audio via speakers. But audio works through headphones alone on my sony vaio vpcz138gg running 64bit linux mint 16 kde. Tried every solution under the sun -no luck yet. Am glued to ear plugs built-in speakers remain dead
all fail
Either forcing Alsa reload or rebooting solved it for me. Thanks for the help.
i have just upgraded the system from 12.10 to 13.04 then to 13.10. now i am facing sound problem for each restart. Does it have any permanant solution
Forcing ASLA to reload and then restarting worked for the same problem in 12.04.
hii , actually i baught Acer aspire E1-572 core i5 with xubuntu
OS when i shut down my laptop that don’t shutdown normally untill i
push the power button for the 10-15 second :( i have tryed al the
grub recovery command but nothing happned , can plzz someone help
me out
ur an idiot
thx
Welcome
My sound was going out after a little while after every boot for Ubuntu 13.10 on a Lenovo u430 Touch… I repeatedly did the first solution when it would go out, but it was getting annoying. I was hoping the first alternative would be a more permanent solution, but after doing it, the sound won’t work at all and I can’t open my Unity Tweak Tool (keeps telling me I’m missing schema com.canonical.indicator.sound). Help!
I know my audio controller is a Lynx Point-LP HD Audio Controller, which should be supported, but I don’t know where to re-download the necessary packages/how to re-install them.
Is there any fix without reboot?
Thank you very, very much! After numerous attempts, it is finally working, alsa-force reload did the trick! Using skype with PearOs8 (ubuntu 13-10), seemed like system “forgot” to initialise my analog devices in Skype; strange, Clementine, xine and vlc are working just fine without need to “force”…. thnx again and best wishes! :)
worked for me, thanks!
You are welcome Chris
The purging and reinstalling of alsa worked for me.
Good to know :)
I love your “First Alternate method”. I love you so much. I love ItsFoss. Ubuntu 12.04 LTS.
Thanks for loving It’s FOSS :)
Hey folks,
none of the above or below could solve the issue for me, but I found another solution in
http://askubuntu.com/questions/95223/volume-icon-missing-after-removing-and-re-installing-pulseaudio
In 13.10 (and maybe in prior versions), the settings are no longer stored in ~/.pulse, but in ~/.config/pulse – so all you have to do is changing the name of ~/.config/pulse to ~/.config/pulse_backup. You can do that manually in your filebrowser (ctrl + h to show hidden directories!) or by console:
mv ~/.config/pulse ~/.config/pulse_backup
Afterwards you will have to log out and in again to auto-recreate a clean config. Maybe it’ll help others as well :-)
PS: Another post (http://askubuntu.com/questions/325262/what-is-a-failed-to-load-module-module-ladspa-sink-error) suggests that it might be enough to change some lines in ~/.config/pulse/default.pa .
See original post for further details, but use the the path given above, since settings are no longer stored in ~/.pulse.
Thanks for sharing it Hagbard
Dear Abhishek. I did everithing you`ve said. Followed every step. And
there is no sound at all. I`ve changed my os from Ubuntu to Lubuntu previous formated hdd. Everithing” s OK but no sound at all. Thank you for trying :)
try this from one of the users:
“The install had found three audio devices. What did work was going into terminal with
alsamixer
then I could select the correct device there using F6. Scrolling through the options with the left/right arrow keys I found
automute
was enabled, so simply disabled it and presto!”
Thank you very much ! It fixed my problem
Thanks alot I kept overlooking this option on my new Xubuntu 13.10.
I have ubuntu 11.10 version. It was built in ver with my Dell Optiplex i7 7010 desktop. But no sound is coming. Any solution?
I have ubuntu 11.04 version. It was built in ver with my Dell 7010 desktop. But no sound is coming. Any solution?
Thx! IT works
Welcome
The 1st method worked.
Thanks a lot for the helpful post.
Hi, since I installed 13.10 (it’s basically my start with open source) I’ve had trouble with sound. With trial and error I have managed several times to get sound, however it’s never permanent. Yesterday I found your solution and it worked, but today it was gone again. So I did your trick again and after the restart, which I will do after this message, I will see if it works again.
Is there a way to get sound work all the time?
thanks for your advise and hopefully there is a way to have sound all the time
ton baars
When I go to the system settings and check the sound, it works, but in either Chrome or Firefox, there is no sound. I think they both use flash, is there a way to reload that?
Do you have a article on how to disable headphone autodetect? I want sound coming through both speakers and headphones. I’m on Ubuntu 13.10 and in the sound settings there is no option to turn it off which is sad since such option exist in Windows.
Thanks Abhishek for posting this guide. I ran a clean installation of Ubuntu 13.10 and could restore my sound thanks to your instructions.
But my volume icon disappeard from the tray in the process. I restored the tray icon by reinstalling Indicator Sound with this command:
sudo apt-get install indicator-sound
(Thanks for Jorge Castro at askubuntu for sharing this tip – http://askubuntu.com/questions/182711/how-do-i-reinstall-the-sound-icon-sound-menu)
Is there a way to fix volume always maxed on restart??
Thanks a ton for this. Was really struggling after installation of xubuntu-desktop trashed by sound settings.
+++!!! Upgraded from 13.04 to 13.10. First method worked great!
Thanks a ton my friend it worked like a charme with the first command
sudo alsa force-reload
and after i just restarted ubuntu 13.10 64 bits, I opend sound settings and immediately I saw the volume bar at 100 %, before the command recommended by your article it was disabled.
You saved my day.
GOD BLESS YOU lol First option worked for me
Hi,
i`ve sound problems too after upgrrading to Ubuntu 13.10 and i can`t find a solution. I`ve remove alle pulseaudio and reinstall all alsa. Editing speech-dispatcher file by using the following command:
sudo gedit /etc/default/speech-dispatcher, it is still set RUN=no.
In the windows settings/audio it shows the built in speakers, the sound from skype message doesn’t play and no login/logoff sound, no drum. What can i do? Any idea? Thank you
I’ve found a two easy steps solution to this synthoms:
“I just updated to Kubuntu 13.10 and several things are wrong. For instance, the only output sound device is Dummy Output, network icon has a red X on it and shutdown and restart buttons are missing.”
> sudo dpkg –configure -a
> sudo reboot
(extracted from http://askubuntu.com/questions/360929/kubuntu-13-10-no-sound-missing-shutdown-button-network-disconnected )
I don’t know why and how it fixed the problem but if it did, its well and good. Thanks for sharing it.
Yesterday I updated to Kubuntu 13.10 and today those synthoms were revealed.
Thank you for your posts.
I’m running Kubuntu 14.04 and this fix worked for me. Thanks!
Alright, I just tried all of these methods, they didn’t work, and now the sound icon on my panel is missing. How do I get it back?
Try
> sudo dpkg –configure -a
> sudo reboot
thanks a lot, i installed boot manager , to disable speech synthesizer..
I have done all of the above and still have the same problem. My sound only stops working when the computer sleeps and starts up. Then I have to re-start with no changes and it works until sleep again. I think I have Kernal version 3.8.0-30 if it matters.
It is very frustrating since I really like the Ubuntu “feel” better than Windows 8.
I have pretty much done everything on this post and some of the suggestions below and still the same result. When the comp sleeps and then re-awakens, no sound.
this is truly weird. Which version are you using??
I am using version 13.04 and will update to 13.10 today. I am using an All-In-One Dell XPS 27. I was reading where some laptops had problems because of onboard speakers. Right now, I just do sudo alsa force-reload and then re-start and all is good till sleep state.
Thanks for replying and suggestion would be greatly appreciated.
Update: I have just did a fresh install of Ubuntu 13.10 and added Unity and one theme pack. So far the sound works when awakened. Hopefully everything will keep working.
I am now going to do a step by step install of additional software and see if anything triggers the change.
I hope it won’t. Enjoy the sound of music :)
Yes. it worked. Just had to do a fresh install. I wondered if it had to with installing alongside Win 8? Either way, win 8 is now in VirtualBox after installing Ubuntu as the main OS.
I “no” it worked??? I KNOW that’s not what you meant.
lol…. thanks for pointing out the error. I edited the post :)
Hi,
I am using 13.10 the sound works but not with skype, on the skype download page there is no option for 13.10 so I used the 12.04 one is this the problem?
it could be a problem with configuration. Please check it.
Hi,
When I rebooted, it does not load skype from the terminal any more, I guess I will have to wait for a fix to be issued.
Subject: Re: New comment posted on How To Fix: No Sound In Ubuntu 13.04 and Ubuntu 13.10 [Updated]
Hi,
i`ve sound problems too but i can`t find a solution. I`ve remove alle pulseaudio and reinstall all alsa. In the windows settings/audio it shows the built in speakers, the sound from skype or thunderbird massage plays. But no login/logoff sound, no drum. What can i do? Any idea?
Greetings Roland
Great super work around. In my sound settings two options displayed. After selecting reading the first soution i tries to identify the correct option to be selected and not its just rocking. Thanks
welcome.
after first step, Rhythmbox no longer loaded with system…
Incredibly, it works!!. Thank you.
You are welcome.
its still did not work.. it get the robot sound. but no drum beat startup. I get system program problem detect. wine will not update but it is installed. no updates appear to fix this problem. Intermittant sound drop out.. have to reset from time to time.
try killall pulseaudio
it s working THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS
THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS
THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS THANKS
You are welcome*15 :P
None of the above worked for me. The install had found three audio devices. What did work was going into terminal with
alsamixer
then I could select the correct device there using F6. Scrolling through the options with the left/right arrow keys I found
automute
was enabled, so simply disabled it and presto!
Whoa! Thanks for the info. I’ll put in place your suggestion with screenshots in this or another article so that others will get benefit,
worked for me thx a million
Alright so I just recently installed Xubuntu 13.04 and I had audio for about 3 days. But now, the audio is all of a sudden gone! I did what you said and it fixed the problem but the next time I reboot the audio is gone again! I’ve been told by several people that it’s because Pulse doesn’t quite work properly. I have an Nvidia onboard sound card. Please help me! I have fallen in love with Linux but the annoyance of no sound is the only thing turning me off!
Try killall pulseaudio
It has worked for many people.
hi
I use ubuntu 12.04.2, and I’m new to it… :)
My sound always stops after a few seconds, for different applications (youtube with rekonq, amarok…)
I tried the three methods and it didn’t work..
thanks for help
sam
Try killall pulseaudio
Thaaaanks, man! I’ve tried to reinstall alsa and pulseaudio, restart computer and so, but the strongest command is killall!
Yes, it worked…I hav done killall pulseaudio …. :)
So doing killall pulseaudio fixed this problem? did it reoccur?? I may update the post with your suggestion so the other could be benefited as well.
yes Its fixed….
Great.. I update the article with your suggestion.
I have the same problem, but none of the above methods worked …:(
this tutorial helped with one of my laptops (an acer) but the issue I have with my HP DV9000 laptop is not that there isn’t any sound, but that the sound is very low. By this I mean when the sound is say set to the middle of the volume scale, there’s absolutely no sound coming out of the speakers. If I’m playing a game, I have to turn it up to the highest setting in order to get any sound out of the speakers. Turning it down even a notch or two, makes it so quiet that you’d think it was set just a but louder then the lowest setting. Frustrating as it worked in 12.04 without any issues. Tried 13.10 just to see, and worked on that as well, but 13.04 seems to be having an issue.
You may have done it, but just to verify, did you check the alsa settings?
I saw someone mentioning pavucontrol for this problem on Ask Ubuntu. Did you try it?
Thanks For the fix! Work for me on Linux Mint 15.
You are welcome.
In my case, sometimes kernel dumped snd-hda error message and when the computer booted, audio hardware was not available. I.e I would not be able to run alsa-mixer, or hear any sound. Even normal reboot or shutdown would freeze the OS.
After ubuntu’s automatic upgrade to kernel 3.8.0-27, that issue seems to have been fixed.
Dummy Output had come only once in mint (first boot after installation).
I don’t think it has been fixed with Kernel 3.8.0-27. Anyways.. you have the sound now an that’s the good news here :)
I have a weird problem. Since yesterday, sound in Flash Player videos stopped working. However, in other apps sound still works fine. Forcing an ALSA reload didn’t help :(
try re-installing flash. It should be fine.
Hello, thank you very much for your post. In my case I tried all options but still have no sound on my desktop PC. I am running Ubuntu 12.04 however (not 13). Do you have any recommendations what I can try to get sound working? Many thanks, Marco Bianchi, London
Try this: http://www.computerandyou.net/2011/06/how-to-solve-no-sound-through-laptop-integrated-speakers-in-ubuntu-11-04/
I’m on Mint 15, and while I thought this might help since Mint obviously stems from Ubuntu. But I tried all of these options and still no sound.
But I finally tried looking at the hardware settings, because I have a GPU installed with an onboard sound device. When I first got the graphics card it messed up my sound because the integrated audio got automatically turned off. Well when I installed Mint 15 it messed that part up again and I had to fix it in the BIOS. So I thought, great! I’m good to go. But still I had sound trouble. So ultimately I looked at the “output device” settings, changed it to the sound card on the GPU, then changed it back to the internal audio. And problem solved!!
So I don’t know if what I did (changing the audio back and forth between the GPU sound and the integrated sound) only worked because I did it in unison with the above steps, or if these steps were unnecessary for the type of problem I had. But I’ll say thanks anyway because for all I know I had both problems and wouldn’t have known it if one of the above fixes helped fix one problem and my solution fixed a completely separate problem with the hardware.
My laptop doesn’t have a graphics card so I cannot vouch for it. But yes, I have found people discussing over sound problem because of graphics card. In any case, all is well if ends is well. Glad that you have sound again in your computer.
Graphics cards will have an audio component if there is an HDMI port.
Yeah, I already knew that. The card I have advertised it on the box when I bought it so it was kind of a given. But I noticed that it switched to the graphics card’s audio chipset and disabled the internal one upon installing it. I didn’t have any way to get audio over the graphics card though so I reenabled the integrated sound in my BIOS settings and that fixed my problem the first time.
The second time I had lost sound after upgrading my system and doing a clean install to Linux Mint 15. I’m guessing some settings got messed up with the graphics card (though I noticed in my BIOS settings that I needed to reenable the integrated audio again as well), But like I mentioned above between trying a little bit of everything, and fixing the settings in Mint, I got it all working just fine.
Thanks for the post. The first solution works for me – don’t even need to restart the machine. Whenever pulseaudio gives up, the following seems to get it back:
pulseaudio –kill
sudo alsa force-reload
pulseaudio –start
The indicator in the task bar doesn’t come back alive, though pavucontrol works fine.
Does it happen often?
yes, it’s constant. It never actually changes from this state. There is also a popping sound that randomly happens as well, from the speakers, but that mostly happens when I am turning the volume up or down, so it would be okay. But the issue with the low volume on the sound is always present, and a huge inconvenience, considering that putting it even just above half way, means I get absolutely no sound :(
i have the same issue with linux mint 16 rc cinnamon nothing works besides those commands listed above
For me (Kubuntu 12.04) these commands return a number of error msgs.
I use:
killall pulseaudio
sudo alsa force-reload
kmix and tray icon work fine.
thanks
mint 17.1 cinnamon, cheers… didn’t even have to reboot to get audio back.
acer extensa 5620z laptop
i was playing with MusE and jackd and couldn’t get them to play nice with my
soundcard. (removed both)
i do appreciate OP’s post, without that i wouldn’t have found Doc Hego’s post
Thanks man.
Welcome
When I run the first command I get:
Unloading ALSA sound driver modules: (none loaded).
Loading ALSA sound driver modules: (none to reload).
If I try to change the speech-dispatcher file, the RUN flag is already set to “no”.
can you try to re-install alsa and pulse audio (first alternate method)?
I did that, same results. :/
Then its complicated. Do you dual boot it?? Do you have sound in other OS, or if you could boot from live CD, do you have sound there?
I’m running Ubuntu on VMware Fusion 5.0.3 and I have sound on my host system :/
Hmm.. tricky. Can’t really help here as I have little to none experience with virtual installation :(
I had to upgrade my drivers and it worked when none of the above methods worked for me.
Follow :
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-audio-dev
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
i have a sound problem related to the mic, the internal mic it’s not recognized, and neither an external mic, what can i do, please!!!
Can you try this: https://itsfoss.com/how-to-solve-microphone-not-working-in-skype-quick-tip/
Thanks!
welcome
I have the Kernel version 3.8.0-19 and the first method worked perfectly for me. Thanks very much for the solution !
Welcome.
The first option did not work, but I applied the alternative solution and now I have sound.
Thank you!
You are welcome Carlos.
I have same problem. It works the first time but it comes back and then it won’t work anymore :-(
In last 5 days, it happened with me twice. And purging the alsa worked again BUT this is not really the solution, I accept. I’ll update the article if there is another one.
Yeah, nice post, but norbert’s right. This is a major flaw with 13.04. The steps you listed fix the issue once. But it always comes back.
In fact, you don’t always have to mess with alsa. Just restarting sometimes fixes the issue. But every few restarts, your old friend “Dummy Output” will be back to greet you.
And if you’re lucky like me, the applet for sound will disappear from the top panel. And Canonical has apparently decided to disable right-click functions for the panel, so I’m still searching for a good way to get that back. In the meantime, it’s just a fun surprise to find out when trying to play a video or song that the sound card’s gone again.
Thanks for the neat blog, Abhishek! Keep it up, but it’d be great it you could revise this post with a little more testing to give a better idea of what’s really going on.
Hi Matt,
I had the feeling that this is not really a complete solution. This is why I mentioned that “this trick worked for me”. Luckily for me, audio is working smoothly till now. If I face issue again, I’ll surely update the post with the new fix.
In fact, sound issue is not the only one. I find several things broken in Ubuntu 13.04. Damn, I have to come up with an article “10 things I hate in Ubuntu 13.04” ;)
P.S. Thanks for liking the blog.
At new restart , the problem is here again !
Hi Norbert,
If I find a better solution, I’ll update the article. Stay tuned :)
Any news about a permanent fix to this, everytime I restart ubuntu 13.04 I lost the sound, so I have to do this all the time.
Thanks
I added a new work around… can you try this one?
Works perfectly – Thanks !
Perfect :)