No Sound with Flash in Firefox

**n8dude** · March 10th, 2009

Hey guys, I decided to give Kubuntu a try. Once I had everything installed, I copied over my old Firefox profile. Now there is no sound in Flash Videos at all.None of my Media Files play at all either, and I do have the Medibuntu packages installed so it's not a codec issue. Anyone else having similar issues? I am using KDE 4.2 x86_64 with the 64bit Flash plugin installed if that helps.

**Zorael** · March 10th, 2009

Did you install kubuntu-desktop atop an existing Ubuntu installation? Ubuntu uses PulseAudio and KDE's Phonon multimedia layer doesn't (per default), so perhaps they're conflicting.

If this is a fresh Kubuntu installation, that's weird. What's the terminal output of the following?

Code:

$ aplay -l
$ cat /etc/asound.conf
$ lshw -c multimedia

Does sound output if you enter this?

Code:

$ speaker-test -c2 -twav

**n8dude** · March 10th, 2009

The outputs of those commands are:

aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: ALC888 Analog [ALC888 Analog]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 1: ALC888 Digital [ALC888 Digital]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 6: Si3054 Modem [Si3054 Modem]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

cat /etc/asound.conf
cat: /etc/asound.conf: No such file or directory
That's probably one of the problems right there.

lshw -c multimedia
*-multimedia
description: Audio device
product: 82801H (ICH8 Family) HD Audio Controller
vendor: Intel Corporation
physical id: 1b
bus info: pci@0000:00:1b.0
version: 03
width: 64 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: pm msi pciexpress bus_master cap_list
configuration: driver=HDA Intel latency=0 module=snd_hda_intel

And I do not hear any sound when I do speaker-test -c2 -twav
I do hear sound from Amarok and when I login though. Any thoughts?

**Zorael** · March 10th, 2009

Well, you have several devices (analog, digital, modem). Perhaps it's outputting to the wrong one?

Code:

$ aplay -L

/etc/asound.conf should be empty/not exist, so no worries there.

If Amarok can play sound properly, stuff *works*, you just need to get Flash to output to the right device, or set the right device as the default one.

**n8dude** · March 10th, 2009

Would you have any idea how to do that? I was wondering if it had something to do with Phonon, but I am pretty new to KDE4 so I wouldn't really know.

**Zorael** · March 12th, 2009

Looking through the menus real fast, I'd try System Settings -> Multimedia, prefer/defer audio devices as you wish, Apply Device List To: everything.

Obviously, one way to know for sure if it's outputting to the wrong port (device) would be to connect something to that other port (analog/digital) and see if sound plays there.

Furthermore. I'm not sure it applies to this issue, but if you have several different cards, you can assign defaults by using the asoundconf script. I think it's included in Intrepid by default. (It certainly is in Jaunty a5.)

Code:

zorael@tleilax:~$ asoundconf
Usage:
asoundconf is-active
asoundconf get|delete PARAMETER
asoundconf set PARAMETER VALUE
asoundconf list

Convenience macro functions:
asoundconf set-default-card PARAMETER
asoundconf reset-default-card
asoundconf set-pulseaudio
asoundconf unset-pulseaudio
asoundconf set-oss PARAMETER
asoundconf unset-oss

zorael@tleilax:~$ asoundconf list
Names of available sound cards:
Intel

zorael@tleilax:~$ asoundconf set-default-card Intel
<stuff supposedly happens and .asound* files are created in your home directory>

Also, there's a difference between aplay -l and aplay -L.

Code:

zorael@tleilax:~$ aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: ALC1200 Analog [ALC1200 Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1                                                   
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0                                        

zorael@tleilax:~$ aplay -L                                          
default:CARD=Intel                                                  
    HDA Intel, ALC1200 Analog                                       
    Default Audio Device
front:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC1200 Analog
    Front speakers
surround40:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC1200 Analog
    4.0 Surround output to Front and Rear speakers
surround41:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC1200 Analog
    4.1 Surround output to Front, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround50:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC1200 Analog
    5.0 Surround output to Front, Center and Rear speakers
surround51:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC1200 Analog
    5.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround71:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC1200 Analog
    7.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Side, Rear and Woofer speakers
null
    Discard all samples (playback) or generate zero samples (capture)

To test a certain device, use speaker-test with the -D argument. Increment -c with as many channels (speakers) as you want to test. Like so:

Code:

zorael@tleilax:~$ speaker-test -c2 -twav -Dsurround40

speaker-test 1.0.18

Playback device is surround40
Stream parameters are 48000Hz, S16_LE, 2 channels
WAV file(s)
Rate set to 48000Hz (requested 48000Hz)
Buffer size range from 64 to 16384
Period size range from 32 to 8192
Using max buffer size 16384
Periods = 4
was set period_size = 4096
was set buffer_size = 16384
 0 - Front Left
 1 - Front Right
Time per period = 2.742553
...

**Zorael** · March 12th, 2009

**Zorael** · March 12th, 2009

Mmkay, so I suddenly ran into the same problem.

My Intel HDA card has several channels that all affect output (Master, Headphone, PCM and Front). They're multiplicative, in the sense that if I have them all at 80%, the end volume is 0.8*0.8*0.8*0.8 = 0.4096, ~41%. My multimedia keys on this laptop control the Master volume, so I just set the other three reasonably high and live with it.

Turns out that KDE system sounds and Amarok 2 (amongst others, perhaps) disregard the PCM channel, while still obeying Master, Headphone and Front. Flash depends on them all. And my PCM volume had somehow dropped to 0.

KDE/Amarok: 0.8*0.8*0.8*0.8 = 0.4096
Flash: 0.8*0.8*0*0.8 = 0

Pop up a terminal and start alsamixer to make sure that's not what's causing it for you.

Code: