Tip: Simplify Ubuntu Sound Management
Ubuntu has always had notoriously bad sound management. Introduced in 9.04, Pulseaudio has done something to improve on it’s predecessor, Alsa, but one problem I regularly run into is getting it to use the right sound devices. Often I’ll restart my computer or unplug my webcam, and the next time I start a Skype conversation, the computer is convinced that I want to use the built in sound card’s microphone jack rather than the webcam.
Only recently did I come across a way to make sure Ubuntu uses the soundcard you want, even if it’s unplugged for a while.
To do this, right click the volume manager in the taskbar and select “Sound Preferences”
Go to the “Hardware” tab and you should see something that looks like the picture below:
What we’re going to do is disable any inputs and outputs we aren’t using, this way, if you stick with pretty much one sound setup, Pulseaudio won’t be tempted to send your sound to anything but the cards you want it to.
Warning: When changing hardware profiles, Pulseaudio sets the volume to maximum. You may want to unplug speakers and headphones (Especially headphones.) before continuing.
To do this, select each device in turn and set it to “Off” in the “Profile” selection box.
Before. All sound devices enabled:
After. Only the devices I plan on using enabled:
Now I’ve got just my USB sound card and my webcam for my computer to work with. If you look in the “Input” and “Output” tabs, you’ll see only one device available. Make sure to set your volume back to normal as they may have jumped up to maximum when you changed the profile. The microphone may have also become muted. Set the volume back up and make sure it’s un-muted.
And there you have it! From now on, you won’t have any issues having to tell Pulseaudio where to send your sound to!
If you’ve got questions, I’d love to hear them, so post in the comments.
