No sound in ubuntu 10.04 under X-Windows

[D. Hugh Redelmeier]

Straightening out the top-posting:

| > On Sat, 2010-10-09 at 17:36 -0400, Paul King wrote:
| > > Hugh:
| > > 
| > > I created a new account, and the sound worked obediently. The user has
| > > no password (don't worry, I intend to delete this account), and is I
| > > don't think it's an ALSA or any kind of driver problem, as I have had
| > > this same installation since April with no sound issues. This problem
| > > has only occurred in the past couple of days.

That strongly indicates that you (your account) has some setting that
is interfering with sound.

I know that that is rather vague, but it eliminates a whole bunch of
possible problems:
- your hardware is clearly supported
- the driver is working
- the kernel, Gnome, etc. can work in your setup.
- the updates seem fine (i.e. can work)

| > > It is likely that a recent "update" of Linux has caused a problem, as
| > > I've been updating mindlessly so far. Can't think of anything else.

Not impossible, but clearly if it was an upgrade, it isn't broken in
itself (because the new user's sound worked).

Updates don't normally to change a user's settings -- they live in the
user's home directory somewhere, usually within a .something-or-other
file or directory.

If the problem was created by an update, it is one that changed how
your settings are being interpreted.

| On Sat, 2010-10-09 at 17:58 -0400, Paul King wrote:
| > I would like to add quickly that it still doesn't solve the sound
| > problem in my own account. That is still a problem.

Understood.  It would be very odd if creating a new user account fixed
something in your account.

On Sat, 9 Oct 2010, Paul King wrote:
| I logged on as root, and the date stamp, group, user attributes and
| permission on ~/.gvfs was undefined (just "?" marks). But logging into
| the same directory as the owner of the home directory shows the same
| directory using ls -la with all of the attributes defined. This shows up
| the most under a TTY.

I don't think .gvfs is relevant.  It is a mysterious Gnome Virtual
File System thingee.

Suggested approach:

- muck about looking for a relevant setting

- if that doesn't work, carefully and temporarily replace some of your
  . files with ones from the new user.

  - beware: you may lose settings that you care about, ones that have
    nothing to do with sound

  - beware: there are are lots and lots of settings files.

  - each setting change may or may not only take effect when you log
    in again.  A reboot should not be needed.
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