Ubuntu

pulse audio suddenly stopped working after lowering volume

Asked by pyroman2000

This is totally wierd. I have been using this system for months without problem. Today I was on Youtube watching videos. I clicked on a link that brought me to a troll page with a screaming witch or somethign in it. I lowered the volume controls in a panic (down to 0 but NOT muted) and left that page. When I raised the volume control later, no more audio. This affects all audio in the system, (sounds, flash video, vlc, etc).

I checked all the settings I could find, (main volume, mixer, volume and mute buttons on both controls). All the settings look right. The system is plugged into an audio amplifier, and that is still working.

All I can say is that in my panic, I ht the volume control butons on my keyboard, AND the mouse on the main volume control that popped up. (I know, that sounds a little confused). If this was a windowss box, I would be tempted to say that this scam web page somehow managed to load some sort of virus in the system, but that doesnt sound too likely.

Help!

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daniel CURTIS (anoda) said : 		#1

Hi Pyroman. That's pretty strange, really. Have you tried to reset user/your PulseAudio configuration? I don't know which Ubuntu series you're running, but according to the Ubuntu Wiki page (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PulseAudio#Resetting_User_Configuration) it looks different with various releases. Also, I think that getting a diagnostic log could be helpful.

One more thing. You can always use e.g. chkrootkit or rkhunter apps - both are created for a rootkit detection. Remember about so-called 'false-positive' scan results. Both programs are available e.g. via APT utility and you have to use 'sudo'.

What about AppArmor profile for a web browser, that you're using? remember, that e.g. Firefox's profile is disabled by default. There is available 'apparmor-profiles' package, containing - as a name suggesting - various profiles.

Best regards.

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actionparsnip (andrew-woodhead666) said : 		#2

Try:

killall pulseaudio

See if it helps some.

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Mark Rijckenberg (markrijckenberg) said : 		#3

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/SoundTroubleshootingProcedure

Please post full Terminal output here:

https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/238954

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pyroman2000 (paged2000) said : 		#4

Thank you so much, all who replied.
pu
I did rebot the machine a few times, tried stoping and starting the service, no joy. I started the pulse-audio debug procedure but I got confused and I quit it. I'm afraid my troubleshooting skills on Linux are close to nonexistent. I re-installed the mixer, etc. Out of desperation, I reloged with a different deskop manager . I ws using MATE, and I switched to Cinnamon. All of a sudden things started to work again.

As I'm afraid to break something, I did not go back to the MATE desktop yet. In a while, when I feel brave :P These things tend to break in the strangest ways :P

For now, I consider this problem shelved, if not solved :)