Arch Linux

millus

Member

Registered: 2019-07-21

Posts: 167

[SOLVED] (Pipewire) audio output device list is randomly empty

Since some recent "pacman -Syu" the list of audio output devices is sometimes completely empty when I start the PC. I have to restart it then, with a high chance of it being normal again.

Last edited by millus (2023-06-01 21:02:56)

V1del

Forum Moderator

Registered: 2012-10-16

Posts: 19,772

Re: [SOLVED] (Pipewire) audio output device list is randomly empty

Do you have to restart the PC or does restarting the pipewire components suffice? e.g.

systemctl --user restart pipewire{-pulse} wireplumber

? When having the issue, what's the output of

sudo journalctl -b

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/List_o … n_services

millus

Member

Registered: 2019-07-21

Posts: 167

Re: [SOLVED] (Pipewire) audio output device list is randomly empty

Ok, it finally happened again, so..

systemctl --user restart pipewire pipewire-pulse wireplumber

didn't seem to change anything.

But in journal I spotted these lines, maybe this is it?

May 27 11:17:54 archlinux kernel: snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1f.3: cannot find the slot for index 1 (range 0-2), error: -16
May 27 11:17:54 archlinux kernel: snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1f.3: Error creating card!
May 27 11:17:54 archlinux kernel: snd_hda_intel: probe of 0000:00:1f.3 failed with error -16
May 27 11:17:54 archlinux kernel: snd_hda_intel 0000:01:00.1: cannot find the slot for index 1 (range 0-2), error: -16
May 27 11:17:54 archlinux kernel: snd_hda_intel 0000:01:00.1: Error creating card!
May 27 11:17:54 archlinux kernel: snd_hda_intel: probe of 0000:01:00.1 failed with error -16

V1del

Forum Moderator

Registered: 2012-10-16

Posts: 19,772

Re: [SOLVED] (Pipewire) audio output device list is randomly empty

You have a broken modprobe config hardcoding indices that might get occupied by different devices. Post them to give you proper advice on how they should look like without conflict

Last edited by V1del (2023-06-01 17:49:40)

millus

Member

Registered: 2019-07-21

Posts: 167

Re: [SOLVED] (Pipewire) audio output device list is randomly empty

Seems so, I found "index=1" option for snd_hda_intel module and removed it. The problem hasn't occured again so far.
I remember I had to add this option maybe 3 years ago because back then sound devices would randomly get shuffled and I really needed the onboard sound to be the "primary" device, so it was actually the "solution" back then. Funny that it lay dormant all the time and just started making trouble now though.
Thanks.

V1del

Forum Moderator

Registered: 2012-10-16

Posts: 19,772

Re: [SOLVED] (Pipewire) audio output device list is randomly empty

The assignment order should always have been  random it's always a 50/50 (relevantly increase with more audio devices) on which card get's which index (maybe some improvements leads to some other device loading faster which makes the race more likely or so). Pipewire and pulse for that matter aren't really reliant on the index staying the same so this kind of config is mostly moot with them. FWIW if you want to do this "correctly" you need to account for all possible cards when assigning indices and/or use negative values (which will pick the lowest possible number and then jump to the next, e.g. -1 (the default) is pick whatever index is available, -2 is pick whatever index is available but not 0 and so forth the further you go into the negatives)

Please mark as [SOLVED] by editing the title in your first post in case it doesn't appear again (... it shouldn't that error is caused by this)