[SOLVED] No audio on reboot - speaker-test has no audio with no error

grog398 · 2025-10-23 20:19:31

Surface Level

At a surface level, I was using my computer perfectly fine the night before, audio working as expected, then upon shutting it down for the night and turning it back on the next day, there was no more audio coming from my headphones. the speaker-test command does not output any audio either.

Solutions Attempted

- Rebooting
- Updating system (important to note: no update was performed between the audio working and the audio breaking)
- Using different headphones
- Using different aux ports on my computer
- Checking alsamixer to see if anything was muted by mistake (this includes auto-mute)
- Installing and reinstalling different combinations of sound systems (This could still be a solution, but I've tried just ALSA, PulseAudio, PipeWire, etc. in several different ways and they did not work)
- Checking pavucontrol to see if anything was wrong (All sound cards appear as normal, and all signs point to the computer trying to play audio through the correct device, but without any audio actually being played).
- Running speaker-test (see below for output)
- Updating BIOS
- Running alsactl restore

My gut instinct is that its something really simple that's wrong with ALSA that I'm just unaware of.

Logs

speaker-test:

speaker-test 1.2.14

Playback device is default
Stream parameters are 48000Hz, S16_LE, 1 channels
Using 16 octaves of pink noise
Rate set to 48000Hz (requested 48000Hz)
Buffer size range from 192 to 2097152
Period size range from 64 to 699051
Periods = 4
was set period_size = 12000
was set buffer_size = 48000
 0 - Front Left
Time per period = 1.996398
 0 - Front Left
Time per period = 3.000436
 0 - Front Left
Time per period = 2.997972
 0 - Front Left
Time per period = 3.001791
 0 - Front Left
Time per period = 3.001129
 0 - Front Left
Time per period = 2.997230
 0 - Front Left

systemctl status --user pulseaudio.service

● pulseaudio.service - Sound Service
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/user/pulseaudio.service; disabled; preset: enable>
     Active: active (running) since Thu 2025-10-23 15:42:28 EDT; 21min ago
 Invocation: a6e6156fa6c64f3eb3593022e8d42d68
TriggeredBy: ● pulseaudio.socket
   Main PID: 837 (pulseaudio)
      Tasks: 14 (limit: 37370)
     Memory: 91.9M (peak: 92.2M)
        CPU: 28.263s
     CGroup: /user.slice/user-1000.slice/user@1000.service/session.slice/pulseaudio.ser>
             ├─837 /usr/bin/pulseaudio --daemonize=no --log-target=journal
             └─879 /usr/lib/pulse/gsettings-helper

Oct 23 15:42:26 GrogBrick systemd[750]: Starting Sound Service...
Oct 23 15:42:26 GrogBrick pulseaudio[837]: The decibel volume range for element 'Speake>
Oct 23 15:42:26 GrogBrick pulseaudio[837]: The decibel volume range for element 'Speake>
Oct 23 15:42:26 GrogBrick pulseaudio[837]: The decibel volume range for element 'Speake>
Oct 23 15:42:26 GrogBrick pulseaudio[837]: The decibel volume range for element 'Speake>
Oct 23 15:42:28 GrogBrick pulseaudio[837]: Failed to open cookie file '/home/grog/.conf>
Oct 23 15:42:28 GrogBrick pulseaudio[837]: Failed to load authentication key '/home/gro>
Oct 23 15:42:28 GrogBrick systemd[750]: Started Sound Service.

systemctl status --user pipewire.service

● pipewire.service - PipeWire Multimedia Service
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/user/pipewire.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
     Active: active (running) since Thu 2025-10-23 16:06:31 EDT; 3s ago
 Invocation: 913f279c06584d7ea999ec6c8f4d13dc
TriggeredBy: ● pipewire.socket
   Main PID: 3347 (pipewire)
      Tasks: 3 (limit: 37370)
     Memory: 3M (peak: 3.3M)
        CPU: 7ms
     CGroup: /user.slice/user-1000.slice/user@1000.service/session.slice/pipewire.servi>
             └─3347 /usr/bin/pipewire

Oct 23 16:06:31 GrogBrick systemd[750]: Started PipeWire Multimedia Service.

lsof /dev/snd/*

COMMAND   PID USER  FD   TYPE DEVICE SIZE/OFF NODE NAME
pulseaudi 837 grog mem    CHR 116,18          1092 /dev/snd/pcmC3D1c
pulseaudi 837 grog mem    CHR 116,20          1094 /dev/snd/pcmC3D2c
pulseaudi 837 grog mem    CHR 116,13          1078 /dev/snd/pcmC0D0c
pulseaudi 837 grog  18u   CHR 116,11      0t0 1054 /dev/snd/controlC1
pulseaudi 837 grog  23u   CHR 116,11      0t0 1054 /dev/snd/controlC1
pulseaudi 837 grog  24u   CHR 116,22      0t0 1096 /dev/snd/controlC3
pulseaudi 837 grog  30u   CHR 116,14      0t0 1079 /dev/snd/controlC0
pulseaudi 837 grog  36u   CHR 116,14      0t0 1079 /dev/snd/controlC0
pulseaudi 837 grog  38u   CHR 116,22      0t0 1096 /dev/snd/controlC3
pulseaudi 837 grog  39u   CHR 116,22      0t0 1096 /dev/snd/controlC3
pulseaudi 837 grog  60u   CHR 116,13      0t0 1078 /dev/snd/pcmC0D0c
pulseaudi 837 grog  67u   CHR  116,9      0t0 1048 /dev/snd/controlC2
pulseaudi 837 grog  76u   CHR 116,20      0t0 1094 /dev/snd/pcmC3D2c
pulseaudi 837 grog  77u   CHR 116,18      0t0 1092 /dev/snd/pcmC3D1c

alsa-info.sh output can be found here.

Relevant hardware info should be at the top of the pastebin.

If you need any additional info on the issue, please do not hesitate to ask, I tried to give as much info as I could here but there's always the chance I missed something important (especially when said important thing is probably the solution.)

Solution

Ran this line:

pacman -Sy pulseaudio pulseaudio-alsa

and rebooted.

Last edited by grog398 (2025-10-26 14:45:05)

unixman · 2025-10-24 06:03:53

hi. WRT lsof /dev/snd/*

C: Card; D: Device

ending with c as "pcmCxDyc" means 'c'apture or MIC there is no speaker out there but too many MIC. it is weird.
it says you have 4 sound cards.

Are there speakers under /dev/snd/ ?
ending with p as pcmCxDyp p means 'p'layback/speaker.

Last edited by unixman (2025-10-24 06:04:33)

grog398 · 2025-10-24 18:30:23

unixman wrote:

Are there speakers under /dev/snd/ ?
ending with p as pcmCxDyp p means 'p'layback/speaker.

Yes, I have:
- pcmC1D3p
- pcmC1D7p
- pcmC1D8p
- pcmC1D9p
- pcmC2D3p
- pcmC2D7p
- pcmC3D0p
- pcmC3D1p
- pcmC3D2p
- pcmC3D3p

unixman · 2025-10-24 19:17:58

stop pulse and pipewire services for them not causing interfere.

look output of "amixer scontrols" you should be see speakers there.
unmute all speakers.(if it Off turn it On)
set all volumes full.
temporarly move /etc/alsa/* somewhere.

then play something with aplay or speaker-test.
if it works then problem is pulse/pipewire related.
You may choose left them disabled.

for info:
amixer help
man amixer

grog398 · 2025-10-24 19:33:04

Ok, now we're getting somewhere I think.

The output of both amixer scontrols and speaker-test has changed to an actual error (!) after stopping both pulse and pipewire.

ALSA lib confmisc.c:855:(parse_card) cannot find card 'PCH'
ALSA lib conf.c:5205:(_snd_config_evaluate) function snd_func_card_inum returned error: No such device
ALSA lib confmisc.c:422:(snd_func_concat) error evaluating strings
ALSA lib conf.c:5205:(_snd_config_evaluate) function snd_func_concat returned error: No such device
ALSA lib confmisc.c:1342:(snd_func_refer) error evaluating name
ALSA lib conf.c:5205:(_snd_config_evaluate) function snd_func_refer returned error: No such device
ALSA lib conf.c:5728:(snd_config_expand) Evaluate error: No such device
ALSA lib control.c:1575:(snd_ctl_open_noupdate) Invalid CTL sysdefault
amixer: Mixer attach default error: No such device

Something I also want to add is the output of aplay -L:

null
    Discard all samples (playback) or generate zero samples (capture)
lavrate
    Rate Converter Plugin Using Libav/FFmpeg Library
samplerate
    Rate Converter Plugin Using Samplerate Library
speexrate
    Rate Converter Plugin Using Speex Resampler
jack
    JACK Audio Connection Kit
oss
    Open Sound System
pipewire
    PipeWire Sound Server
pulse
    PulseAudio Sound Server
speex
    Plugin using Speex DSP (resample, agc, denoise, echo, dereverb)
upmix
    Plugin for channel upmix (4,6,8)
vdownmix
    Plugin for channel downmix (stereo) with a simple spacialization
default
    Default ALSA Output (currently PulseAudio Sound Server)
sysdefault:CARD=S
    HyperX QuadCast S, USB Audio
    Default Audio Device
front:CARD=S,DEV=0
    HyperX QuadCast S, USB Audio
    Front output / input
surround21:CARD=S,DEV=0
    HyperX QuadCast S, USB Audio
    2.1 Surround output to Front and Subwoofer speakers
surround40:CARD=S,DEV=0
    HyperX QuadCast S, USB Audio
    4.0 Surround output to Front and Rear speakers
surround41:CARD=S,DEV=0
    HyperX QuadCast S, USB Audio
    4.1 Surround output to Front, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround50:CARD=S,DEV=0
    HyperX QuadCast S, USB Audio
    5.0 Surround output to Front, Center and Rear speakers
surround51:CARD=S,DEV=0
    HyperX QuadCast S, USB Audio
    5.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround71:CARD=S,DEV=0
    HyperX QuadCast S, USB Audio
    7.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Side, Rear and Woofer speakers
iec958:CARD=S,DEV=0
    HyperX QuadCast S, USB Audio
    IEC958 (S/PDIF) Digital Audio Output
usbstream:CARD=S
    HyperX QuadCast S
    USB Stream Output
hdmi:CARD=HDMI,DEV=0
    HDA ATI HDMI, LC24RG50
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=HDMI,DEV=1
    HDA ATI HDMI, HDMI 1
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=HDMI,DEV=2
    HDA ATI HDMI, CB272 E
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=HDMI,DEV=3
    HDA ATI HDMI, HDMI 3
    HDMI Audio Output
usbstream:CARD=HDMI
    HDA ATI HDMI
    USB Stream Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic,DEV=0
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 0
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=Generic,DEV=1
    HD-Audio Generic, HDMI 1
    HDMI Audio Output
usbstream:CARD=Generic
    HD-Audio Generic
    USB Stream Output
sysdefault:CARD=Audio
    USB Audio, USB Audio
    Default Audio Device
... (truncating it a bit because i dont want to clutter the post too much)

grog398 · 2025-10-25 01:23:48

I fixed the above error by removing an erroneous /etc/asound.conf.

Output of amixer scontrols

Simple mixer control 'Speaker',0
Simple mixer control 'Mic',0

Looking at the speaker itself we can see that

Simple mixer control 'Speaker',0
  Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: Playback 0 - 28
  Mono:
  Front Left: Playback 28 [100%] [-6.00dB] [on]
  Front Right: Playback 28 [100%] [-6.00dB] [on]

it is at 100% and on.

With /etc/alsa moved to /etc/alsa.bak I tried speaker-test again, but to no avail, so it is definitely an ALSA issue.

unixman · 2025-10-25 04:55:16

aplay -L says pulse is still default.

Change that make "alsa" default.
and set dafault device as mainboard builtin sound chip if any.

try systemdctl disable pulse, pipewire ...
then reboot and check again.

ewaller · 2025-10-25 16:00:06

Quick sanity check. Verify that the version numbers reported by uname -a and pacman -Q match (assuming you are using the stock kernel)

grog398 · 2025-10-25 18:26:29

uname -a and pacman -Q do match.

I am a little confused as to how you found out that pulse is the default from aplay -L, and how I would go about making alsa the default. Both pulse and pipewire are disabled at this point.

unixman · 2025-10-26 05:11:10

grog398 wrote:

how you found out that ...

default
    Default ALSA Output (currently PulseAudio Sound Server)
sysdefault:CARD=S
    HyperX QuadCast S, USB Audio
    Default Audio Device

Since you disabled services and (re)move configs Now it must be turn to alsa automatically. BUT:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Advanc … sound_card

grog398 · 2025-10-26 14:43:22

Aaaand it miraculously fixed itself!

Well maybe not entirely miraculously, because I decided to do one last sanity check by running pacman -Sy pulseaudio pulseaudio-alsa to see if a clean reinstall would happen to fix everything - and one reboot later and it magically works! I have no clue why or how it's working now, but apparently in my attempts of trying different combinations of sound server I never ended up using that -y flag, so in the end it was something extremely simple.

Arch Linux

#1 2025-10-23 20:19:31