Arch Linux

emphire

Member

From: Canada

Registered: 2007-03-21

Posts: 203

[Solved] Pulseaudio sound is mono

Just recently the quality of the audio on my system got a lot worse. It's now all mono and really tinny sounding with very little bass. I was hoping someone might be able to shed some light on it or point me in the right direction.

I've verified that the audio is mono with:

speaker-test -t wav -c 2

I'm guessing pavucontrol has something to do with it:

$ pactl list
[...]
Source Output #0
        Driver: protocol-native.c
        Owner Module: 11
        Client: 8
        Source: 0
        Sample Specification: float32le 1ch 25Hz
        Channel Map: mono
        Format: pcm, format.sample_format = "\"float32le\""  format.rate = "25"  format.channels = "1"  format.channel_map = "\"mono\""
        Corked: no
        Mute: no
        Volume: mono: 65536 / 100% / 0.00 dB
                balance 0.00
        Buffer Latency: 22312 usec
        Source Latency: 0 usec
        Resample method: peaks
        Properties:
                media.name = "Peak detect"
                application.name = "PulseAudio Volume Control"
                native-protocol.peer = "UNIX socket client"
                native-protocol.version = "32"
                application.id = "org.PulseAudio.pavucontrol"
                application.icon_name = "audio-card"
                application.version = "3.0"
                application.process.id = "18575"
                application.process.user = "jon"
                application.process.host = "ghost"
                application.process.binary = "pavucontrol"
                application.language = "en_US.UTF-8"
                window.x11.display = ":0"
                application.process.machine_id = "7d79eef4827a488e84b4ad33d37a5ed9"
                application.process.session_id = "c8"
                module-stream-restore.id = "source-output-by-application-id:org.PulseAudio.pavucontrol"

Source Output #10
        Driver: protocol-native.c
        Owner Module: 11
        Client: 8
        Source: 3
        Sample Specification: float32le 1ch 25Hz
        Channel Map: mono
        Format: pcm, format.sample_format = "\"float32le\""  format.rate = "25"  format.channels = "1"  format.channel_map = "\"mono\""
        Corked: no
        Mute: no
        Volume: mono: 65536 / 100% / 0.00 dB
                balance 0.00
        Buffer Latency: 0 usec
        Source Latency: 522 usec
        Resample method: peaks
        Properties:
                media.name = "Peak detect"
                application.name = "PulseAudio Volume Control"
                native-protocol.peer = "UNIX socket client"
                native-protocol.version = "32"
                application.id = "org.PulseAudio.pavucontrol"
                application.icon_name = "audio-card"
                application.version = "3.0"
                application.process.id = "18575"
                application.process.user = "jon"
                application.process.host = "ghost"
                application.process.binary = "pavucontrol"
                application.language = "en_US.UTF-8"
                window.x11.display = ":0"
                application.process.machine_id = "7d79eef4827a488e84b4ad33d37a5ed9"
                application.process.session_id = "c8"
                module-stream-restore.id = "source-output-by-application-id:org.PulseAudio.pavucontrol"
[...]

I've tried uninstalling pavucontrol but I'm still having the issue.

Here is some more detail if it helps:
Output of aplay -L
Output of amixer
Output of pacmd list-cards
Output of pacmd list-sinks
Output of pacmd list-sink-inputs

Last edited by emphire (2018-05-14 22:27:53)

V1del

Forum Moderator

Registered: 2012-10-16

Posts: 21,672

Re: [Solved] Pulseaudio sound is mono

these pavucontrol sinks are normal, repost pacmd-list-sink-inputs during the speaker-test invocation. And maybe test your headphones on another system or similar that they aren't just broken in one channel.

Last edited by V1del (2018-05-14 22:31:44)

emphire

Member

From: Canada

Registered: 2007-03-21

Posts: 203

Re: [Solved] Pulseaudio sound is mono

Thanks @V1del. I tried my headphone in another system and moved them back to my arch machine and they're working as normal now. Maybe it was a loose connection.