Audacity 2.4.1 stops HDMI sound (Manjaro, XFCE, jack2 with pulseaudio) [solved]

darkcity · September 1, 2020, 11:11am

Audacity 2.4.1 kills HDMI sound output. After Audacity is launched no sound is sent to HDMI from Audacity or any other audio program. However, no errors are reported and the sound levels are shown in pulseaudio volume meter and cadence M meter.

I’m using jack2 with cadence to bridge to pulseaudio.

Using HDMI for audio out:

card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 0: ALC233 Analog [ALC233 Analog]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 0/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: CODEC [USB Audio CODEC], device 0: USB Audio [USB Audio]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

The problem seems to outputting to HDMI audio (card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]).

Audacity will output to internal analogue (card 0: PCH [HDA Intel PCH], device 0: ALC233 Analog [ALC233 Analog]) and USB (card 1: CODEC [USB Audio CODEC], device 0: USB Audio [USB Audio]).

Audacity seems to kill as well as not recognise HDMI audio. Steps to reproduce:

Have jack2 running with pulseaudio bridged to jack (jack is configured with HDMI as output, USB as input)
Programs (including VLC and Audacious) output sound to HDMI - both using both jack (‘directly’) and pulseaudio.
Run Audacity
Sound output to HDMI stopped
Audacity won’t send audio to HDMI, additionally no other program now sent audio to HDMI either.

Quitting Audacity and restarting jack and bridge does not restore audio to HDMI - reboot necessary.

I’ve tried Audacity set to jack with both ‘system’ and ‘pulseaudio’ as output device. I’ve tried it set to ALSA and various options (including jack). Also note, when set to ALSA the output device list includes internal analogue and USB devices as an options but NOT a HDMI device.

(Audacity:2661): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: 11:49:42.227: cannot register existing type 'GdkDisplayManager'

(Audacity:2661): GLib-CRITICAL **: 11:49:42.228: g_once_init_leave: assertion 'result != 0' failed

(Audacity:2661): GLib-GObject-CRITICAL **: 11:49:42.228: g_object_new_with_properties: assertion 'G_TYPE_IS_OBJECT (object_type)' failed
11:49:42: Warning: Mismatch between the program and library build versions detected.
The library used 3.0 (wchar_t,compiler with C++ ABI 1013,wx containers,compatible with 2.8),
and your program used 3.0 (wchar_t,compiler with C++ ABI 1014,wx containers,compatible with 2.8).

(Audacity:2661): Gtk-WARNING **: 11:49:42.395: gtk_disable_setlocale() must be called before gtk_init()
ALSA lib pcm.c:2660:(snd_pcm_open_noupdate) Unknown PCM cards.pcm.rear
ALSA lib pcm.c:2660:(snd_pcm_open_noupdate) Unknown PCM cards.pcm.center_lfe
ALSA lib pcm.c:2660:(snd_pcm_open_noupdate) Unknown PCM cards.pcm.side
ALSA lib pcm_route.c:877:(find_matching_chmap) Found no matching channel map
ALSA lib pcm_route.c:877:(find_matching_chmap) Found no matching channel map
ALSA lib pcm_route.c:877:(find_matching_chmap) Found no matching channel map
ALSA lib pcm_route.c:877:(find_matching_chmap) Found no matching channel map
ALSA lib pcm_oss.c:377:(_snd_pcm_oss_open) Unknown field port
ALSA lib pcm_oss.c:377:(_snd_pcm_oss_open) Unknown field port
ALSA lib pcm_usb_stream.c:486:(_snd_pcm_usb_stream_open) Invalid type for card
ALSA lib pcm_usb_stream.c:486:(_snd_pcm_usb_stream_open) Invalid type for card
11:49:44: Debug: ScreenToClient cannot work when toplevel window is not shown ...

11:49:44: Debug: ScreenToClient cannot work when toplevel window is not shown
Expression 'stream->playback.pcm' failed in 'src/hostapi/alsa/pa_linux_alsa.c', line: 4628
Expression 'stream->playback.pcm' failed in 'src/hostapi/alsa/pa_linux_alsa.c', line: 4628
Expression 'stream->playback.pcm' failed in 'src/hostapi/alsa/pa_linux_alsa.c', line: 4628
Expression 'stream->playback.pcm' failed in 'src/hostapi/alsa/pa_linux_alsa.c', line: 4628
Expression 'stream->playback.pcm' failed in 'src/hostapi/alsa/pa_linux_alsa.c', line: 4628
Expression 'stream->playback.pcm' failed in 'src/hostapi/alsa/pa_linux_alsa.c', line: 4628
Expression 'stream->playback.pcm' failed in 'src/hostapi/alsa/pa_linux_alsa.c', line: 4628
Expression 'stream->playback.pcm' failed in 'src/hostapi/alsa/pa_linux_alsa.c', line: 4628
Expression 'stream->playback.pcm' failed in 'src/hostapi/alsa/pa_linux_alsa.c', line: 4628
Expression 'stream->playback.pcm' failed in 'src/hostapi/alsa/pa_linux_alsa.c', line: 4628
Expression 'stream->playback.pcm' failed in 'src/hostapi/alsa/pa_linux_alsa.c', line: 4628
11:49:45: Debug: ScreenToClient cannot work when toplevel window is not shown ...

11:49:46: Debug: ClientToScreen cannot work when toplevel window is not shown
11:49:46: Debug: Unrecognized accel key 'backspace', accel string ignored.
11:49:46: Debug: Unrecognized accel key 'backspace', accel string ignored.
11:49:46: Debug: Unrecognized accel key 'numpad_enter', accel string ignored.
11:49:46: Debug: Unrecognized accel key 'numpad_enter', accel string ignored.

thanks in advance for any help

steve · September 1, 2020, 11:13am

In the Device Toolbar select “Jack Audio System” as the “host” and “System” for both recording and playback devices. Audacity will then record to and play from the Jack audio stream.

darkcity · September 1, 2020, 11:17am

I’ve tried that but there is still no sound sent to HDMI. However, that does work for internal analogue and USB output devices.

Also, after starting Audacity no program will send audio to HDMI output.

EDIT: The connection between Audacity and system is show - see attactment.

steve · September 1, 2020, 11:21am

Are those other programs using Jack?

If you start Jack with QJackCtl, you can see which applications are attached to the Jack audio streams in the “Connect” dialog.

darkcity · September 1, 2020, 11:25am

Some of the programs use jack (for example vlc), others use the pulseaudio bridge (for example Audacious).

Yep the programs are connected in jack (I’m using Catia), see above.

steve · September 1, 2020, 12:09pm

From what I can see, that appears to be working. What am I missing?

darkcity · September 1, 2020, 1:47pm

That’s part of the problem. All seems to be well with the track scrolling and meter bobbing in time, just no sound comes out (of HDMI). I think it may be to do with the way I’ve configured ALSA, Audacity is struggling to see the HDMI device that is #3 on card #0. These warnings may be a clue:

ALSA lib pcm.c:2660:(snd_pcm_open_noupdate) Unknown PCM cards.pcm.rear
ALSA lib pcm.c:2660:(snd_pcm_open_noupdate) Unknown PCM cards.pcm.center_lfe
ALSA lib pcm.c:2660:(snd_pcm_open_noupdate) Unknown PCM cards.pcm.side
ALSA lib pcm_route.c:877:(find_matching_chmap) Found no matching channel map
ALSA lib pcm_route.c:877:(find_matching_chmap) Found no matching channel map
ALSA lib pcm_route.c:877:(find_matching_chmap) Found no matching channel map
ALSA lib pcm_route.c:877:(find_matching_chmap) Found no matching channel map
ALSA lib pcm_oss.c:377:(_snd_pcm_oss_open) Unknown field port
ALSA lib pcm_oss.c:377:(_snd_pcm_oss_open) Unknown field port
ALSA lib pcm_usb_stream.c:486:(_snd_pcm_usb_stream_open) Invalid type for card
ALSA lib pcm_usb_stream.c:486:(_snd_pcm_usb_stream_open) Invalid type for card

steve · September 1, 2020, 2:03pm

I’ve just tried using HDMI on my Linux laptop. The only problem that I had was finding the right device number to connect Jack to. This is the setting that worked for me (using QJackCtl)

darkcity · September 8, 2020, 12:29pm

Thanks for the answer. It could be a soundcard or distro specific problem. I only have one stereo hdmi output.

I reconfigured my system to work with ALSA and Pulse. I get the same problem as when I use Jack. (Audacity set to ALSA with Pulse output option). Audacity appears to play, with a vertical line traversing the audio waveform, the meters in Audacity and Pulse go high. However, no audio is produced. After this the whole system will no longer send sound to the hdmi port, for example VLC and Deadbeef no longer send audio to hdmi. A system reboot is required (although I haven’t tried restarting Pulse audio to restore hdmi audio).
audacity-prob 002 - stripped to ALSA with Pulse v2.png
audacity-prob 002 - cadence ouptput options.png

steve · September 8, 2020, 1:44pm

PluseAudio should automatically respawn if you kill it.

killall pulseaudio

darkcity · September 8, 2020, 5:11pm

I’ve found a solution. Cadence was set to start jack2 at login. Disabling this and manually starting jack solves the problem.

Audacity will then output to hdmi when set to ‘ALSA’ with output device as ‘pulse’. This works for both ALSA + Pulse and Jack + Pulse bridge.

It may be something to do with the order that jack et al initialise that is throwing Audacity off.

I came to the solution by using the command

systemctl --user restart pulseaudio

after Audacity silenced the hdmi output. An alternative solution (to disabling jack2 autostart) is to issue this command at anytime before using Audacity.

steve · September 8, 2020, 8:12pm

Very pleased to hear that you’ve solved the problem.

I’ve always started Jack manually, so I’ve no idea why starting it at login would cause such a strange problem. I’ll close this topic now so that the solution remains at the end of the thread.