Audacity Won't Play or Record

[wmichaelb]

Hi, I installed Ubuntu Studio 10.10 to try and get Audacity to record a tape of a
departed relative speaking that was given to me by a family friend, and I *cannot*
get it to respond. I'm running a 3.06 GHz P4 Intel board with 1 GB of RAM, and a
Soundblaster Audigy SE card. The system plays the Ubuntu Studio login theme
at bootup just fine. Audacious responds to a CD, and imports the tracks and
shows audio activity, but no sound is created.

lshw shows the card:

*-multimedia:1
description: Multimedia audio controller
product: CA0106 Soundblaster
vendor: Creative Labs
physical id: 9
bus info: [email protected]:00:09.0
version: 00
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: pm bus_master cap_list
configuration: driver=CA0106 latency=32 maxlatency=20 mingnt=2
resources: irq:17 ioport:c000(size=32)

"Sound Preferences" shows two devices both labelled as "internal audio". I have one
selected as "analog stereo output" and one selected as "analog stereo input", although
I have tried multiple other selections without result. In no case will the speaker test buttons
generate sound out of the speakers.

I have the tape deck connected to the blue microphone/line in port, and yes the deck
generates good sound when plugged directly into a receiver.

Alsamixer shows both the card and the on board audio; the master is set to 98, and
line in to 81.

I've read that I should be able to select the input port from a drop-down box next to
the microphone slider in Audacity, but there is no such drop down showing on my
system.

I'm clearly missing something very basic, but I don't have a clue as to what.
Does anyone have a suggestion? Thanks in advance.

[bgravato]

To change the playing/recording devices you can do it in Preferences -> Devices

The dropdown menu you mention can be activated in the menu View -> Toolbars -> Device Toolbar

Ubuntu usually uses pulseaudio to control sound. So it's usually better to select "default" in the Preferences -> Devices and then use the pulseaudio volume control to select the input (you might need to install it, should be available in the ubuntu repositoires).

[wmichaelb]

bgravato: First, thanks for your time and quick reply. I do have Pulse Volume Control installed; it comes
with the standard Ubuntu Studio audio package. It is set to close to max output.

Pulling up "View" did indeed give me the choice of input and output device, thanks very much.
That seems to be a display of the choices selected in Edit/Preferences, but is welcome.

Pulling up "Edit/Preferences" gives me only a single choice of host, and that is Alsa. If I pull up
Alsamixergui, it shows that the card and internal audio are both related to Pulse. I tried Alsa
default, Alsa Pulse, and CA0106(hw 1,0) for the input. The last selection finally seemed to
capture the audio, although in "lumps"; the waveform doesn't track the moving line, but shows
up in clumps over time. Is this a loading problem on the CPU? I'm running a 3.06 GHz P4 with
a GB of RAM.

And I still have no output, although I've tried selecting Alsa Default, Alsa Pulse, and CA0106
hw 1,1; 1,2; and 1,3 for the output function in Audacity. If I play back the sample recording
I've acquired, the output monitor shows activity, but there is still no output sound. Since I still
can't generate sound from a CD, I suspect this is a system issue, but I don't know where else
to look. I'm not new to Linux nor Ubuntu, and I have a fairly strong technical background,
but this one has me stumped. My one thought is, do I need to invoke Jack?

Any further suggestions you might have would be greatly appreciated, and thanks again for
what you've done so far.

[bgravato]

I'm also an experienced linux user and sound on linux sometimes is still a mystery for me!

Have you tried to set alsa pulse in audacity and then use pulse volume control to select the input/output?

I'm not very fond of (nor familiar with) pulseaudio nor ubuntu (and I've never tried ubuntu studio). I'd say try to kill pulseaudio and use alsa directly, but I think ubuntu automatically relaunches pulseaudio when it's killed.

I use JACK on my debian system. It's a powerful sound server, but not very straightforward to set up.

Steve is more familiar with ubuntu and pulseaudio, so I'm waiting for him to jump in and add his "2 cents"

[bgravato]

I forgot to say that your cpu and ram should be more than enough to run audacity without problems, I don't that's what's causing the "lumps", but I don't have any explanation for that either...

[steve]

The last selection finally seemed to
capture the audio, although in "lumps"; the waveform doesn't track the moving line, but shows
up in clumps over time. Is this a loading problem on the CPU? I'm running a 3.06 GHz P4 with
a GB of RAM.

I've occasionally noticed this issue and it has been reported elsewhere but there is as yet no definitive answer.
On my machine I've noticed it after using Flash in Firefox - I suspect that it is a bug in the Flas plug-in that is upsetting PulseAudio, but as yet I've been unable to confirm this. Logging out and back in again (or rebooting) invariably fixes it for me.

The settings that I use in "Edit menu > Preferences > Devices" are:
Host: Alsa
Recording device: default
Playback device: default

The Audacity recording/playback ports are not visible in PulseAudio Volume Control unless Audacity is actually in Playback/Record mode (may be paused).
To select the playback device for Audacity, set Audacity Preferences to Alsa/default, then generate a sound (or silence) and press Play, then Pause.
Open PulseAudio volume Control and you should see Audacity listed in the Playback tab. You should then be able to select any of the available audio devices for Playback.
Press Stop to get out of playback mode and click on the Recording meter in Audacity to enable monitoring.
Go back to the PulsAudio Volume Control and Audacity should be visible in the Recording tab.
Select the required Recording device.
Click on the Recording Meter again to stop monitoring.

Go to the Input Devices tab on PulseAudio Volume Control and select the default input.
Go to the Output Devices tab and select the default output.

You should now be ready to go. If it does not record from the required input, check that you have the correct defaults set for Input/Output devices in PulseAudio Volume Control and restart Audacity.

[wmichaelb]

You folks are responsive and knowledgeable; thank you.

All is set up as noted, with but one exception: Pulse Volume Control has no
"default" setting. One must select from a list of 23 very specific output (or
input) hardware selections. Some are digital in or out, and so are obviously
not good choices. But I've tried all the analog out options without success.
I have successfully acquired a brief test track, and when I play it, I see
activity in the output monitor bar, but hear no sound.

Since I can't play CD's either, I'm still concerned that the problem may lie in
some other part of the Linux sound system, and that Audacity is working
correctly. My understanding is that Alsa provides the lowest level of interface
to the hardware, and that its output can feed Pulse and/or Jack, or even get
fed back. Is there a piece of software that shows the path(s) of the sound
data through the system?

Thanks again!

[bgravato]

With JACK you can see the paths with qjackctl (click connect to show the connections made by jack). For pulseaudio I don't know.

Is there any other player with which you can hear anything? Like mplayer, vlc, alsaplayer, etc?

How many soundcards do you have? You have an internal pci soundblaster card right? Beside that do you have a built-in sound card in the motherboard? If so check if the output is going to the built-in card.

[wmichaelb]

Finally: I started the Jack server, added Output Socket 1 from CA etc., and then Input Socket 1 from the same. Now I have output from the recording that I made with Audacity, but have lost the ability to record. So the problem lies somewhere in the Jack server setup with Ubuntu Studio. I need to settle down and learn Jack.

I may post again, but thanks for all your time and help! The ball is in my court for the moment.

[steve]

Audacity's Record and Playback ports are only visible in Jack if:
1) You start Jack before you start Audacity
2) you select "Jack" in "Edit menu > Preferences > Devices > Host"
3) Audacity must be in Playback mode for the Audacity output ports to be visible in "Jack Connect", and must be in Record mode for the Audacity input ports to be visible.
The Audacity input and output ports are listed as "PortAudio".