Comment 3 for bug 497002

You say it only shows Master, but at the end of the description you say you have instances of them running using Front, Side, and Surround. So what is it?

Furthermore, have you installed pulseaudio?

Please show a screenshot of the preferences window with the Device combobox open, and maybe a screenshot with the Mixer track combobox open too.

Last thing I want you to do: open a terminal and type alsamixer (you can close that by pressing Esc key). If you have that program, then do this: deactivate all the volume applet instances, and leave only a volume applet with Side Then mute Side and check in alsamixer which channels get muted. This should only be Side.
Then the second experiment: leave volume applet with Side open and activate another that you should configure to use Master. Then toggle mute of Side and check what gets muted in alsamixer.