In Xfce, Gnome3, Ubuntu Studio, and Mate Desktop the pulse audio gui application is corrupted, I can't switch outputs.

[c_smooth]

Ubuntu 16.04.3 LTS
1.8.0
I expected to be able to switch to different outputs of my sound hardware. That list is gone and all I have is a volume circle knob. This doesn't effect the cinnamon DE but it does effect Gnome3, Mate, Xfce, and Xfce ubuntu studio edition.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 16.04
Package: pulseaudio 1:8.0-0ubuntu3.4
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.10.0-40.44~16.04.1-generic 4.10.17
Uname: Linux 4.10.0-40-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia_uvm nvidia_drm nvidia_modeset nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.20.1-0ubuntu2.13
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: X-Cinnamon
Date: Sat Nov 25 22:12:43 2017
InstallationDate: Installed on 2017-09-29 (57 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 16.04.3 LTS "Xenial Xerus" - Release amd64 (20170801)
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_US
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=<set>
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: pulseaudio
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
dmi.bios.date: 11/07/2013
dmi.bios.vendor: American Megatrends Inc.
dmi.bios.version: P1.60
dmi.board.name: Z87-M8
dmi.board.vendor: ASRock
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.chassis.type: 3
dmi.chassis.vendor: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.chassis.version: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAmericanMegatrendsInc.:bvrP1.60:bd11/07/2013:svnToBeFilledByO.E.M.:pnToBeFilledByO.E.M.:pvrToBeFilledByO.E.M.:rvnASRock:rnZ87-M8:rvr:cvnToBeFilledByO.E.M.:ct3:cvrToBeFilledByO.E.M.:
dmi.product.name: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.product.version: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
dmi.sys.vendor: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
modified.conffile..etc.pulse.daemon.conf: [modified]
mtime.conffile..etc.pulse.daemon.conf: 2017-10-18T18:43:48.348315

[c_smooth (hypernovaes)]

I took all the other DE's from my system, I think a lot of the problems stemmed from running KDE Plasma from a backport. It pretty much conflicted with every DE theme except cinnamon. There where still some problems even after I removed it, but at least cinnamon works.

[Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt)]

Your system is logging a couple of issues repeatedly:

Nov 25 15:00:52 username-desktop pulseaudio[2489]: [pulseaudio] alsa-mixer.c: Volume element Speaker has 8 channels. That's too much! I can't handle that!

and

Nov 25 15:12:09 username-desktop pulseaudio[3489]: [pulseaudio] shm.c: shm_open() failed: No such file or directory

Bug 1652505 mentions that second one too. In that case the solution was to get a newer version of PulseAudio. Can you try Ubuntu 17.10 or 18.04 by any chance?

[c_smooth (hypernovaes)]

I may have to, because it's even registering output changes on a reinstall. I reedited those pulse audio files to change the number of speakers, but that didn't help either, so I did a reinstall. I usually try to avoid that. Thanks for the assistance.

[c_smooth (hypernovaes)]

I've been Running default flavor of Ubuntu since 12/22 without issue; still version 16.04.3. I didn't switch to 17 or 18 because I use my machine for my work, and I do like to run the most stable version. I've realized that Ubuntu doesn't run simulated 7.1 surround sound well. I got it working a few years ago with another headset so I thought I could replicate the same solution with my Astro A40's. It just didn't work.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for pulseaudio (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]