Flashplugin-nonfree has no sound on Intrepid AMD64 Alpha6

[Jean-Paul]

Binary package hint: firefox-3.0

On the 64-bit version of Intrepid Alpha6 it is possible to install a 32bit version of flashplugin-nonfree. This works fine (I haven't seen any crashes yet etc), but the only problem is that there is no sound output by the plugin. I've tried it with a couple of flash sites (including youtube) and none of them had sound.
I'll try the liveCD of Intrepid Alpha6 x86 as well and post my findings here (maybe important, maybe not, but I'm running the AMD64 version of Intrepid alpha 6 while this problem occurred).

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: amd64
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 8.10
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
Package: firefox-3.0 3.0.2+build3+nobinonly-0ubuntu2
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: firefox-3.0
Uname: Linux 2.6.27-3-generic x86_64

[Jean-Paul (jeanpaul145)]

I've repeated the procedure on the x86 version of Intrepid Alpha6 and here the plugin outputs sound as it should. So I'd say it is definitely an issue with the 32bit plugin running on an 64bit system.

I don't know if this problem pops up on other 64bit pc's, so *some* specs would be handy:
Zepto Znote 6625WD,
Intel C2D T7500,
2.0GB DDR2.

[Mackenzie Morgan (maco.m)]

Do you have libflashsupport installed? If not, install it and try again.

[Jean-Paul (jeanpaul145)]

I just rebooted the Intrepid Alpha 6 AMD64 LiveCD and the weird thing is, that I can't reproduce the problem.
Indeed I didn't have libflashsupport installed earlier, but a couple of minutes ago I hadn't installed it either, and I had sound with the flashplugin-nonfree.

Right now I do have libflashsupport installed, and I don't notice any difference compared to just before.

I guess this bug should be marked as invalid since I can't reproduce the problem.

[Jean-Paul (jeanpaul145)]

Point of notice: both times I had all the updates available at that time installed on the live system.

[Mackenzie Morgan (maco.m)]

If you use, for example, Rhythmbox, to play music and then go to a Flash
site, are they both able to continue working as expected?

[Id2ndR (id2ndr)]

I'm running Intrepid 64bits without libflashsupport.

When I play a music in Rythmbox and I go to youtube, I can hear the music but no the sound of the video.
- PulseAudio Volume Control show me both Rhythmbox and ALSA pulg-in [npviewer.bin].
- The movie stop playing after about 1 second and I'm able to navigate trought the movie (it will stop playing again after about 1 second). I also can change tab in Firefox.
- When I close the Youtube tab it freeze Firefox. ALSA pulg-in [npviewer.bin] doesn't disappear in PulseAudio Volume Control.
- When I quit firefox, ALSA pulg-in [npviewer.bin] disappears few secondes after in PulseAudio Volume Control.

When I go to YouTube website while not running rythmbox, the movie is play normaly (using ALSA directly because it doesn't appears in PulseAudio Volume Control).

I'll do more tests with libflashsupport.

[Id2ndR (id2ndr)]

With libflashsupport installed, the result is worst : there is no sound in the movie even when Rhythmbox is not playing and it doesn't appear at all in PulseAudio Volume Control. Other behaviors are the same.

[ktp420 (ktp420)]

I can confirm this also...and this has to be recent regression because I had this working correctly before this week updates. After updating, when I play a music in Rythmbox and I go to youtube, I can hear the music but no the sound of the video and video stops after about 1 second.

I am seeing the same things as Id2ndR.

[ktp420 (ktp420)]

Found a thread that talks about recent issues with pulse and ALAS:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=929641

[Daniel T Chen (crimsun)]

There are multiple issues being discussed here, so I will address them individually before explaining why this bug is not really a bug per se (and hence why I marked this bug invalid).

Firstly, there is a known (and being addressed) alsa-plugins issue that Luke and I are investigating regarding yesterday's upload (1.0.17-0ubuntu3). This bug affects GStreamer-based apps configured to use, and native, ALSA with pulse pcm+ctl plugin (meaning that PulseAudio is active).

Secondly, libflashsupport should NOT be installed in intrepid. You should use the pulse pcm+ctl plugin by executing `asoundconf set-pulseaudio' in a Terminal and then restarting your audio apps (perhaps logging out and back into GNOME to be certain).

Thirdly, by default, pulse pcm+ctl plugin is not active, so installing non-Free Flash (via the flashplugin-nonfree package) will result in nondeterministically inaudible audio. You need to follow the steps in the above (explanation 2) paragraph.

[ktp420 (ktp420)]

Thanks Daniel,

Just a FYI, when I downgraded the pulseaudio packages to 0.9.10-2ubuntu2 and things work again.

https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/pulseaudio

[Id2ndR (id2ndr)]

Should this bug be marked as duplicate of bug 198453 instead of invalid since there still is a real bug in alsa-plugin ?

[kenden (kenden)]

I think It's problably more a duplicate of bug 279346, since 198453 is for Hardy, not Intrepid.
If there is a problem, "known (and being addressed) alsa-plugins issue", why mark the bug as invalid?

[Mackenzie Morgan (maco.m)]

Id2ndR:
What's the bug? Did you do what Daniel said to do? That's the automatic if you upgrade to Intrepid now or do a fresh install. If that doesn't work, then there's a problem.

[Id2ndR (id2ndr)]

Mackenzie Morgan :
I don't got any trouble now, all works great for me since bug 198453 was fixed (2008-10-08, comment 135). If I do a fresh install, I won't have trouble neither.

[Mackenzie Morgan (maco.m)]

Really, 279236 is a duplicate of this, then, isn't it?

[Jean-Paul (jeanpaul145)]

I am running the Intrepid AMD64 rc with all available updates (I really don't know if there's any difference with the final concerning the updates) and I do not have this problem anymore (I do have others concerning flash, but I'll file a separate bug report about that).

[Szymon Życiński (zycinski)]

confirmed .... no sound in interpid on any flash videos site. It is very annoying bug.

[Mackenzie Morgan (maco.m)]

Szymon, if you read and followed what Daniel said above and still have issues, please file a new bug, because you may have a different problem.