sound stops working with pulseaudio

[Herb McNew]

Binary package hint: pulseaudio

From /var/log messages:

Oct 6 09:47:35 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 4 events suppressed
Oct 6 09:54:50 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 2 events suppressed
Oct 6 09:55:56 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 5 events suppressed
Oct 6 09:56:16 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 3 events suppressed
Oct 6 09:56:37 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 4 events suppressed
Oct 6 09:58:23 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 4 events suppressed
Oct 6 09:58:29 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 5 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:00:54 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 1 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:02:43 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 1 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:02:56 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 2 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:04:03 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 9 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:07:29 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 2 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:09:12 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 1 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:13:11 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 4 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:16:08 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 1 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:31:32 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 104 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:32:19 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 96 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:32:27 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 97 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:32:36 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 93 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:32:54 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 106 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:33:00 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 90 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:33:20 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 92 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:33:33 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 90 events suppressed
Oct 6 10:33:40 bagheera pulseaudio[1590]: ratelimit.c: 97 events suppressed

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: i386
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/pcmC0D0p: herb 1590 F...m pulseaudio
 /dev/snd/controlC0: herb 1590 F.... pulseaudio
Card0.Amixer.info:
 Card hw:0 'Intel'/'HDA Intel at 0x90400000 irq 22'
   Mixer name : 'SigmaTel STAC9221 A1'
   Components : 'HDA:83847680,106b0200,00103401'
   Controls : 20
   Simple ctrls : 12
Date: Tue Oct 6 17:56:09 2009
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.10
Package: pulseaudio 1:0.9.18-0ubuntu3
ProcEnviron:
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.31-11.38-generic
SourcePackage: pulseaudio
Uname: Linux 2.6.31-11-generic i686

[FKtPp (m-pupil)]

Jan 17 20:48:01 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 103 events suppressed
Jan 17 21:00:13 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 104 events suppressed
Jan 17 21:12:14 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 95 events suppressed
Jan 17 21:13:05 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 95 events suppressed
Jan 17 21:17:53 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 96 events suppressed
Jan 17 21:26:58 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 90 events suppressed
Jan 17 21:42:47 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 97 events suppressed
Jan 17 22:36:59 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 94 events suppressed
Jan 17 22:38:27 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 96 events suppressed
Jan 17 23:48:50 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 97 events suppressed
Jan 17 23:58:52 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 97 events suppressed
Jan 17 23:59:33 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 100 events suppressed
Jan 18 00:02:24 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 96 events suppressed
Jan 18 00:22:25 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 102 events suppressed
Jan 18 00:57:39 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 111 events suppressed
Jan 18 01:04:44 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1987]: ratelimit.c: 100 events suppressed
Jan 18 19:02:24 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: module-x11-xsmp.c: X11 session manager not running.
Jan 18 19:02:24 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: module.c: Failed to load module "module-x11-xsmp" (argument: ""): initialization failed.
Jan 18 19:11:36 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 85 events suppressed
Jan 18 19:13:59 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 81 events suppressed
Jan 18 19:27:12 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 88 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:13:02 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 83 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:14:55 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 96 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:15:58 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 90 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:18:26 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 86 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:18:33 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 79 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:18:46 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 82 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:19:03 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 80 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:19:21 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 79 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:19:29 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 81 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:19:36 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 75 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:19:43 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 72 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:20:20 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 74 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:20:30 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 89 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:20:38 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 84 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:21:01 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 84 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:21:23 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 82 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:21:35 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[1972]: ratelimit.c: 77 events suppressed
Jan 18 21:21:47 fktpp-laptop pulseaudio[19...

[FKtPp (m-pupil)]

fktpp@fktpp-laptop:~$ dpkg -l | fgrep pulseaudio
ii gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio 0.10.16-1ubuntu3 GStreamer plugin for PulseAudio
ii pulseaudio 1:0.9.19-0ubuntu4 PulseAudio sound server
ii pulseaudio-esound-compat 1:0.9.19-0ubuntu4 PulseAudio ESD compatibility layer
ii pulseaudio-module-bluetooth 1:0.9.19-0ubuntu4 Bluetooth module for PulseAudio sound server
ii pulseaudio-module-gconf 1:0.9.19-0ubuntu4 GConf module for PulseAudio sound server
ii pulseaudio-module-udev 1:0.9.19-0ubuntu4 udev device detection module for PulseAudio sound server
ii pulseaudio-module-x11 1:0.9.19-0ubuntu4 X11 module for PulseAudio sound server
ii pulseaudio-utils 1:0.9.19-0ubuntu4 Command line tools for the PulseAudio sound server

[mikewhatever (mikewhatever)]

This bug affects me too on a Dell mini 10. The sound stops working a couple of hours after startup, and user.log is full of 'ratelimit.c: XX events suppressed'.
The hardware in question is as follows:

aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: MID [HDA Intel MID], device 0: ALC269 Analog [ALC269 Analog]
  Subdevices: 0/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: MID [HDA Intel MID], device 3: INTEL HDMI 0 [INTEL HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

[Daniel T Chen (crimsun)]

Can you reproduce this symptom in current lucid?

[Murz (murznn)]

Same problem on Karmic AMD64 & ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 Azalia (Intel HDA) and 5.1 surround sound.
After some time I got the problem, described in this bug. For example, boot, open VLC player, play movie. And sometimes after 20-180 minutes the sound goes off and I see only short clicks from the speakers and "ratelimit.c: xx events suppressed" messages. When I pause video, clicks goes away, when play again - clicks returns!

 try to upgrade pulseaudio from ubuntu-audiodev ppa, but the problem stay here.
Also try newer alsa (to 1.0.22.1+dfsg-0ubuntu2~ricotz1 from ppa) and pulseaudio (1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8478-0ubuntu1~ricotz1) from another PPA, but it isn't solve the problem for me too.

Daniel T Chen, can I safely upgrade to lucid (full system or some packages), test this and rollback to karmic?

[Murz (murznn)]

Add: If I close vlc, run "pulseaudio -k" and open again, I see the normal sound for some time!

[David Henningsson (diwic)]

Murz, the recommended way is to try a Lucid live-cd or similar. AFAIK you can't easily rollback to Karmic if you have upgraded to Lucid.

[Jose (jmbalado)]

I can confirm the same bug on Lucid amd64

[Bruce Edge (bruce-edge)]

Confirmed on lucid beta 1 386 with:

tv@tv:~$ aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 0: VT1708B Analog [VT1708B Analog]
  Subdevices: 2/2
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
  Subdevice #1: subdevice #1
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 1: VT1708B Digital [VT1708B Digital]
  Subdevices: 0/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 3: NVIDIA HDMI [NVIDIA HDMI]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

Mar 21 09:47:34 tv pulseaudio[1188]: ratelimit.c: 7026 events suppressed
Mar 21 09:47:39 tv pulseaudio[1188]: ratelimit.c: 6751 events suppressed
Mar 21 09:47:44 tv pulseaudio[1188]: ratelimit.c: 6625 events suppressed
Mar 21 09:47:49 tv pulseaudio[1188]: ratelimit.c: 6682 events suppressed
Mar 21 10:05:05 tv pulseaudio[1188]: ratelimit.c: 5035 events suppressed
.....

[Mikael Nilsson (mini)]

Confirmed on uptodate lucid system.

$ uname -r
2.6.32-16-generic

card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: STAC92xx Analog [STAC92xx Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

The message comes reproducibly every time Skype sounds a chat message notfication. The notification sound stutters, though listening to music works ok.

This is a regression from Karmic, where I never had this issue.

[bnight (bnight)]

Same bug here on Ubuntu 9.10 AMD64

uname -r
2.6.31-20-generic

Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 03)

The pulseaudio -k

Seams to fix the issue for some time.

But i really don`t think this is ok.

Have no problems with 8.10 before.

So this is a regression from Karmic.

[EricDHH (ericdhh)]

2.6.31-21-generic
00:14.2 Audio device: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 Azalia (Intel HDA)

Apr 8 18:03:23 agamemnon pulseaudio[2156]: ratelimit.c: 12 events suppressed
Apr 8 18:03:28 agamemnon pulseaudio[2156]: ratelimit.c: 4 events suppressed
Apr 8 18:03:34 agamemnon pulseaudio[2156]: ratelimit.c: 13 events suppressed
Apr 8 18:03:39 agamemnon pulseaudio[2156]: ratelimit.c: 6 events suppressed
Apr 8 18:03:47 agamemnon pulseaudio[2156]: ratelimit.c: 9 events suppressed

The harddisc is crackling down the log all the time when music is playing, never seen so fat logfiles before. Running amd64 9.10 here. This is very annoying, players suddenly stop and hang while pulse goes to undefined waitstait. Stoppin and restart pulse will fix this for some minutes. Seems that pulse need more prio or realtime scheduling.

[henry (hzmisc)]

+1!

over 400 entries in the last two weeks.

Also Ekiga can't open sound device. Rhythmbox is still playing ok.
I'm not using ALSA anywhere to my knowledge, changed everything to Pulse.

Can this be so difficult to solve?

Cheers,
henry

[Daniel Convissor (convissor)]

Pulseaudio started working for me when I upgraded from Karmic/9.10 to Lucid/10.04.

[Peter B P (peterbp)]

I'll add that since upgradign to 10.04, my soudn problems have been reduced substantially, HOWEVER - I still regularly experience "crunchy sound", plus i still get the system log spam with blah blah blah ratelimit.c X event supressed fx. during movie playback.

[Bill (hudacek)]

Here too, on a W500, 32-bit with PAE, Lucid.

/home/bgh > aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: CONEXANT Analog [CONEXANT Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 1: Conexant Digital [Conexant Digital]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

/var/log > dpkg -l | grep -i pulseaudio
ii gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio 0.10.21-1ubuntu2 GStreamer plugin for PulseAudio
ii libcanberra-pulse 0.22-1ubuntu2 PulseAudio backend for libcanberra
ii libpulse-browse0 1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8 PulseAudio client libraries (zeroconf support)
ii libpulse-dev 1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8 PulseAudio client development headers and libraries
ii libpulse-mainloop-glib0 1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8 PulseAudio client libraries (glib support)
ii libpulse0 1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8 PulseAudio client libraries
ii libsdl1.2debian-pulseaudio 1.2.14-4ubuntu1 Simple DirectMedia Layer (with X11 and PulseAudio options)
ii libsox-fmt-pulse 14.3.0-1.1build1 SoX PulseAudio format I/O library
ii padevchooser 0.9.3-2ubuntu4 PulseAudio Device Chooser
ii paman 0.9.4-1ubuntu2 PulseAudio Manager
ii paprefs 0.9.9-2ubuntu1 PulseAudio Preferences
ii pavucontrol 0.9.9-1 PulseAudio Volume Control
ii pavumeter 0.9.3-1ubuntu1 PulseAudio Volume Meter
ii pulseaudio 1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8 PulseAudio sound server
ii pulseaudio-esound-compat 1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8 PulseAudio ESD compatibility layer
ii pulseaudio-module-bluetooth 1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8 Bluetooth module for PulseAudio sound server
ii pulseaudio-module-gconf 1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8 GConf module for PulseAudio sound server
ii pulseaudio-module-x11 1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8 X11 module for PulseAudio sound server
ii pulseaudio-module-zeroconf 1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8 Zeroconf module for PulseAudio sound server
ii pulseaudio-utils 1:0.9.22~0.9.21+stable-queue-32-g8 Command line tools for the PulseAudio sound server
ii vlc-plugin-pulse 1.0.6-1ubuntu1.1 PulseAudio plugin for VLC
ii xmms2-plugin-pulse 0.7DrNo-4ubuntu1 XMMS2 - PulseAudio output plug-in

Just a taste of the high rates I'm seeing:

Jun 13 20:06:58 wall-e pulseaudio[16000]: ratelimit.c: 461 events suppressed
Jun 13 20:22:47 wall-e pulseaudio[16000]: ratelimit.c: 404 events suppressed
Jun 13 20:48:16 wall-e pulseaudio[16000]: ratelimit.c: 397 events suppressed
Jun 13 20:48:43 wall-e pulseaudio[16000]: ratelimit.c: 394 events suppressed
Jun 13 20:48:56 wall-e pulseaudio[16000]: ...

[Jeremy Foshee (jeremyfoshee)]

Herb,
  Has there been any change for you with updates?

Thanks!

~JFo

[Herb McNew (herb)]

> Herb,
> Has there been any change for you with updates?

I haven't been using that box with 10.04 recently. I'll start it up in the
next day or two and see how it does.

Regards,
Herb

[Dmitry V. Irtegov (dmitry-irtegov)]

I have similar problem on 2.6.32-23-generic #37-Ubuntu SMP Fri Jun 11 08:03:28 UTC 2010 x86_64 GNU/Linux
Audio 00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 03)

Sound seems to be working (at least, Rhytmbox, Flash player and system sounds) but it spam /var/log/messages with the messages like:
pulseaudio[1420]: ratelimit.c: 3 events suppressed

Do not have this problem on 8.04 on same hardware.

[Andreas Wettergren (murpe79)]

I'm also experiencing these problems, not sure exactly when they started. With Lucid the symptoms seem to have improved, but i still get stutters from time to time.

I'm running the following:
Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801H (ICH8 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 03)
 Subsystem: CLEVO/KAPOK Computer Device 0721

2.6.32-24-generic #38-Ubuntu SMP x86_64

At first i thougth there was an IRQ-conflict, but the soundcard IRQ is not shared with any other device.
One of the latest kernel upgrades seems to have improved things a bit over the inital Lucid release, it's still there but occurs less often.

On a side note i sometimes get slight "freezes" where the system becomes unresponsive for a short time. Usually i can "unfreeze" it by moving the mouse or pressing a key. This is why i first suspected an irq-problem, since the input would trigger an interrupt. Just curious if anyone else suffering from the stuttering sound issues have similar freezes or if they are totaly unrelated.

It's still a little eraly to tell if the latest kernel upgrade (i did it yesterday) removes the freezes, sound issues are still there.

[Andreas Wettergren (murpe79)]

Disregard my comments above, it seems like my problem is slightly different. I downgraded to 2.6.31-14-generic from karmic and now have a lot less trouble. There is still a glitch now and then, and i still get similar log messages when e.g. watching a movie. However the whole system is now a lot more stable, no freezes and audio/video is useable again. I tried a lot of different (official and unofficial) kernels from lucid/maverick, but none of them performs as well as this one.

PS I'm curious what 2.6.36 might bring, i peeked at LKML and there seems to be lots of changes for hda-intel. Crossing my fingers for a final fix.

[Roger (r-wiberg)]

Unfortunately, this affects the RC of Maverick/Ubuntu 10.10 as well. I've been able to go for an hour or so, at the most, before sound goes completely haywire and my logs are filled with "ratelimit.c" and "suppressed" messages from pulseaudio. Pulseaudio worked flawlessly on 10.04.

The RC is due tomorrow, I believe. Can something be done in time for final release?

My kernel: 2.6.35-22-generic #33-Ubuntu SMP Sun Sep 19 20:32:27 UTC 2010 x86_64 GNU/Linux
My sound card:
 description: Audio device
       product: 82801JI (ICH10 Family) HD Audio Controller
       vendor: Intel Corporation
       physical id: 1b
       bus info: pci@0000:00:1b.0
       version: 00
       width: 64 bits
       clock: 33MHz
       capabilities: pm msi pciexpress bus_master cap_list
       configuration: driver=HDA Intel latency=0
       resources: irq:75 memory:f7ff8000-f7ffbfff

[GoncaloP (goncalop)]

I can confirm this bug in Maverick. I'm getting quite some "pulseaudio[1894]: ratelimit.c: 452 events suppressed" lines in /var/log/user.log

I can supply some more info, but dunno if it's any help, with all the logs above.
Just for the record, my soundboard is recognized as an HDA Intel - Nvidia MCP77/78 HDMI, using laptop.

[Bouazza (white-spirit92)]

Hello !

I can confirm this too on Maverick . Moreover, the mouse and the keyboard act very slowly when these slow downs take place, and once I move the mouse for nearly 5~10 seconds, I get normal sound again . It's really annoying because I have to move the cursor everytime I see these slow downs .

Nearly the same logs as above with the "ratelimit.c" thing .

This bug acts randomly, and I don't know how to exactly reproduce it .

I don't have this issue with the Lucid Lynx LiveCD ( or I'm just too lucky because it's a random issue ... ) .

[Ludovic (draco91)]

Hi

Same problem here with the sound lagging after a while and the following appearing many times in messages:
ratelimit.c: 19 events suppressed

Started with an old install when using it on a new computer, and also occurs on a fresh maverick install.

# aplay -l
**** Liste des PLAYBACK périphériques ****
carte 0: Intel [HDA Intel], périphérique 0 : ALC889 Analog [ALC889 Analog]
  Sous-périphériques: 0/1
  Sous-périphérique: #0: subdevice #0
carte 0: Intel [HDA Intel], périphérique 1 : ALC889 Digital [ALC889 Digital]
  Sous-périphériques: 1/1
  Sous-périphérique: #0: subdevice #0

# lspci | grep Audio
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801JI (ICH10 Family) HD Audio Controller

# uname -a
Linux interlope 2.6.35-22-generic #35-Ubuntu SMP Sat Oct 16 20:45:36 UTC 2010 x86_64 GNU/Linux

[Jarle Thorsen (jarlethorsen)]

I have exactly the same hardware and kernel as Ludovic, and I'm also seeing the same bug.

[Richard Moore (richard-darton-moore)]

I have these messages also. My sound output is working OK but I cannot get a response from the mic in my Logitech Quickcam E3500. It was working up until about one week ago. During this time there have been two kernel upgrades I think. My current kernel is 2.6.25-23-generic and I have a Pentium 4.

[buntunub (mckisick)]

This bug also hit me on Kubuntu Lucid 64bit pretty hard, like ever since release kinda hard. I have dealt with it in the past by sudo apt-get remove --purge pulseaudio, but I would really like to fix this. I reinstalled pulse and double checked the setup with Phonon and all should be working well, but no. Scratchy sounds and eventually I get the overflowing logs with ratelimit.c overflows.

[johnnyb0y (ubuntu64)]

Sam problem here with Ubuntu 10.04 LTS and a Soundblaster Audigy card. This problem has been around for a while, and I normally tend to rid myself of pulseaudio and install esound instead. However, this causes problems due to linking with other required apps, so when you choose to uninstall pulseaudio, it complains about several other dependencies. I just ignore it and install esound anyway as my sound just works...

I recently rebuilt my system which was running 10.10, and installed 10.04 instead. As per usual, the ratelimit msgs started populating the syslog and I was getting all the old crackling noises as well. Going to install esound again now. I'm amazed at 2 things:

1) Why is pulseaudio set to the default when it still doesn't work properly? And I reiterate that there are several dependencies which deter people from uninstalling it.

2) That it's taken so long and it's still not fixed?

Current kernel: Linux vanpersie 2.6.32-27-generic #49-Ubuntu SMP Wed Dec 1 23:52:12 UTC 2010 i686 GNU/Linux

Soundcard is: 00:0c.0 Multimedia audio controller: Creative Labs SB0400 Audigy2 Value

Regards

John Goodwin

[Till Klampaeckel (till-php)]

I'm on 10.04 (lucid, LTS) and pulseaudio broke after yesterday's update. Broke in this case means that sound is completely gone - no device is recognized anymore.

This is the update I did (/var/log/apt/history.log):

Start-Date: 2011-03-02 11:49:56
Install: linux-headers-2.6.32-29-generic (2.6.32-29.58), linux-headers-2.6.32-29 (2.6.32-29.58), linux-image-2.6.32-29-generic (2.6.32-29.58)
Upgrade: linux-generic (2.6.32.28.32, 2.6.32.29.35), linux-headers-generic (2.6.32.28.32, 2.6.32.29.35), linux-image-generic (2.6.32.28.32, 2.6.32.29.35), linux-libc-dev (2.6.32-28.55, 2.6.32-29.58)
End-Date: 2011-03-02 11:51:23

And since then syslog states:
Mar 3 11:04:15 till-laptop pulseaudio[1328]: module-alsa-card.c: Failed to find a working profile.
Mar 3 11:04:15 till-laptop pulseaudio[1328]: module.c: Failed to load module "module-alsa-card" (argument: "device_id="29" name="platform-thinkpad_acpi" card_name="alsa_card.platform-thinkpad_acpi" tsched=yes ignore_dB=no card_properties="module-udev-detect.discovered=1""): initialization failed.

[Unc0nn3ct3d (netflow)]

Can confirm this bug is still going strong in 10.10 on the 2.6.35-28-generic kernel. Sound will work immediately after booting up and last for a max 30-40 minutes before dying out unexpectantly and refusing to work again until the system is rebooted. Restarting Xserver has no effect

card 0: Generic [HD-Audio Generic], device 3: ATI HDMI [ATI HDMI]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: SB [HDA ATI SB], device 0: HDA Generic [HDA Generic]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

May 3 07:42:55 vera pulseaudio[1556]: ratelimit.c: 1131 events suppressed
May 3 09:41:34 vera pulseaudio[1569]: ratelimit.c: 17 events suppressed
May 3 17:21:51 vera pulseaudio[1567]: ratelimit.c: 2 events suppressed
May 3 20:51:04 vera pulseaudio[1562]: ratelimit.c: 10 events suppressed
May 4 11:39:21 vera pulseaudio[1532]: ratelimit.c: 11240 events suppressed
May 4 11:50:39 vera pulseaudio[1532]: ratelimit.c: 373 events suppressed
May 4 11:55:12 vera pulseaudio[1532]: ratelimit.c: 615 events suppressed

[Unc0nn3ct3d (netflow)]

Interestingly enough I was able to watch videos and have audio for over 2 hours yesterday without interruption when I was running off battery power. When I am plugged in I will get 7 minutes tops before it cuts out, without fail, but on battery power the problem seemingly disappears

[Christian Dannie Storgaard (cybolic)]

My sound card supports surround and I've noticed that if I switch the output to that and back to stereo, the problem disappears for a while (making me think it's a buffer issue). It also works with switching to the sound card's digital output, but causes an audible pause in sound.

To do this for me when the sound starts crackling, I've added a launcher to Unity that simply has this as its Exec line:
sh -c "pactl set-card-profile 'alsa_card.pci-0000_00_14.2' 'output:analog-surround-40' ; pactl set-card-profile 'alsa_card.pci-0000_00_14.2' 'output:analog-stereo'"

This of course only works on my computer due to the PCI address, but the concept should work in general.

[Brad Figg (brad-figg)]

This bug was filed against a series that is no longer supported and so is being marked as Won't Fix. If this issue still exists in a supported series, please file a new bug.

This change has been made by an automated script, maintained by the Ubuntu Kernel Team.

[Janus (reslayer-mail)]

$ aplay -l
**** Список PLAYBACK устройств ****
карта 0: SB [HDA ATI SB], устройство 0: AD198x Analog [AD198x Analog]
  Подустройства: 0/1
  Подустройство №0: subdevice #0