No sound Ubuntu 10.10 (have SB Live! card)

Question

I am new to Linux/Ubuntu and I just installed 10.10 on my Dell Desktop PC that was running Windows XP. The PC is about 5-6 years old and the sound card it has is a SoundBlaster Live! card. The Sound Preferences recognizes the card as [SB Live! Value] EMU10k1X. It is currently set to Analog Stereo Duplex.

I tried multiple other sound configurations and nothing works. No sound but some clicks come out of the speakers. I ran the system test and during the audio tests the same thing happened, just clicks and pops.

I tried to play some music with Rhythmbox and when it tries to play a track it tries for several seconds and then just closes itself, or sometimes just doesn't play.

I ran a check for drivers, but the only driver it found to install was for my nVidia video card. It did not show any drivers for the sound card.

Does anyone have any idea what I need to do to get the sound to work?

Answer 1

It's usually the same old/same old. Pulseaudio is a pain in the butt to get working properly when it goes wrong.

Try following this and see if you then get it working: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=776739

Answer 2

Sound Blaster support in Linux is very poor. Go through these sites and check if your sound card is supported. Many require custom compiled drivers.

Creative Labs Site (Linux support)

Alsa supported cards list

Answer 3

Make sure that your sound mixer is not set to mute the speakers. Make sure that the relevant devices in /dev have the right permissions -- executable by everyone. Check that dmesg detects the right card. Finally, check which sound device your player thinks it is using.