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Normally, the audio works properly in Linux Mint. Immediately: out of the box and flawlessly.
But not for some computers; there are number of possible reasons for that. Here I will treat some of the most common causes.
Contents of this page:
- 1. Remove speed-dispatcher
- 2. Sandboxing application Firejail blocks sound
- 3. Two active sound cards
- 4. The volume is not right / not all sound channels are working
- 5. Brand-new modern sound card
- 6. Want more tips?
Remove speed-dispatcher
1. Your Mint system might contain a package called speech-dispatcher. This ensures that text-to-speech output becomes actual speech hearable in the speakers. It's mainly useful when you use a screen reader, for example because you're visually handicapped.But speech-dispatcher is known to create sound issues in some cases. When you have no use for a screen reader, it's therefore best to remove speech-dispatcher. Like this:
a. Launch a terminal window.
(You can launch a terminal window like this: *Click*)
b. Copy/paste the following command line into the terminal, in order to avoid typing errors:
sudo apt-get remove speech-dispatcher
Press Enter. Type your password when prompted. In Ubuntu this remains entirely invisible, not even dots will show when you type it, that's normal. In Mint this has changed: you'll see asterisks when you type. Press Enter again.
c. Reboot your computer. Then test your sound.
Sandboxing application Firejail blocks sound
2. If you've installed the sandboxing application Firejail, this may block your sound. Fix it like this (item 4).Two active sound cards
3. Sometimes there are two active sound cards in a computer: one on the motherboard (a so-called on-board card) and a separate PCI sound card. Or a built-in old-fashioned phone modem: that has its own sound chip, for making calling sounds.In certain rare cases, Linux Mint has a problem with the presence of multiple active sound cards. Then it's therefore best, to have only one active sound card.
Solution: disable the on-board card (and / or the phone modem) in the BIOS. After you reboot your computer, the sound will come entirely through the PCI card.
If you can't find the disabling option of the on-board sound card (and / or the phone modem) in the BIOS, search the support section of the website of your motherboard builder (or laptop builder) for the manual for your motherboard.
The volume is not right / not all sound channels are working
4. The volume may not be right, or too few sound channels are opened.a. Install pavucontrol by means of the application Software Manager.
b. Now launch pavucontrol and check the position of the sound channel sliders.
Note: don't put any slider higher than 90% (risk of distortion).
Tip: It may be that the firmware of the soundcard is flawed, so that the slider for the master volume is under a different channel label than usual. Experiment a bit with combinations of open channels....
Brand-new modern sound card
5. You have a brand new modern sound card model, and it has no driver. For brand new models, it's probably best that you wait until a new version of Linux Mint is released. The sound card will then probably work out of the box.Every six months there's a new version of Linux Mint, each time with a new Linux kernel. The drivers for hardware, are embedded in the kernel.
Want more tips?
6. Do you want more tips and tweaks? There's a lot more of them on this website!For example:
Speed up your Linux Mint!
Clean your Linux Mint safely
Avoid 10 fatal mistakes
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