Please, Ubuntu, do not embarrass me again!

[Basil Chupin]

I am using Lucid with everything which I normally use working perfectly. 
The main things are multi-media (TV, DVDs, CDs). So, I create the USB 
Starup Disc thinking that it will contain my system settings which will 
allow me to reboot into my system as painlessly as possible in case of 
emergency.

I have a friend whose system (and his wife's) has been hit by 
trojans/virii and I have had to go out to get him out of trouble. I have 
been trying to get him to move to Linux for some time. And he is also 
"into" a bit of multi-media.

So, armed with the USB Startup Disc I go to his place to show him Ubuntu 
and what it can do. Before going I made sure that the USB disc booted 
correctly into Ubuntu. But stupid me.....

The USB booted up on his latest, you beaut computer with everything 
multimedia support for Windows, and he asked me, "What is this 'Samples 
folder"; I opened it up and he then asked me for a  demo of the sound 
file to do with the Aesop's Fable. And this is where the wheels fell off 
:-( . Not a damn of tiniest squeaks came out from the speakers; total 
and utter silence.

OK, I had/have this problem when I installed Ubuntu on my own system but 
I know that there is a fix which I did and which should have been 
included on the USB Startup disc surely....surely? yes? In fact 
absolutely NO.

When it comes to sound, Ubuntu is totally braindead.

Why?

Because of 2 things:

(1) it uses pulseaudio; and

(2) it does not automatically install alsamixergui.

Pulseaudio is a pain in the butt. Ubuntu installs it by default. Even if 
you install alsamixergui afterwards, pulseaudio prevents alsamixer from 
displaying all of its parameters. Only 5 are shown - not the 20+ which 
can be set.

The one which needs to be set to get the sound working is the Analog 
Output Jack with the Soundblaster (card). But this setting is simply not 
available when pulseaudio is installed.

What does one do then? Unistall pulseaudio, run alsamixer, set the Jack 
to be active, and get sound.

But then you need to re-install pulseaudio because you have lost the 
sound icon in your top panel bar. OK, so pulseaudio is back and your 
icon is back in the top panel.

But now what happens? You run alsamixer and you are now back where you 
started: only 5 settings are shown - which are totally useless if you 
want to set any other parameters.

Pulseaudio is a PITA!

Please, Ubuntu, do something in respect of getting sound to work "out of 
the box" for people who install Ubuntu.


BC

-- 

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