Ardour 8.12 no sound

Installation & Configuration Linux
#1

Hi - i’ve been successfully using Ardour 6.9 “After Bach” on my system.

I’m trying to upgrade to Ardour 8.12. So far i have no sound.
using Jack (pipewire) i can see audio playing in the tracks - but i see no activity on the master track.

using ALSA i see audio playing on the tracks and on the master track but we still don’t hear anything.

i’m on Linux Mint 21.3 Cinnamon
using pipewire
Cinnamon Version 6.0.4
Linux Kernel 5.15.0-134-generic
Processor Intel i7-4702MQ CPU @ 2.20GHz x 4

any help would be appreciated.

#2

We need a lot more information to get to the bottom of this. It could be something simple.

A few guesses:

Is master-out connected?

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image438×680 37.5 KB

–

Does perhaps the “feedback” button in the main toolbar blink?

–

Could it be that pipewire still uses the soundcard, so Ardour/ALSA cannot?

While Ardour is running, please open a terminal window and run this command:

 cd /tmp && wget https://community.ardour.org/files/adevices.sh && bash ./adevices.sh

It will not modify your system; it lists all soundcards, their current settings and applications using them, etc. That may shed some light.

#3

thanks for your reply,

i ran that command (while ardour is running) & got this:

adevices.sh 100%[===================>] 2.29K --.-KB/s in 0s

2025-03-24 08:41:35 (735 MB/s) - ‘adevices.sh’ saved [2347/2347]

========================================
Part I: ALSA
Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version k5.15.0-134-generic.

Card 0 (HDMI):

  • Playback Device 3 (HDMI 0):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:HDMI,3,0):
      closed

  • Playback Device 7 (HDMI 1):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:HDMI,7,0):
      closed

  • Playback Device 8 (HDMI 2):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:HDMI,8,0):
      closed

  • Playback Device 9 (HDMI 3):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:HDMI,9,0):
      closed

  • Playback Device 10 (HDMI 4):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:HDMI,10,0):
      closed

Card 1 (PCH):

  • Playback Device 0 (92HD91BXX Analog):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:PCH,0,0):
      used by: pipewire (PID 1942)
      access: MMAP_INTERLEAVED
      format: S32_LE
      subformat: STD
      channels: 2
      rate: 48000 (48000/1)
      period_size: 1024
      buffer_size: 32768

  • Recording Device 0 (92HD91BXX Analog):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:PCH,0,0):
      used by: pipewire (PID 1942)
      access: MMAP_INTERLEAVED
      format: S32_LE
      subformat: STD
      channels: 2
      rate: 48000 (48000/1)
      period_size: 1024
      buffer_size: 32768

========================================
Part II: jack/pipewire
1942 ? S<sl 0:03 /usr/bin/pipewire
1944 ? S<sl 0:02 /usr/bin/pipewire-pulse
jackdmp version 1.9.20 tmpdir /dev/shm protocol 9
pipewire
Compiled with libpipewire 0.3.48
Linked with libpipewire 0.3.48

#4

this was with Ardour connected to Jack (Pipewire)

the relevent sections when Ardour is connected to ALSA are:

Part I: ALSA
Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version k5.15.0-134-generic.

Card 0 (HDMI):

  • Playback Device 3 (HDMI 0):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:HDMI,3,0):
      used by: ArdourGUI (PID 6280)
      access: MMAP_INTERLEAVED
      format: S32_LE
      subformat: STD
      channels: 8
      rate: 48000 (48000/1)
      period_size: 1024
      buffer_size: 2048

  • Playback Device 7 (HDMI 1):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:HDMI,7,0):
      closed

  • Playback Device 8 (HDMI 2):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:HDMI,8,0):
      closed

  • Playback Device 9 (HDMI 3):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:HDMI,9,0):
      closed

  • Playback Device 10 (HDMI 4):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:HDMI,10,0):
      closed

Card 1 (PCH):

  • Playback Device 0 (92HD91BXX Analog):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:PCH,0,0):
      closed

  • Recording Device 0 (92HD91BXX Analog):

    • Subdevice 0 (hw:PCH,0,0):
      used by: ArdourGUI (PID 6280)
      access: MMAP_INTERLEAVED
      format: S32_LE
      subformat: STD
      channels: 2
      rate: 48000 (48000/1)
      period_size: 1024
      buffer_size: 2048

========================================
Part II: jack/pipewire
1942 ? S<sl 0:04 /usr/bin/pipewire
1944 ? S<sl 0:02 /usr/bin/pipewire-pulse
jackdmp version 1.9.20 tmpdir /dev/shm protocol 9
pipewire
Compiled with libpipewire 0.3.48
Linked with libpipewire 0.3.48

#5

master out is connected to Main Out 1 & 2.

the feedback button does not blink.

#6

When you’re using Pipewire it sends the sound to your HDMI device, presumably your monitor.
So unless your monitor has built-in speakers (and the volume is turned up) you won’t hear anything.

If you install qpwgraph you should be able to reroute the audio to your 92HD91BXX Analog device.

Pipewire 0.3.48 is quite old so you should try and get a more recent version, if possible.

#7

The other way around as @peder mentioned.

With Ardour/ALSA output is to HDMI (the monitor), which is likely why you don’t hear anything on the speakers.

with Ardour/ALSA:

Playback Device 3 (HDMI 0):

    Subdevice 0 (hw:HDMI,3,0):
    used by: ArdourGUI (PID 6280)
    access: MMAP_INTERLEAVED

So go to Ardour Menu > Window > Audio/MIDI Setup, and switch the output device to “PCH, Analog” (and then re-connect master-out).

–

And @peder is right. pipewire 0.3.48 is old and will cause issues with Ardour. You need at least version 1.0

#8

thankyou @peder i’ve installed qpwgraph, haven’t yet dealt with it but i understand what you’re getting at. and yes - my version of pipewire is old - i’ll see if i can get a newer version.

#9

thanks Robin, i will try that - and yes - getting to pipewire > 1 is the way to go also.

#10

great, thanks again both of you, connecting to PCH has fixed my not hearing things when using Alsa

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#11

Marvellous - i’ve got my pipewire version up to 1.0.7 - and now sound is working properly with jack(pipewire) as well as with Alsa (with the change of outputs).

i really appreciate the help and i will now get to arpeggiating which is the original reason i wanted to get to Ardour 8

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