PulseAudio

A sound server for Linux

PavuControl

GUI for pulseaudio

Install

sudo apt install pavucontrol

PulseControl

CLI for pulseaudio

# list all device
pactl list sinks
# view device volume
pactl get-sink-volume <sink id>
# set device volume
pactl set-sink-volume <sink id>

Commands

Show audio devices

pacmd list

Set a card to a2dp_sink

pacmd set-card-profile <card_name> a2dp_sink

e.g. to get the card name of a bluetooth headphone

pacmd list | grep bluez_card

Restart pulseaudio process

systemctl --user restart pulseaudio

Kill pulseaudio process

pulseaudio -k

Start pulseaudio process

pulseaudio --start

Troubleshooting

General

Something's wrong e.g. no input device detected

rm  ~/.config/pulse/*
pulseaudio -k
pulseaudio --start

https://askubuntu.com/a/882222

Failure: Module initialization failed

Failure: Module initialization failed when running

sudo pactl load-module module-bluetooth-discover

Solution

sudo apt install bluetooth pulseaudio-module-bluetooth

https://askubuntu.com/a/1121417

Video conferencing app can't use microphone

First, check if your microphone is functioning (e.g. check it in the input devices in pavucontrol). If it is indeed functioning, you probably restarted pulseaudio after your app / browser was started. In this case, your microphone can't be used by them.

Solution

Kill your app / browser and start again

See https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?pid=1907275#p1907275