it gave me a starting point for the audio but it didn't do much. Here is what happened: First I had to figure out which method my system used so : bmike1@c521 ~ $ sudo dpkg-reconfigure alsa bmike1@c521 ~ $ sudo dpkg-reconfigure pulse bmike1@c521 ~ $ sudo dpkg-reconfigure jack bmike1@c521 ~ $ sudo dpkg-reconfigure jackd all of which gave me a similar error dpkg-query: package 'jackd' is not installed and no information is available Use dpkg --info (= dpkg-deb --info) to examine archive files, and dpkg --contents (= dpkg-deb --contents) to list their contents. /usr/sbin/dpkg-reconfigure: jackd is not installed finally I happened upon: bmike1@c521 ~ $ sudo dpkg-reconfigure pulseaudio Processing triggers for libc-bin (2.19-0ubuntu6.6) ... But that didn't help any. So I suppose I'll look at the man page and see if any of the options help: bmike1@c521 ~ $ man dpkg-reconfigure bmike1@c521 ~ $ sudo dpkg-reconfigure --default-priority pulseaudio Processing triggers for libc-bin (2.19-0ubuntu6.6) ... bmike1@c521 ~ $ sudo dpkg-reconfigure --force pulseaudio Processing triggers for libc-bin (2.19-0ubuntu6.6) ... Nope. Looking at the man pages it seems as if you are supposed to be presented with configuration questions. Hmmmmmm..... I got none of that. On Tue, Dec 22, 2015 at 8:57 PM, Todd Millecam wrote: > The general problem with the Ubuntu graphical frontend is that it's the > absolute end of the chain. If everything up to it is working, then it > works fine. If any link upstream is broken, then it's useless. > > In the case of sound, the general chain goes as follows: > > kernel->pci or usb bus->udev rules -> alsa or pulse -> ubuntu config and > application > > Anything along that chain could be busted. My bet, pulse and alsa are > fighting, which is usually the case. Alsa is a direct link into your sound > card and will accept mathematical wave functions as input and output > sound. Pulseaudio or Jackd is a digital mixer, so it takes all the > applications that wants sound, mixes them together, and then sends the > final waveform up the chain. Check these programs and use those names to > start your troubleshooting/debugging search. > > If you want the easy way to do things, try using the internal > "dpkg-reconfigure" to just reinstall pulse, or jack, or alsa, or whatever > is giving you trouble--kinda hard to know which from a "sound is not > working" statement alone. > > > As for the scanner, that's almost guaranteed to be a udev problem, it's > chain looks about like: > kernel->usb bus->udev rules->sane stack->application > > Hope that gives you a starting point. > > On Tue, Dec 22, 2015 at 6:47 PM, Michael Havens wrote: > >> I wonder what is happening! First the scanner stopped being detected and >> now the sound stopped working. I went to the control center -> sound >> preferences and selected the hardware tab and it says tha there are no >> devices to configure. I then select the output tab and it says it is Dummy >> output. What is going on? >> >> -- >> :-)~MIKE~(-: >> >> --------------------------------------------------- >> PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.phxlinux.org >> To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: >> http://lists.phxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss >> > > > > -- > Todd Millecam > > --------------------------------------------------- > PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.phxlinux.org > To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: > http://lists.phxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss > -- :-)~MIKE~(-: