Audio Volume Panel (from tray) never releases microphone

Support KDE Plasma
, ,
1

For some weeks now (after the update with which the volume bars in the Audio Volume Panel started jumping based on input/output), I encounter this annoying problem:

I click on the Audio Volume tray icon to adjust something, light indicator of my webcam is turned on (prob to make the volume illustration), after making the adjustment I click elsewhere since I finished, the webcam indicator still remains turned on while it shouldn’t.

I don’t know if it is a Plasma bug or a webcam driver bug but it drives me nuts. Unfortunately I don’t have the knowledge to investigate what is happening by myself.

Here's the inxi: 
System:
  Kernel: 5.4.105-1-MANJARO x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 10.2.0 
  parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-5.4-x86_64 
  root=UUID=93294a2d-e9ab-4aed-a066-77c048ef7a09 rw quiet apparmor=1 
  security=apparmor udev.log_priority=3 
  Desktop: KDE Plasma 5.21.3 tk: Qt 5.15.2 wm: kwin_x11 vt: 1 dm: SDDM 
  Distro: Manjaro Linux base: Arch Linux 
Machine:
  Type: Desktop Mobo: MSI model: Z97 GAMING 5 (MS-7917) v: 1.0 
  serial: <filter> UEFI: American Megatrends v: 1.13 date: 02/16/2016 
Memory:
  RAM: total: 15.59 GiB used: 7.61 GiB (48.8%) 
  RAM Report: permissions: Unable to run dmidecode. Root privileges required. 
CPU:
  Info: Quad Core model: Intel Core i5-4690K bits: 64 type: MCP arch: Haswell 
  family: 6 model-id: 3C (60) stepping: 3 microcode: 28 cache: L2: 6 MiB 
  bogomips: 28010 
  Speed: 1025 MHz min/max: 800/3900 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 1025 2: 1057 
  3: 1081 4: 1071 
  Flags: abm acpi aes aperfmperf apic arat arch_perfmon avx avx2 bmi1 bmi2 bts 
  clflush cmov constant_tsc cpuid cpuid_fault cx16 cx8 de ds_cpl dtes64 dtherm 
  dts ept ept_ad erms est f16c flexpriority flush_l1d fma fpu fsgsbase fxsr ht 
  ibpb ibrs ida invpcid invpcid_single lahf_lm lm mca mce md_clear mmx monitor 
  movbe msr mtrr nonstop_tsc nopl nx pae pat pbe pcid pclmulqdq pdcm pdpe1gb 
  pebs pge pln pni popcnt pse pse36 pti pts rdrand rdtscp rep_good sdbg sep 
  smep ss ssbd sse sse2 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 stibp syscall tm tm2 tpr_shadow 
  tsc tsc_adjust tsc_deadline_timer vme vmx vnmi vpid x2apic xsave xsaveopt 
  xtopology xtpr 
  Vulnerabilities: Type: itlb_multihit status: KVM: Split huge pages 
  Type: l1tf 
  mitigation: PTE Inversion; VMX: conditional cache flushes, SMT disabled 
  Type: mds mitigation: Clear CPU buffers; SMT disabled 
  Type: meltdown mitigation: PTI 
  Type: spec_store_bypass 
  mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl and seccomp 
  Type: spectre_v1 
  mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization 
  Type: spectre_v2 mitigation: Full generic retpoline, IBPB: conditional, 
  IBRS_FW, STIBP: disabled, RSB filling 
  Type: srbds mitigation: Microcode 
  Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected 
Graphics:
  Device-1: NVIDIA TU116 [GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER] vendor: Gigabyte 
  driver: nvidia v: 460.56 alternate: nouveau,nvidia_drm bus-ID: 01:00.0 
  chip-ID: 10de:21c4 class-ID: 0300 
  Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.10 compositor: kwin_x11 driver: 
  loaded: nvidia display-ID: :0 screens: 1 
  Screen-1: 0 s-res: 3840x1080 s-dpi: 92 s-size: 1060x301mm (41.7x11.9") 
  s-diag: 1102mm (43.4") 
  Monitor-1: HDMI-0 res: 1920x1080 hz: 60 dpi: 102 
  size: 480x270mm (18.9x10.6") diag: 551mm (21.7") 
  Monitor-2: DP-4 res: 1920x1080 dpi: 93 size: 527x296mm (20.7x11.7") 
  diag: 604mm (23.8") 
  OpenGL: renderer: GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER/PCIe/SSE2 v: 4.6.0 NVIDIA 460.56 
  direct render: Yes 
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel 9 Series Family HD Audio vendor: Micro-Star MSI 
  driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 00:1b.0 chip-ID: 8086:8ca0 
  class-ID: 0403 
  Device-2: NVIDIA TU116 High Definition Audio vendor: Gigabyte 
  driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 01:00.1 chip-ID: 10de:1aeb 
  class-ID: 0403 
  Device-3: Microsoft LifeCam HD-3000 type: USB driver: snd-usb-audio,uvcvideo 
  bus-ID: 1-9.4:7 chip-ID: 045e:0779 class-ID: 0102 
  Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.4.105-1-MANJARO running: yes 
  Sound Server-2: JACK v: 1.9.17 running: no 
  Sound Server-3: PulseAudio v: 14.2 running: yes 
  Sound Server-4: PipeWire v: 0.3.23 running: yes 
Network:
  Device-1: Qualcomm Atheros Killer E220x Gigabit Ethernet 
  vendor: Micro-Star MSI driver: alx v: kernel port: d000 bus-ID: 03:00.0 
  chip-ID: 1969:e091 class-ID: 0200 
  IF: enp3s0 state: up speed: 100 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter> 
  IP v4: <filter> type: dynamic noprefixroute scope: global 
  broadcast: <filter> 
  IP v6: <filter> type: noprefixroute scope: link 
  Device-2: Realtek RTL8192CU 802.11n WLAN Adapter type: USB driver: rtl8192cu 
  bus-ID: 1-10:6 chip-ID: 0bda:8178 class-ID: 0000 serial: <filter> 
  IF: wlp0s20u10 state: down mac: <filter> 
  IF-ID-1: docker0 state: down mac: <filter> 
  IP v4: <filter> scope: global broadcast: <filter> 
  WAN IP: <filter> 
Bluetooth:
  Device-1: Cambridge Silicon Radio Bluetooth Dongle (HCI mode) type: USB 
  driver: btusb v: 0.8 bus-ID: 1-5:4 chip-ID: 0a12:0001 class-ID: e001 
  Report: This feature requires one of these tools: hciconfig/bt-adapter 
Logical:
  Message: No LVM data was found. 
RAID:
  Message: No RAID data was found. 
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 2.73 TiB used: 1.38 TiB (50.6%) 
  SMART Message: Required tool smartctl not installed. Check --recommends 
  ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 maj-min: 259:0 vendor: Samsung 
  model: SSD 970 EVO Plus 500GB size: 465.76 GiB block-size: physical: 512 B 
  logical: 512 B speed: 31.6 Gb/s lanes: 4 rotation: SSD serial: <filter> 
  rev: 1B2QEXM7 scheme: GPT 
  ID-2: /dev/sda maj-min: 8:0 vendor: Samsung model: SSD 850 EVO 250GB 
  size: 232.89 GiB block-size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s 
  rotation: SSD serial: <filter> rev: 3B6Q scheme: GPT 
  ID-3: /dev/sdb maj-min: 8:16 vendor: Western Digital model: WD10EZEX-08M2NA0 
  size: 931.51 GiB block-size: physical: 4096 B logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s 
  rotation: 7200 rpm serial: <filter> rev: 1A01 scheme: MBR 
  ID-4: /dev/sdc maj-min: 8:32 vendor: Samsung model: SSD 850 EVO 250GB 
  size: 232.89 GiB block-size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s 
  rotation: SSD serial: <filter> rev: 1B6Q scheme: GPT 
  ID-5: /dev/sdd maj-min: 8:48 type: USB vendor: Western Digital 
  model: WD My Passport 0748 size: 931.48 GiB block-size: physical: 512 B 
  logical: 512 B serial: <filter> rev: 1019 scheme: MBR 
  Message: No Optical or Floppy data was found. 
Partition:
  ID-1: / raw-size: 94.2 GiB size: 92.6 GiB (98.30%) used: 58.57 GiB (63.2%) 
  fs: ext4 dev: /dev/nvme0n1p2 maj-min: 259:2 label: N/A 
  uuid: 93294a2d-e9ab-4aed-a066-77c048ef7a09 
  ID-2: /boot/efi raw-size: 476 MiB size: 475.1 MiB (99.80%) 
  used: 300 KiB (0.1%) fs: vfat dev: /dev/nvme0n1p1 maj-min: 259:1 label: N/A 
  uuid: 6A54-6F12 
  ID-3: /home raw-size: 371.09 GiB size: 364.27 GiB (98.16%) 
  used: 285.15 GiB (78.3%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/nvme0n1p4 maj-min: 259:3 
  label: N/A uuid: dfe7c322-cd24-457f-a1f6-7b82b1dc14a5 
  ID-4: /media/CaviarBlue raw-size: 931.51 GiB size: 931.51 GiB (100.00%) 
  used: 678.85 GiB (72.9%) fs: ntfs dev: /dev/sdb1 maj-min: 8:17 
  label: Caviar Blue uuid: 0EE465CEE465B91B 
  ID-5: /media/WD_External raw-size: 931.48 GiB size: 931.48 GiB (100.00%) 
  used: 390.88 GiB (42.0%) fs: ntfs dev: /dev/sdd1 maj-min: 8:49 
  label: WD_External uuid: AEC8CC32C8CBF69D 
  ID-6: /run/timeshift/backup raw-size: 371.09 GiB size: <superuser required> 
  used: <superuser required> fs: ext4 dev: /dev/nvme0n1p4 maj-min: 259:3 
  label: N/A uuid: dfe7c322-cd24-457f-a1f6-7b82b1dc14a5 
Swap:
  Kernel: swappiness: 60 (default) cache-pressure: 100 (default) 
  ID-1: swap-1 type: file size: 512 MiB used: 12.5 MiB (2.4%) priority: 50 
  file: /var/lib/systemd-swap/swapfc/1 
Unmounted:
  ID-1: /dev/sda1 maj-min: 8:1 size: 128 MiB fs: <superuser required> 
  label: N/A uuid: N/A 
  ID-2: /dev/sda2 maj-min: 8:2 size: 232.76 GiB fs: ntfs label: SSD2 
  uuid: 4036972C36972248 
  ID-3: /dev/sdc1 maj-min: 8:33 size: 529 MiB fs: ntfs label: Recovery 
  uuid: FE462F1B462ED465 
  ID-4: /dev/sdc2 maj-min: 8:34 size: 100 MiB fs: vfat label: N/A 
  uuid: 4230-88A8 
  ID-5: /dev/sdc3 maj-min: 8:35 size: 16 MiB fs: <superuser required> 
  label: N/A uuid: N/A 
  ID-6: /dev/sdc4 maj-min: 8:36 size: 232.25 GiB fs: ntfs label: N/A 
  uuid: 565832D45832B31B 
USB:
  Hub-1: 1-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 14 rev: 2.0 
  speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900 
  Device-1: 1-3:2 info: Corsair K40A Gaming Keyboard type: Keyboard,HID 
  driver: hid-generic,usbhid interfaces: 3 rev: 2.0 speed: 12 Mb/s 
  power: 500mA chip-ID: 1b1c:1b0e class-ID: 0300 
  Device-2: 1-4:3 info: A4Tech F3 V-Track Gaming Mouse type: Keyboard,Mouse 
  driver: hid-generic,usbhid interfaces: 2 rev: 1.1 speed: 12 Mb/s 
  power: 100mA chip-ID: 09da:9066 class-ID: 0301 
  Device-3: 1-5:4 info: Cambridge Silicon Radio Bluetooth Dongle (HCI mode) 
  type: Bluetooth driver: btusb interfaces: 2 rev: 2.0 speed: 12 Mb/s 
  power: 100mA chip-ID: 0a12:0001 class-ID: e001 
  Hub-2: 1-9:5 info: Genesys Logic Hub ports: 4 rev: 2.1 speed: 480 Mb/s 
  chip-ID: 05e3:0610 class-ID: 0900 
  Device-1: 1-9.4:7 info: Microsoft LifeCam HD-3000 type: Video,Audio 
  driver: snd-usb-audio,uvcvideo interfaces: 4 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s 
  power: 500mA chip-ID: 045e:0779 class-ID: 0102 
  Device-2: 1-10:6 info: Realtek RTL8192CU 802.11n WLAN Adapter type: Network 
  driver: rtl8192cu interfaces: 1 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s power: 500mA 
  chip-ID: 0bda:8178 class-ID: 0000 serial: <filter> 
  Hub-3: 2-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 6 rev: 3.0 speed: 5 Gb/s 
  chip-ID: 1d6b:0003 class-ID: 0900 
  Hub-4: 2-1:2 info: Genesys Logic USB3.1 Hub ports: 4 rev: 3.2 speed: 5 Gb/s 
  chip-ID: 05e3:0620 class-ID: 0900 
  Device-1: 2-3:3 info: Western Digital My Passport (WDBKXH WDBY8L) 
  type: Mass Storage driver: usb-storage interfaces: 1 rev: 3.0 speed: 5 Gb/s 
  power: 896mA chip-ID: 1058:0748 class-ID: 0806 serial: <filter> 
  Hub-5: 3-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 2 rev: 2.0 
  speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900 
  Hub-6: 3-1:2 info: Intel ports: 6 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s 
  chip-ID: 8087:8009 class-ID: 0900 
  Hub-7: 4-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 2 rev: 2.0 
  speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900 
  Hub-8: 5-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 2 rev: 2.0 
  speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900 
  Hub-9: 5-1:2 info: Intel Integrated Hub ports: 8 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s 
  chip-ID: 8087:8001 class-ID: 0900 
  Hub-10: 6-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 4 rev: 3.1 
  speed: 10 Gb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0003 class-ID: 0900 
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 29.8 C mobo: 27.8 C gpu: nvidia temp: 48 C 
  Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A gpu: nvidia fan: 0% 
Info:
  Processes: 278 Uptime: 7h 42m wakeups: 0 Init: systemd v: 247 
  tool: systemctl Compilers: gcc: 10.2.0 alt: 8 clang: 11.1.0 Packages: 2001 
  pacman: 1992 lib: 484 flatpak: 0 snap: 9 Shell: Bash v: 5.1.0 
  running-in: konsole inxi: 3.3.03
2

inxi data shows you have 2 active sound servers

  Sound Server-3: PulseAudio v: 14.2 running: yes 
  Sound Server-4: PipeWire v: 0.3.23 running: yes

Pulseaudio and Pipewire do not work well together

You need to choose either:

  • Mask pipewire.socket and stop pipewire.service to continue using PulseAudio

    systemctl --user mask --now pipewire.socket && systemctl --user stop pipewire.service

OR

  • install manjaro-pipewire to get the additional dependency files for Pipewire and remove PulseAudio packages
3

Hm I see. Is there a way I can check how/why both ended up being installed?

I searched “pipewire”, “pipe” and “wire” to find relevant packages with Pipewire in pacman and I have these 2 following results:

$ pacman -Qi libpipewire02 
Name            : libpipewire02
Version         : 0.2.7-1
Description     : User space API to deal with multimedia pipelines (0.2)
Architecture    : x86_64
URL             : https://pipewire.org
Licenses        : LGPL2.1
Groups          : None
Provides        : libpipewire-0.2.so=1-64
Depends On      : alsa-lib  dbus
Optional Deps   : None
Required By     : None
Optional For    : qt5-webengine
Conflicts With  : None
Replaces        : None
Installed Size  : 1568.36 KiB
Packager        : Jan Alexander Steffens (heftig) <jan.steffens@gmail.com>
Build Date      : Κυρ 08 Μαρ 2020 04:25:17 πμ EET
Install Date    : Σαβ 19 Δεκ 2020 07:42:45 μμ EET
Install Reason  : Installed as a dependency for another package
Install Script  : No
Validated By    : Signature
$ pacman -Qi pipewire 
Name            : pipewire
Version         : 1:0.3.23-1
Description     : Low-latency audio/video router and processor
Architecture    : x86_64
URL             : https://pipewire.org
Licenses        : LGPL
Groups          : None
Provides        : libpipewire-0.3.so=0-64
Depends On      : rtkit  alsa-card-profiles  libdbus-1.so=3-64  libncursesw.so=6-64  libsndfile.so=1-64  libudev.so=1-64  libasound.so=2-64
                  libsystemd.so=0-64  libbluetooth.so=3-64  libsbc.so=1-64  libldacBT_enc.so=2-64  libopenaptx.so=0-64  libfdk-aac.so=2-64
Optional Deps   : pipewire-docs: Documentation
                  pipewire-media-session: Default session manager
                  pipewire-alsa: ALSA configuration
                  pipewire-jack: JACK support
                  pipewire-pulse: PulseAudio replacement
                  gst-plugin-pipewire: GStreamer support
Required By     : kwin  xdg-desktop-portal
Optional For    : None
Conflicts With  : None
Replaces        : None
Installed Size  : 5.49 MiB
Packager        : Jan Alexander Steffens (heftig) <heftig@archlinux.org>
Build Date      : Πεμ 04 Μαρ 2021 08:47:35 μμ EET
Install Date    : Σαβ 20 Μαρ 2021 05:44:00 μμ EET
Install Reason  : Installed as a dependency for another package
Install Script  : Yes
Validated By    : Signature

I guess the more noob-friendly choice is to choose Pulseaudio. Given the above 2 results I included, is it safe to mask the pipewire socket etc.? If I am gonna do that, then why not uninstall pipewire packages altogether? Is there a difference between “throwing a package into a coma” and uninstalling it?

Thanks for your response btw.

UPDATE: I just re-checked the steps of my issue, and the mic deactivated normally. It’s weird since it’s the first time it didn’t stay activated, and I have dozens of consistent examples of it staying up. No updates/changes are done since yesterday.

UPDATE 2: Again today (next day to the above), the problematic behavior returned.

4

Btw as seen in the package details I included above, and verified in this thread here,

pipewire probably isn’t something that I should uninstall just like that. And this gives me second thoughts on whether I should even disable the service at all.

5

Uninstalling Pipewire is not an option for KDE. Only the systemd service can be turned off

Conversely, uninstalling all PulseAudio packages is required by pipewire-pulse
One of the packages included in metapackage manjaro-pipewire

pamac info manjaro-pipewire 
Name                  : manjaro-pipewire
Version               : 20210109-1
Description           : Meta package for pipewire support.
URL                   : www.manjaro.org
Licences              : GPL
Repository            : community
Depends On            : pipewire pipewire-alsa pipewire-pulse pipewire-jack
                        wireplumber
Packager              : Stefano Capitani <stefano@manjaro.org>
Build Date            : 09/01/21
Signatures            : Yes
pamac info pipewire-pulse 
Name                  : pipewire-pulse
Version               : 1:0.3.23-1
Description           : Low-latency audio/video router and processor -
                        PulseAudio replacement
URL                   : https://pipewire.org
Licences              : LGPL
Repository            : extra
Depends On            : pipewire-media-session libpulse
Make Dependencies     : git meson doxygen graphviz xmltoman valgrind libpulse
                        alsa-lib gst-plugins-base rtkit dbus sdl2 ncurses
                        libsndfile bluez-libs sbc libldac libopenaptx
                        libfdk-aac
Check Dependencies    : desktop-file-utils
Provides              : pulseaudio pulseaudio-bluetooth
Conflicts With        : pulseaudio pulseaudio-bluetooth
Packager              : Jan Alexander Steffens (heftig) <heftig@archlinux.org>
Build Date            : 04/03/21
Signatures            : Yes

You can see how installing manjaro-pipewire works out in these discussions
Failed update due to conflicting packages "pipewire-pulse" and "pulseaudio"
What is the correct way to install package “manjaro-pipewire”?

6

Sorry for the late answer.

In the meantime, I moved from kernel 5.4 to 5.9 for other reasons and since then I think I haven’t encountered this issue (although not enough time has passed I think).

Also having read your links (among other things), it seems that pipewire is the future so I guess sometime I’ll have to change to it. For the time being I’ll stick to pulseaudio as I’d like to look into the transition a bit better, with regard to apps, jack etc.

Ftr, I tried the pipewire service masking that you suggested and the result is

Failed to connect to bus: $DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS and $XDG_RUNTIME_DIR not defined (consider using --machine=<user>@.host --user to connect to bus of other user)

In any case, I won’t pursue a solution for now (at least not until I see the problem return as often as it did). Thanks for your help, if anything, I learned some things about pipewire :stuck_out_tongue:

7