Recent Unstable update introduced a lot of changes to alsa which resulted in no audio. Downgrading alsa-lib to 1.2.4-3 restored sound although this is not a simple fix as all the new alsa programs are interdependent, in particular, alsa-lib cannot be downgraded until lib32-alsa-lib has been forcibly removed. After removing this alsa-lib can be downgraded to the working version and then the working version of lib32-alsa-lib (1.2.4-2) can be reinstalled if needed.
However this still leaves 11 updates any one of which will remove audio again by forcing the upgrade of alsa-lib to the broken version.
So I guess nobody else has the same problem as this then. It is still the same for me - upgrade alsa-lib, sound fails - downgrade alsa-lib sound returns. I have now added alsa-lib to the pacman ‘ignore’ list along with the programs that depend on it - lib32-alsa-plugins and lib32-libcanberra and I have a working computer with sound, but it is not a solution I feel comfortable with.
You’re not alone. Since 2 months, i have no sound (pipewire or alsa, same thing). I read plenty of threads on different communities (Ubuntu, Suse, Mint, Fedora,…) and post a thread on the french section of this forum. No results but as i can see, there is a rise of sound problems since one month.
I can listen to my music or videos … But with bluetooth headphones.