Ubuntu – How to control Front and Back volume independently with cloned stereo signal

pulseaudiosound

I have my 7.1 soundcard set to stereo and plugged in two stereo thingies (a. my desktop speakers b. my stereo) to the front respectively rear plug. Now I would like to an easy way to mute/volume control them independently – gui if possible.

If I set my soundcard to 4.0, the pulse audio mixer gives me sliders for front and back but the problem is that's the input signal. so if i mute the front there and I'm listening to stereo everything remains silent. But what I'd have liked in that scenario would be the front to be silent and the back playing the full stereo signal.

Is there a way to do that or something similar?

Best Answer

The mixers that ship in Ubuntu are all very flimsey in my opinion but there are a couple of good options that are simple to install.

  1. ALSAMixer is usually the first port of call for telling people how to fix muted channels, etc but it's a fairly robust text-mode mixer. I would suggest this over the GUI alternatives (gnome-alsamixer as one example) because they lack polish and that makes them harder to use.

    If it's not already installed, it's as simple as:

    sudo apt-get install alsamixer
alsamixer

    Alsamixer

  2. padevchooser is another option. It's a lot more than just a mixer - it's a whole suite of tools for managing pulseaudio. Rather than being console-based 

    sudo apt-get install padevchooser
padevchooser

    When it's running you should see a new icon in your Notification Area (near the clock). Click it and select Volume Control. Under Output Devices you should be able to manage the volumes on a per-channel basis.

    padevchooser's volume control

    You might want to add padevchooser to your list of start-up applications (in System -> Preferences)

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