I’m a new NixOS user and have a fresh install of NixOS 24.11 on my laptop. There’s no sound from the speaker when playing an audio file or a video on the browser.
Here are some outputs that I’ve seen people post for this issue:
● pipewire.service - PipeWire Multimedia Service
Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/user/pipewire.service; linked-runtime; preset: ignored)
Drop-In: /nix/store/j480c1vimigz5xgqbqm940lfmfcgpilc-user-units/pipewire.service.d
└─overrides.conf
Active: active (running) since Fri 2025-03-21 17:01:33 PDT; 1h 59min ago
Invocation: e277fbaeb6af4afdab8278bc222a7ab5
TriggeredBy: ● pipewire.socket
Main PID: 2600 (pipewire)
Tasks: 4 (limit: 18187)
Memory: 6.7M (peak: 8.7M)
CPU: 3.351s
CGroup: /user.slice/user-1000.slice/user@1000.service/session.slice/pipewire.service
└─2600 /nix/store/vmj55f4sc24mhzag9dxq40dkxaq1v83y-pipewire-1.2.7/bin/pipewire
Mar 21 17:01:33 nixos systemd[2031]: Started PipeWire Multimedia Service.
Mar 21 17:18:54 nixos pipewire[2600]: pw.node: (alsa_output.pci-0000_07_00.6.HiFi__Speaker__sink-61) graph xrun not-triggered (0 suppressed)
Mar 21 17:18:54 nixos pipewire[2600]: pw.node: (alsa_output.pci-0000_07_00.6.HiFi__Speaker__sink-61) xrun state:0x7fbbcc131008 pending:1/1 s:1072272078780 a:1072272434788 f:10722724>
The audio secion of the /etc/nixos/configuration.nix file:
# Enable sound with pipewire.
hardware.pulseaudio.enable = false;
security.rtkit.enable = true;
services.pipewire = {
enable = true;
alsa.enable = true;
alsa.support32Bit = true;
pulse.enable = true;
# If you want to use JACK applications, uncomment this
jack.enable = true;
# use the example session manager (no others are packaged yet so this is enabled by default,
# no need to redefine it in your config for now)
#media-session.enable = true;
};
Please let me know if any other information would be helpful.
I’ve installed pavucontrol and all audio packages that I could think of, but there’s no sound from the speaker …
I’m not sure what changes are required in configuration.nix.
This is my config file in its entirety, (apologies for the noise):
# Edit this configuration file to define what should be installed on
# your system. Help is available in the configuration.nix(5) man page
# and in the NixOS manual (accessible by running ‘nixos-help’).
{ config, pkgs, ... }:
{
imports =
[ # Include the results of the hardware scan.
./hardware-configuration.nix
];
# Bootloader.
boot.loader.systemd-boot.enable = true;
boot.loader.efi.canTouchEfiVariables = true;
networking.hostName = "nixos"; # Define your hostname.
# networking.wireless.enable = true; # Enables wireless support via wpa_supplicant.
# Configure network proxy if necessary
# networking.proxy.default = "http://user:password@proxy:port/";
# networking.proxy.noProxy = "127.0.0.1,localhost,internal.domain";
# Enable networking
networking.networkmanager.enable = true;
# Set your time zone.
time.timeZone = "America/Los_Angeles";
# Select internationalisation properties.
i18n.defaultLocale = "en_US.UTF-8";
i18n.extraLocaleSettings = {
LC_ADDRESS = "en_US.UTF-8";
LC_IDENTIFICATION = "en_US.UTF-8";
LC_MEASUREMENT = "en_US.UTF-8";
LC_MONETARY = "en_US.UTF-8";
LC_NAME = "en_US.UTF-8";
LC_NUMERIC = "en_US.UTF-8";
LC_PAPER = "en_US.UTF-8";
LC_TELEPHONE = "en_US.UTF-8";
LC_TIME = "en_US.UTF-8";
};
# Enable the X11 windowing system.
services.xserver.enable = true;
# Enable the GNOME Desktop Environment.
services.xserver.displayManager.gdm.enable = true;
services.xserver.desktopManager.gnome.enable = true;
# Configure keymap in X11
services.xserver.xkb = {
layout = "us";
variant = "";
};
# Enable CUPS to print documents.
services.printing.enable = true;
# Enable sound with pipewire.
hardware.pulseaudio.enable = false;
security.rtkit.enable = true;
services.pipewire = {
enable = true;
alsa.enable = true;
alsa.support32Bit = true;
pulse.enable = true;
jack.enable = true;
# use the example session manager (no others are packaged yet so this is enabled by default,
# no need to redefine it in your config for now)
#media-session.enable = true;
};
# Enable touchpad support (enabled default in most desktopManager).
# services.xserver.libinput.enable = true;
# Define a user account. Don't forget to set a password with ‘passwd’.
users.users.saurabh = {
isNormalUser = true;
description = "Saurabh Mishra";
extraGroups = [ "networkmanager" "wheel" ];
packages = with pkgs; [
# apps
qbittorrent
keepassxc
librewolf
audacious
audacious-plugins
mpv
vnote
# development
llvmPackages_19.libcxx
llvmPackages_19.clang-tools
# utilities
kakoune
nb
];
};
# Install firefox.
programs.firefox.enable = true;
# Allow unfree packages
nixpkgs.config.allowUnfree = true;
# List packages installed in system profile. To search, run:
# $ nix search wget
environment.systemPackages = with pkgs; [
# multimedia
pavucontrol
flac
libao
ffmpeg_6-full
gst_all_1.gstreamer
gst_all_1.gst-plugins-base
gst_all_1.gst-vaapi
gst_all_1.gst-plugins-ugly
gst_all_1.gst-plugins-good
gst_all_1.gst-plugins-bad
gst_all_1.gst-libav
haskellPackages.gi-gstaudio
libmpcdec
libmpg123
libopus
libsndfile
mpd
pcaudiolib
pipewire
pwvucontrol
portaudio
pulseaudioFull
vorbis-tools
libvorbis
wireplumber
# utilities
git
curl
wget
yt-dlp
vim
];
# Some programs need SUID wrappers, can be configured further or are
# started in user sessions.
# programs.mtr.enable = true;
# programs.gnupg.agent = {
# enable = true;
# enableSSHSupport = true;
# };
# List services that you want to enable:
# Enable the OpenSSH daemon.
# services.openssh.enable = true;
# Open ports in the firewall.
# networking.firewall.allowedTCPPorts = [ ... ];
# networking.firewall.allowedUDPPorts = [ ... ];
# Or disable the firewall altogether.
# networking.firewall.enable = false;
# This value determines the NixOS release from which the default
# settings for stateful data, like file locations and database versions
# on your system were taken. It‘s perfectly fine and recommended to leave
# this value at the release version of the first install of this system.
# Before changing this value read the documentation for this option
# (e.g. man configuration.nix or on https://nixos.org/nixos/options.html).
system.stateVersion = "24.11"; # Did you read the comment?
}
( There’s nothing wrong with the speaker, it worked on OpenSUSE tumbleweed. )
Pressing Fn + F2 and F3 do provide the volume change indication visually, but there’s no “pop” sound.
There’s nothing wrong with your configuration (except for all the random unrelated and conflicting packages you put in environment.systemPackages, though at least those should be inert), chances are this is a missing kernel driver or something along those lines.
It could also simply be very quiet, sometimes there are bugs like that. Crank it all the way up and listen closely
There’s nothing wrong with your configuration (except for all the random unrelated and conflicting packages you put in environment.systemPackages, though at least those should be inert), chances are this is a missing kernel driver or something along those lines.
Yes, it does look something like a missing kernel driver. How can it find it ?
It could also simply be very quiet, sometimes there are bugs like that. Crank it all the way up and listen closely
