Warning: It didn’t work for some people. I don’t have instructions to undo this. Use it at your own risk.

After I installed Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron on my new Quad core desktop , I installed Skype . The installation was smooth, but the microphone didn’t work. The output sound was fine. The webcam was detected automatically, but the video loses brightness after 2-3 minutes of use. I wasn’t sure if the microphone problem was due to buggy implementation of Pulse Audio in Ubuntu 8.04 or not. I tried changing the sound preferences and mic preferences, but nothing worked. I finally found a solution to install complete Pulse Audio pack after searching the Ubuntu forums and then for Skype microphone problem.

I followed zman0900’s guide in Ubuntu forums for complete pulse audio setup. Once I set that up, I got the microphone working in Skype. These are the steps I followed to get the Pulse audio setup and microphone to work.

Open a terminal (Application -> Accessories -> terminal)

1. Install additional packages for Pulse Audio by entering the following command in the terminal. Enter your password if prompted.

sudo apt-get install libao-pulse libasound2-plugins

2. Then edit or create your asound.conf file

sudo gedit /etc/asound.conf

and add the following lines. Click save once added.

pcm.pulse {
type pulse
}
ctl.pulse {
type pulse
}
pcm.!default {
type pulse
}
ctl.!default {
type pulse
}

3. Edit libao.conf.

sudo gedit /etc/libao.conf

and add the line below

default_driver=pulse

Now go to System -> Preferences -> Sound. Set under Devices tab the following to PulseAudio Sound Server
Sound Events Sound Playback
Music and Movies Sound Playback
Audio conferencing Sound Playback and Sound Capture

Set the Default Mixer Tracks Device to your sound card. In my case it’s HDA Intel (Alsa Mixer). Check the screenshot below.

Pulse 300x217

After you are done with that, install some additional packages. Enter the following command in the terminal.

sudo apt-get install libflashsupport padevchooser pulseaudio-module-hal pulseaudio-module-x11

sudo apt-get install libsdl1.2debian libsdl1.2debian-alsa

Now add the repositories given below to your sources.list file to install additional packages needed for Pulse Audio.
Open your sources.list by

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

and add the following lines

## zman0900’s PPA
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/zman0900/ubuntu hardy main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/zman0900/ubuntu hardy main

Save and close. Now enter the following commands one by one in the terminal.

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade
sudo apt-get install libsdl1.2debian-pulseaudio

If the installation goes fine, then you can move ahead to Device Chooser. If libsdl1.2debian-pulseaudio won’t install, then enter

sudo apt-get install libsdl1.2debian-all

sudo gedit ~/.profile

and add the following two lines. Save and close.

# Make SDL audio work properly with Pulse
# export SDL_AUDIODRIVER=pulse

Now go to PulseAudio Device Chooser under Applications -> Sound & Video. It’ll show an icon in the top right menu bar, next to Tracker search tool or Date area. Click that icon and select preferences. Check the box Start applet on session login under Startup. See the screenshot below.

Pulseaudio 300x191

Restart the computer. You should see the PulseAudion Device Chooser icon to appear once you login. I then changed my input sources by selecting Volume Control under System -> Preferences and selecting the Options tab. I selected Front Mic for all 3 input sources as shown below. This will vary from system to system and you may not see this option in some systems. My microphone was connected to the back of my computer, but it worked after I set it to Front Mic.

Volumecontrol 300x194

I then started Skype , clicked the small Skype icon at the bottom and selected options. I then went to Sound Devices and selected HDA Intel (hw:intel,0) as my sound in, sound out and ringing options as shown below. I then made a test call and everything worked fine.

Skype 300x254