So I have a USB mic that works with Linux Mint 17.2 on my Thinkpad, but does not work with MATE on my desktop machine.
Opening the sound preferences from the panel spawns a broken settings menu, in which the output level is stuck on zero (despite the computer playing sounds), however typing mate-volume-control opens a working version, which is able to adjust the output volume.
It also displays a “USB Ear-Microphone” under the Hardware tab and as a device option in the Input tab. However, selecting the corresponding radio button and turning the volume up does not produce any output in the Input Level indicator. Interestingly, in Audacity, a number of slightly strange options are available, such as “USB Ear Microphone: Audio (hw:2,0) Rear Mic:0”, and the same but with Front Mic, Line In etc. instead of Rear Mic. These all record from the physical microphone.
Is there a way of getting MATE volume control to recognise the correct device?
Dmesg output:
[105771.781041] usb 2-1.5.2: USB disconnect, device number 9
[105882.827815] usb 2-1.5.2: new full-speed USB device number 10 using ehci-pci
[105882.922380] usb 2-1.5.2: New USB device found, idVendor=05e1, idProduct=202a
[105882.922394] usb 2-1.5.2: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3
[105882.922397] usb 2-1.5.2: Product: USB Ear-Microphone
[105882.922399] usb 2-1.5.2: Manufacturer: Generic
[105882.922401] usb 2-1.5.2: SerialNumber: 0000000001
[105882.934687] input: Generic USB Ear-Microphone as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1d.0/usb2/2-1/2-1.5/2-1.5.2/2-1.5.2:1.3/0003:05E1:202A.0005/input/input22
[105882.988095] hid-generic 0003:05E1:202A.0005: input,hidraw3: USB HID v1.00 Device [Generic USB Ear-Microphone] on usb-0000:00:1d.0-1.5.2/input3
[106950.426325] usb 2-1.5.2: USB disconnect, device number 10
[106957.533547] usb 2-1.1: new full-speed USB device number 11 using ehci-pci
[106957.605549] usb 2-1.1: device descriptor read/64, error -32
[106957.781551] usb 2-1.1: device descriptor read/64, error -32
[106957.957566] usb 2-1.1: new full-speed USB device number 12 using ehci-pci
[106958.052061] usb 2-1.1: New USB device found, idVendor=05e1, idProduct=202a
[106958.052066] usb 2-1.1: New USB device strings: Mfr=1, Product=2, SerialNumber=3
[106958.052078] usb 2-1.1: Product: USB Ear-Microphone
[106958.052080] usb 2-1.1: Manufacturer: Generic
[106958.052083] usb 2-1.1: SerialNumber: 0000000001
[106958.065008] input: Generic USB Ear-Microphone as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1d.0/usb2/2-1/2-1.1/2-1.1:1.3/0003:05E1:202A.0006/input/input23
[106958.117818] hid-generic 0003:05E1:202A.0006: input,hidraw3: USB HID v1.00 Device [Generic USB Ear-Microphone] on usb-0000:00:1d.0-1.1/input3