No audio on certain youtube pages

[paul1149]

I've run across this several times in the past few weeks, but here's the latest instance:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCvUf9WU4qI&t=14s

• Video plays fine, but no audio.
• video player has audio enabled, at full volume
• Dropping built-in V. adblocker doesn't help.
• Doesn't work in a Guest window either
• Works fine on google chrome, which doesn't have an ad blocker.
• Works in Brave, which does have its built-in adblocker enabled for youtube

Most youtube vids work fine, but occasionally I hit this problem. I'm on Vivaldi 5.7.2887.3 (Official Build) snapshot (64-bit). The problem existed on previous snaps as well.

[DoctorG]

@paul1149 A. Can you please check which media-internals are shown for the video?

1. Close all tabs
2. Open vivaldi://media-internals in one tab
3. Open https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCvUf9WU4qI&t=14s in next tab an play
4. Select tab #1
5. Select the entry which says blob:https://www.youtube..... kPlay
   At section "Player Properties" hit "Copy to clipboard"
   and paste here with the </> code button.
   At section "Log" hit "Copy to clipboard"
   and paste here with the </> code button.

B. Try to sudo /opt/vivaldi-snapshot/update-ffmpeg for update of lib
or uninstall and re-install of vivaldi-snapshot

C. Does a start of Vivaldi with temporary profile gives you the sound? In shell with:
vivaldi --user-data-dir=/tmp/test-viv/

[DoctorG]

@paul1149 Works for me on Debian 11.6 KDE 5.

My mediainternals related to audio:

kAudioTracks [{"bytes per channel":4,"bytes per frame":8,"channel layout":"STEREO","channels":2,"codec":"opus","codec delay":312,"discard decoder delay":true,"encryption scheme":"Unencrypted","has extra data":true,"profile":"unknown","sample format":"Float 32-bit","samples per second":48000,"seek preroll":"80000us"}]

kAudioDecoderName "FFmpegAudioDecoder"

kIsPlatformAudioDecoder false

info "Selected FFmpegAudioDecoder for audio decoding, config: codec: opus, profile: unknown, bytes_per_channel: 4, channel_layout: STEREO, channels: 2, samples_per_second: 48000, sample_format: Float 32-bit, bytes_per_frame: 8, seek_preroll: 80000us, codec_delay: 312, has extra data: true, encryption scheme: Unencrypted, discard decoder delay: true, target_output_channel_layout: STEREO, target_output_sample_format: Unknown sample format, has aac extra data: false"

[Dancer18]

@paul1149 Works fine here with sound. Linux Mint Cinnamon 20.3 + Vivaldi latest version.

[paul1149]

Thanks to everyone for your input.

EDIT: SKIP TO BOTTOM FOR SOLUTION!

@DoctorG

I followed most of the steps you gave, only I did not close all tabs before running that diagnostic. It yielded:

render_id: 39
player_id: 0
created: 2023-01-08 13:35:15.533 UTC
origin_url: https://www.youtube.com/
kFrameUrl: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCvUf9WU4qI&t=14s
kFrameTitle: What Is Autophagy? 8 Amazing Benefits Of Fasting That Will Save Your Life - YouTube
url: blob:https://www.youtube.com/03353147-1e28-4745-8489-6754b511840a
kTextTracks: 
info: Selected video track: []
kRendererName: RendererImpl
pipeline_state: kPlaying
duration: 1346.181
kVideoTracks: [object Object]
kAudioTracks: [object Object]
event: kPlay
seek_target: 14
kIsAudioDecryptingDemuxerStream: false
kAudioDecoderName: FFmpegAudioDecoder
kIsPlatformAudioDecoder: false
kIsVideoDecryptingDemuxerStream: false
kVideoDecoderName: Dav1dVideoDecoder
kIsPlatformVideoDecoder: false
audio_buffering_state: [object Object]
dimensions: 854x480
kResolution: 854x480
pipeline_buffering_state: [object Object]

I also ran update for ffmpeg, it was already up to date. I tried a new temporary profile, and I removed and reinstalled Vivaldi-snapshot, all to no avail.

Last night I found the problem on another youtube page. This morning I checked and apparently all videos have no sound, on youtube, rumble, and bitchute.

I have none of these problems in other browsers or in Telegram Desktop.

SOLUTION:
That last statement got me thinking, that maybe I have a system audio problem. So I went to Audio Properties, to the Applications tab. With Vivaldi silently playing a video, it showed the "Chrome" audio volume at 100%. But as soon as I clicked on it to move it, with no change the volume started working. I can only guess that something got stuck internally. I hadn't moved the application volume and it showed in range, but it needed a little jog to get working again. I'm on the KDE desktop, btw.

Thanks to everyone for your help!

[DoctorG]

@paul1149 Rarely the volume settings and audio backend goes crazy on some Linux Desktops.
But i never hat this the last 2 years.

In shell this command helped me:
alsactl init
or
sudo alsactl init

[paul1149]

@DoctorG What does that do, reset all the alsa settings?

[DoctorG]

@paul1149 Yes. It is used to reset the ALSA to safe defaults.