Audirvana Studio 2.8.1.3 on Linux - Unable to Unlock Audio Device

Linux and NAS Linux
1

Audirvana Studio 2.8.1.3 on Linux - Unable to Unlock Audio Device

Environment

  • Audirvana Studio 2.8.1.3
  • Ubuntu 22.04 (in Docker container)
  • Endeavour OS (Arch Linux)
  • Linux Kernel 6.8.5
  • ALSA 1.2.11
  • iFi Zen DAC v2

Problem Description

@Antoine, Audirvana Studio is working well for music playback on Linux. However, there is an issue with unlocking the audio device. When clicking the “Unlock Audio Device” button in the Audirvana Remote app (v5.0), the sound device is not properly released back to ALSA or Pipewire in the KDE desktop environment. The audio device remains inaccessible until completely stopping Audirvana Studio.

Steps to Reproduce

  1. Start Audirvana Studio on Linux
  2. Play music (working)
  3. In Audirvana Remote app, click “Unlock Audio Device” button
  4. Observe that sound device is not accessible to other applications

Expected Behavior

Clicking “Unlock Audio Device” should properly release the sound device back to ALSA/Pipewire, making it available for use by other audio applications without needing to stop Audirvana Studio.

Actual Behavior

The sound device remains locked/unavailable after clicking “Unlock Audio Device”. It can only be released by completely stopping Audirvana Studio.

Additional Info

  • Issue reproduced on both Ubuntu 22.04 in Docker and native Endeavour OS (Arch) installs
  • iFi Zen DAC v2 being used as the audio device4

Workaround

The only current workaround is to stop Audirvana Studio to release the audio device back to the system. The unlock button does not work as expected on Linux systems with this setup.

1 Like
2

Hi @HertzDonut,

Thank you for your detailed feedback. We have been able to reproduce the issue on our side.

1 Like
3

Hi @Antoine, I just setup Studio on a fresh Ubuntu 24.04.1 LTS (GNU/Linux 6.8.0-41-generic x86_64) and I’m running into the same issue with the Audirvana Studio 2.8.9 beta release.

With the release 2.8.2 release I had to manually stop pipewire before starting audirvana and restart it again after stopping. I faced the same issue on a Debian 12 machine I tried before.

Didn’t see any other issues on the matter so not sure if this is still an open issue.

4

That’s right - Unlock Audio Device still doesn’t work on Linux, even though it’s been a long time it was reported…

5

It release the DAC but for some reason is not available for other apps until computer restart (Debian 12, ALSA, Pulse Audio, tried with original kernel and Liquorix Kernel).

6

Hi guys, which apps are you using? Do you have this behavior if you try to play a Youtube video after you unlock the device?

7

On Ubuntu desktop there was a conflict with Pipewire on the system level. So all apps were impacted as the system sound was broken.

I’ve now switched it to headless unit running Ubuntu server which doesn’t ship pipewire so I can’t easily replicate but running Spotify on the same unit doesn’t work. I still have to reboot before Spotify can use the DAC

8

So you are using the Spotify app, but if you use Firefox, there is no issue whatsoever, right?

9

Sorry for the late reply. It’s not application specific, Audirvana retains the driver lock after “unlocking” and this requires a reboot to fix. Just shutting down the audirvana daemon doesn’t work, pipewire or alternatives cannot obtain a lock

1 Like
10

That’s right - for example, switching from “Audirvana” mode to “DLNA” mode is cumbersome for this reason.