I'm pretty sure the issue stems from the browser not being exposed to the right
device at the right time. When I have a mic plugged in, the device isn't exposed
until it is requested. Even so, running kwave, there's a bunch of different
devices I can chose from, from which 2 are input and one is for the backpanel
while the other is the frontpanel.

When I did the test with discord, switching profiles in pavucontrol, a bunch of
different devices got listed in the apps. The default device being "Monitor of
XXX". I suspect firefox is listening to the backpanel port (as default), and me
wiggling the profiles around exposed the active frontpanel device.

As you pointed out, there seems to be a greater involvment from the DE than
pipewire itself. Pipewire only does the audio, it doesn't really handle where
the pipe goes. As in, it just does what the software using audio is telling it
to do.

So the effective difference between your laptop and desktop experience would be
the amount of port available and how your DE handle them.

Cheers,
                 Ludovic

On Fri, 18 Apr 2025, Johan Helsingius wrote:

>Stranger and stranger - I don't have this problem on my laptop that is
>also running Daedalus with pipewire. All pipewire libraries and programs
>seem to be the same version on both the laptop and the desktop. Only
>major difference is the deskytop manager / environment. Xfce on
>the desktop, lightdm on the laptop.
>

>    Julf

>
>On 17/04/2025 09:54, Ludovic Bellière via Dng wrote:
>>Hello Julf,
>>
>>Please install qpwgraph and make sure the capture is linked to the browser.
>>
>>Other than that, make sure your system can record sound. Open kwave or OBS and
>>do a sound check. Avoid audacity, seems to be temperous and will fuck with your
>>pipewire, forcing you to restart.
>>

>>Cheers,
>>              Ludovic

>>
>>On Wed, 16 Apr 2025, Johan Helsingius via Dng wrote:
>>
>>>Hi,
>>>
>>>I am running Daedalus with pipewire.
>>>Suddenly, for some reason, all my video conferencing has
>>>lost ability to sens audio. Pavucontrol shows audio
>>>coming in from mic, but using web browser with any
>>>teleconferencing app such as zoom fails, with my
>>>voice not being heard.
>>>
>>>Any suggestions for what could be wrong?
>>>

>>>    Julf

>>>