My desktop has Windows 10 installed, and I decided I wanted to install linux on the side and chose Pop!_OS 21.04 (nvidia). But then I ran into the audio issue. The rear headphone port works fine and so does the monitor's built-in speakers. The only port that doesn't play sound is the front one. Everything works fine with Windows 10.

When I run alsamixer, it shows 4 cards: "HDA Intel PCH", " Xtreme Audio DAC", and 2 "HDA Nvidia". However, when I select "HDA Intel PCH", which seems to be the default, it says "This sound device does not have any controls." When I select the other cards, they all have settings for me to modify. None of them have anything relating to headphones and I don't see anything about Auto-Mute. Regardles of whether or not I have headphones plugged in, alsamixer doesn't show anything about headphones.

In the sound settings, when I have the headphones plugged into the front port, it says the Output Device is set to "Headphones - Xtreme Audio DAC". When I plug the same headphones into the rear port, it says "Speakers - Xtreme Audio DAC" and also gives me a drop down for Configuration with "Analog Stereo Output" selected by default.

I found many posts online and tried them all, but nothing ever worked. Modifying all the config files, using the Pulse Audio Control program, and following the article from System76 about audio issues. I also installed the Ubuntu restricted extras, and VLC hoping maybe something was missing and this would install it, but nope.

I make sure all the volumes are at 100% when I shut down Windows (even using shift click on Shut Down option). I have also checked the BIOS and there are no sound options. I also have the boot option set to "UEFI".

First version I installed was 20.04 (nvidia version of course) and it had this issue. Then I tried 21.04 (nvidia), but same thing. I got curious and installed Ubuntu 21.04 (which I know isn't super different, but still wanted to try) but I still had the same issue.

So right now, I have Windows 10 installed on an SSD, and I have Pop!_OS 21.04 installed on a separate hard drive. I have no clue what else to try. Has anyone encountered this before or have any suggestions for me to try? Thank you for reading.

These are my specs, just in case:

Do you have pavucontrol installed? What is the 'output configuration' set to for the device (I'm assuming this machine only has two 'actual' audio devices - the onboard/motherboard sound, and the nVidia HDA for HDMI/DisplayPort audio, right?) with something plugged into the jack (it is likely auto-sense so it disables the output with nothing plugged in)? You may have to change from 'stereo output' or 'stereo analog out' to 'stereo headphones out' or 'FP audio out' or something of that nature. I'd also not set everything to 100% with the headphones on your head, just to be safe.

I had it installed before, and messed around a bit according to what I found online, but then I did a fresh install of Pop!_OS. But I just reinstalled it and tried literally every possible combination of all the settings. It took a while. But the only results where either nothing changed, or the audio stopped working completely.

In the Configuration tab, there are three options, and the profiles selected are:

GM200 High Definition Audio: Off
GM200 High Definition Audio: Digital Stereo (HDMI 2) Output
Xtreme Audio DAC: Analog Stereo Output + Digital Stereo (IEC958) Input

When I set the volume to 100%, it's in Windows, before booting to Pop!_OS, just to make sure Windows isn't affecting the volume, which I saw several posts of people saying that happened. When I boot into Pop!_OS, I definitely do not have the volume all the way up.

And yes, there are only 2 actual audio devices; the motherboard and the 2 nVidia GPUs, like you said.

Are there any other options for 'Xtreme Audio DAC' in configuration? Like 'front panel output' or something?

Is this in a VM? Why are you adjusting audio settings in Windows simultaneously? (I'm confused by this statement)

There's a bunch, but nothing about front panel or anything like that:
No, it's not a VM. I have Windows 10 on one hard drive and Pop!_OS on another. The reason for turning up the volume on Windows is because I saw several posts of people having sound issues and when they turned up the volume all the way in Windows, it fixed their audio issues in their Linux OS, even though it wasn't a VM. Makes little sense to me, but I'm desperate and figured it can't hurt. Sorry for the confusion.

And is that list in pavucontrol with something plugged into the front panel? It looks like it's 'seeing' the hotplug for an input, just not an output - makes me wonder if this is a cabling issue.

Hi.....I am assuming you have tower? Most laptops that I have seen do not have connectors on the front and the rear. they tend to have connectors on the side
Normally you choose one sound out device at a time. I think somehow you had sound out thru a 3.55 mm headphone at the back....is not right
Most towers have a line out for the back not a headphone jack.

the headphone jack is on the front headers.

monitor built-in speakers suggests you had sound going thru HDMI.

Me thinks you should seriously consider doing a screenshot of your pavucontrol for the last TAB called configuration.

If you do not want sound out thru the monitor then disable HDMI and below it or above should be analog sound.
Analog sound is for either the headphone socket or line out to speakers.

Unless you are doing surround sound....choose analog stereo out please.

pavucontrol does allow you to swap devices, but it helps to know exactly what device cable you need to hear sound from.

eg for me, I use a tower, 3.55 mmm jack to desktop speakers connected to rear audio out and occassionaly headphones using front 3.55 mm hole