Essentially, none of the audio ports will function when I am in the terminal or when I have started X (with GNOME) using the command 'startx'. I have also tried enabling and disabling my onboard Intel HDA. I have a Dell Dimension 4600, so it also has an audio port in the front.

I have trying to solve this problem since I installed Ubuntu Server (and used it to host www.haneefmubarak.com and news.haneefmubarak.com) in June this year (2011).

Ideally, I would like all of the ports to work, but at this point, any of the ports working would be a major improvement.

'servers' will have most things disabled by default and have few s/w

OK, BTW, mys sites are still up, (minor error).

But anyways, back to the point. I need it enabled and working. How do I do this?

*BUMP* (At least that's what we do back at the Ubuntu Forums...)

Moved: This thread is more suitable in <Ubuntu> and has been moved accordingly to help your thread/question get the exposure it deserves.

I am having this issue as well

I recently installed ubuntu 11.10 server, installed the various sound packages, but have not been able to get sound out. I have a sound blaster card, reports as sb-16 LE in some programs such as VLC, but is reported as Card: SB Live! Value [CT4780], Chip: TriTech TR28602 in alsamixer. I have alsa and pulseaudio and mplayer installed. I only ssh to the server, but I can get to the server itself if we think that may help. ubuntu didn't set my video correctly on the main display so I ssh in only (whole separate issue that I never bothered fixing.)
I can however get sound commands to run via sudo, but still no sound. example: aplay -l gives the same error as OP stating no sound devices, but sudo aplay -l completes fine and shows the devices. I have added the user to the audio group, but this still persists. when I run sound through the system using mplayer or sound-test using sudo, no sound comes out but it appears to be playing. I have sudo alsamixer and brought all the levels up (that also does not work under regular login and must be sudo'd.) I have followed many forums to trouble shoot this, but this is the first to find someone with the (probably) same problem as I.

i also checked to make sure no other services were using the sound system via command: lsof |grep snd

any help is appreciated, including linking me to other forums that may help.

for right now all I want is to get vlc playing music (i will control it remotely, everything's configured) and have run in to the most important of all issues, no sound! hah :-/

Oh finally, I got some sound! I tried one more thing, and changed the MM to 00 in alsamixer (apparently those are representative of mute) and now I can get audio via sudo mplayer.

i'll keep looking how to get permissions correct on the audio, so i can run commands via ssh without sudo (vlc does not like to be run in sudo) but in the mean time atleast I know what I need to get done.
in regards to the OP, look in to trying sudo for your commands and see if you get any differing results for sound.