How to fix DaVinci Resolve audio issues on Ubuntu 20.10

Hello 👋,

To fix audio issues on a fresh install of DaVinci Resolve 18 on my Ubuntu 20.10 PC I did the following things:

1. List all the available sound cards

cat /proc/asound/cards
 0 [NVidia         ]: HDA-Intel - HDA NVidia
                      HDA NVidia at 0xfc080000 irq 94
 1 [AI1            ]: USB-Audio - RODE AI-1
                      RODE Microphones RODE AI-1 at usb-0000:2d:00.3-1.3, full speed
 2 [Generic        ]: HDA-Intel - HD-Audio Generic
                      HD-Audio Generic at 0xfc400000 irq 96
 3 [U0x46d0x81b    ]: USB-Audio - USB Device 0x46d:0x81b
                      USB Device 0x46d:0x81b at usb-0000:2d:00.3-1.4, high speed

List all the available sound cards a chose a default. I like playing audio though my headphones when editing and the headphones are connected to my USB Audio Interface RODE AI-1, this is what I want to use as the default card.

2. Set the default card for Alsa

To set the default card I’ve created a new file /etc/asound.conf and pasted the following contents into it:

   defaults.pcm.card 1
   defaults.ctl.card 1

The number 1 represents the number of the default sound card, in my case it is:

 1 [AI1            ]: USB-Audio - RODE AI-1
                      RODE Microphones RODE AI-1 at usb-0000:2d:00.3-1.3, full speed

After it’s set, reload alsa with: sudo alsa force-reload

3. Start DaVinci Resolve 18 and restart pipewire

Each time you start DaVinci Resolve 18 you may need to run the following command in order to get audio working:

systemctl restart –user pipewire

Note: DaVinci Resolve can’t play AAC audio files on Linux.

Note: Your audio may stop working outside DaVinci resolve while editing and after closing it, to fix it run the above command again.

4. If this breaks your audio on other software

Remove /etc/asound.conf file and restart Alsa & Pipewire. We need to wait for an official fix. 🙁

Thanks for reading! I hope you’ll find this useful.

Happy hacking! 🦾