When I start up my Raspberry the level is at 100 and stays like that but as soon as I connect my device it drops automatically to 36. I have no clue why.
It might be the logic on the transmitting device side. For instance, when a Bluetooth headset is connected to a phone or laptop, the volume is often decreased to avoid potential harm.
hmm interestingā¦ is there any way to bypass that logic? or something like controling alsamixer volume level with my bluethoth device?
@damch76 when a Bluetooth device is connected, that device can be used to control the volume. I think that whatās going on here may be something different. Just as a hunch, if you are only using Bluetooth, could you try stopping all of the other services on the device (spotify,airplay,snapcast-* etc.) and see if this issue persists? If it stops happening itās possible that one of those other services is interfering. Either way, this would be better tracked as an issue on the Github repo, you can add one here: https://github.com/balenalabs/balena-sound/issues
It might also be worth a quick look to see if any of the other issues reflect what youāre seeing, but I personally have not witnessed this behaviour before.
Anyhow, give that a try and see it it makes a difference.
Hi, thanks for your advice.
When I stop the other services specifically snapcast-server and/or snapcast-client the audio goes completely off. When I turn snapcast-server off Bluetooth is turned off for a second and goes back on. Then when I connect my device I have no audio and alsamixer is still at 100 after connection. As soon as I turn snapcast-server back on, audio comes back and alsamixer level goes down to 36. You migth be in the right track though. Any clue what to do next?
@damch76, hi, how can you tell that the level goes down to 36, how are you reading that value? Have you by any chance set CONNECTION_NOTIFY_VOLUME to 36? Iām trying to figure out if your problem is this one: https://github.com/balenalabs/balena-sound/issues/78
I can see the level on the graphical interface of alsamixer on terminal for bluetooth-audio in the Dashboard.
CONNECTION_NOTIFY_VOLUME is 75
Thanks, can you try removing the CONNECTION_NOTIFY_VOLUME environment variable, and see if the problem persists?
I donĀ“t have any CONNECTION_NOTIFY_VOLUME enviroment variable set. I now is 75 because that is the configuration on start.sh for bluetooth-audio
Okay, that makes sense. Iād like you to run one last test if you can. Try setting DISABLE_MULTI_ROOM env variable to 1 and see if the problem persists. This will disable multi-room feature, perhaps helping us isolate the problem.
Thank you so much! with your suggestion the problem was solved 
Hi, thanks, glad that works. It does mean unfortunately that we have an issue with multi-room. Iāll add this to the repo to track it, however iād like to get some more context on your setup. Can you share what device and balenaOS version you are running on? Also, just to confirm you are NOT using a DAC, correct? I know some of this you already shared, but i just want to be extra sure 
Yeah sure. IĀ“m running it in a Raspberry Pi 4 with balenaOS 2.47.1+rev1. And thatĀ“s correct IĀ“m NOT using DAC. Let me know if you need more info. Thanks again.
Thanks for the information. Iāll add this issue to our tracker. Youāll be pinged in this thread once we resolve it (even though it wonāt change much for you since you are running single room).
Hello there,
I believe I am having a similar - if not the same- issue.
I have accessed alsamixer to turn the volume up on the bluetooth-audio terminal and changes seem to become undone on reboot.
Setup: Balena Sound on a RaspberryPi 3B+; 3.5 jack as the audio output.
I hope there is a permanent solution for this.
Thank you!!
Hey @frnini, what changed did you make to the alsamixer? Can you automate that in a script or something as if itās not stored in the persistent storage (you can find more details in our docs here https://www.balena.io/docs/learn/develop/runtime/#persistent-storage) then they will be lost after a reboot.
I am running off a RPi 4 without a DAC and I am having the same issue as damch76 describes. I can also confirm that disabling multiroom (temporarily) resolves the issue for a single room application. I am looking forward to a fix to test and hopefully utilize the full power of balena Sound.
And as always thanks for a great product and equally great support. Besides the issue I literally transformed my old stereo to a 2020-capable speaker in 4 minutes.
Same thing here, but disabling multi-room has not helpedā¦ Itās just adding it as a enviroment variable, isnāt it?
Hi Sergio
Indeed, you should be able to set a variable and disable multiroom. The instructions for which should be found here
If thatās exactly what you have done, maybe itās a different issue. Can you confirm that you have done this, and if not can you grant support access to your device and share the UUID so that I can take a look?
This is a known issue in balenaSound, and we are working on a solution. Hopefully from your device, weāll get some additional info that can potentially help us to fix it sooner.
Hi there.
I have no idea if this might help. I have just updated one Pi 3 to the new multiroom version, and installed a second one. I have encountered the same issue mentioned here.
I set SYSTEM_OUTPUT_VOLUME and CONNECTION_NOTIFY_VOLUME to 100 as Application Environment Variables. Since that moment, both Piās work on full volume, in multiroom configuration.
Hope it helps
C
Hi guys,
Another context story if that helps.
58e0d5d
Alsamixer manually set to PCM 75 doesnāt survive reboot. Goes straight back to 36. Before any connection (bluetooth or whatever).