Using Ubuntu 10.04 “Lucid Lynx”? Having persistent audio problems? You probably know Pulseaudio is at the root of them. Get rid of Pulseaudio finally, for good, forever, get shot of it, never use it again.

sudo apt-get purge libcanberra-pulse pulseaudio pulseaudio-esound-compat pulseaudio-module-bluetooth pulseaudio-module-gconf pulseaudio-module-udev pulseaudio-module-x11 gstreamer0.10-pulseaudio pulseaudio-utils pavucontrol

sudo apt-get install gnome-alsamixer alsa-oss python-alsaaudio

All my audio woes have been sorted out: Audacity works, Skype works (rings on speakers, listen and chat on USB headseat), VLC works, mplayer works, flash video works, last.fm player works