How to fix Ubuntu 18.04/20.04 not recognizing M-Audio Fast Track Pro USB audio interface

After buying a new machine and installing Ubuntu 18.04 on it, I realized that my old Fast Track Pro USB audio interface was not recognized at all by the system as it did not appear in the system preferences. I was not willing to buy a new sound card yet, so as somewhat a Linux noob, I started troubleshooting and eventually got the sound card to work. This works in 20.04 too!

Hopefully this saves you from a couple hours of frustration. :)

1. Check if your device is recognized by ALSA

$ aplay -l
...
card 5: Pro [FastTrack Pro], device 0: USB Audio [USB Audio]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 5: Pro [FastTrack Pro], device 1: USB Audio [USB Audio #1]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

If the command output includes a similar output to the above, it means that ALSA recognizes the card and you can skip to step 4.

2. Verify that the device is listed as an USB device

$ lsusb
...
Bus 001 Device 006: ID 0763:2012 Midiman M-Audio Fast Track Pro
...

The output of the command lsusb should include the output above. If not, check that the device is connected. If the problem persists, there is some other issue with your system that I can not unfortunately help you any further with.

3. Edit ALSA configuration

Open the configuration file /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf:

$ sudo vim /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf

Comment out the following line:

...
#options snd-usb-audio index=-2
...

Add the following line to the end of the file:

...
options snd_usb_audio vid=0x763 pid=0x2012 device_setup=0x9 index=5 enable=1

For the changes to take effect, reload ALSA:

$ sudo alsa force-reload

Now you can verify according to step 1 that the device is listed with aplay -l. The sound card should also be listed in output of the following command:

$ cat /proc/asound/cards
...
 5 [Pro            ]: USB-Audio - FastTrack Pro
                      M-Audio FastTrack Pro at usb-0000:00:14.0-12, full speed

4. Edit Pulseaudio configuration

Open the Pulseaudio configuration file for editing:

$ sudo vim /etc/pulse/default.pa

Add the following line to the end of the file:

...
load-module module-alsa-sink device=hw:5

IMPORTANT: Change the device number from 5 to the actual card number outputted when you run the command cat /proc/asound/cards!

Reload Pulseaudio for the changes to take effect:

$ pulseaudio -k && pulseaudio

5. Select Fast Track Pro as sound card

This can be done various ways, I myself used the system settings GUI. If your Fast Track Pro is still not listed in the available devices, try running:

pacmd unload-module module-udev-detect && pacmd load-module module-udev-detect