Changing the Ubuntu 8.10 Volume Button Stepping

* Update: This still works with 10.04 Lucid Lynx

If you have hardware volume controls on your keyboard or laptop you probably don’t agree with the default 6% increase/decrease in your volume every time you turn the volume up or down using the hardware volume keys.  Changing this stepping is easy and safe.

1. From a console run ‘gconf-editor’.
2. Navigate through the tree to ‘/apps/gnome_settings_daemon’.
3. Change the value of the ‘volume_step’ setting to a whole integer between 0 and 100.
4. Quit the Configuration Editor.

The volume_step setting is stored as a percentage.  The default is 6 (or 6% of the volume with every button press) though this seems high in my setup.  3% works much better for me.

This fix allows your on screen display (OSD) and the system tray volume control to continue to work as expected.

I’m still searching for a realistic solution for Kubuntu users.