Volume is Muted on (Re)Boot

If you're having problems with the sound being muted on boot or reboot AND you are using Alsa with PulseAudio, here is a simple fix to the problem. On Arch linux locate the PulseAudio Sound Server Startup Script. In Arch, it is typically found in /etc/pulse/. Edit this script directly to affect all users, OR copy it to your user's home directory to only affect your user. To copy to your home directory for editing:

cp /etc/pulse/default.pa ~/.config/pulse/

Now edit the file

nano ~/.config/pulse/default.pa

Locate the following entries....

load-module module-device-restore
load-module module-stream-restore

...and change them to look like this:

load-module module-device-restore restore_muted=false
load-module module-stream-restore restore_muted=false

These added options tell PulseAudio to not restore the muted state of a device or stream. I hope this helps someone