Comment # 6 on bug 904043 from Guido Berh�rster

(In reply to Maciej Pilichowski from comment #5)
> "if you install"
> 
> Sure, I clicked "install", but the selection is not mine, this is the

The default installation when you select the Xfce desktop pattern does not
include pulseaudio.

> default setup. Don't you think default setup should be working properly?

Yes, and in fact an Xfce default installation does work "properly".

> If pavucontrol, as you wrote, works, then include it it default XFCE setup
> instead of gmixer.

gmixer is not part of the default Xfce installation, xfce4-mixer and its panel
applet are.
pavucontrol only works with pulseaudio and does not provide a panel plugin or
system tray applet, two good reasons not to make it the default.
The situation is somewhat unfortunate that the Xfce project does not provide a
mixer that work with both plain Alsa and pulseaudio, but that's the way it is
currently.