audacity preferences error: no audio devices (but orther audio programs work fine)

[noob5000]

i've been happily using ubuntu 9.04 since july (trying to avoid the terminal as much as possible) and audacity always worked fine except for freezing once in a while.
yesterday i encountered another freezing and forced it to quit via the system monitor window (like i did some times before), but this time an error ocurred after that:

now when starting audacity, a dialogue pops up asking for a proper place for the temporary files and redirects me to the preferences without opening the main window. i can enter temp folders as i wish, but then the next dialogue comes and tells me i have to use the same audio devices for input and output. however, in the dropdown lists there are no devices to choose from. obviously some silly bug, because the computer still has some audio devices that all other audio apllications use. for instance, i can play audio files in vlc, audacious etc.
however, i cannot solve the problem in the audacity preferences, and the main window never opens up with the problem unsolved. so i cannot use audacity anymore because of this silly bug.

i tried removing and re-installing audacity via the add/remove option in the applications menu, but the bug remains.

is there any way to repair it?

[B4RR13N705]

I had this problem long ago... usually you get his error if you have ardour installed also. I dont know why, but if i start JACK and then audacity, audacity works...