pulseaudio deeply unreliable (Fedora 10)

[Antti J. Huhtala]

su, 2009-03-08 kello 23:15 +0100, Nigel Henry kirjoitti:
> On Sunday 08 March 2009 18:38, Antti J. Huhtala wrote:
> > Hello Nigel,
> >
> > could/would you please stop advertising "remove pulseaudio" as the
> > panacea for all audio-related problems? Please? It is not as simple as
> > that.
<snip>
I sent my comments to you off-list but now that it's all public I'd like
to add a couple of comments.
> I do not advocate the removal of pulseaudio to resolve all audio problems.
> 
That's good. Learning how to properly use PulseAudio Volume Control in
Applications->Sound & Video solved whatever problems I still had in
directing audio streams where I wanted them.
> When I see audio related probelms, which may,or may not be related to 
> pulseaudio, I suggest disabling pulseaudio to see if that resolves the audio 
> problem, and that's as far as it goes. if disabling pulseaudio resolves a 
> sound related problem, then all well and good.
> 
> If the user now has his/her sounds working, that is all that I'm trying to 
> help with. Personally I have no interest in pulseaudio, as on all my 3 
> machines the sound works without pulseaudio entering the equation.
> 
That's all right if you only use one audio application at a time.
However, sometimes one needs to use more. Here's a quotation from my
private mail to another list member:

"I'm attaching a small text file (of 'top') demonstrating successful use
of pulseaudio. I had Rhythmbox playing some of my favorite records. This
stream was directed to USB headphones. Simultaneously I had totem
(actually totem-xine with all the non-free codecs) playing a movie. This
stream was directed to loudspeakers through the Ensonic SB sound card.
Please note the relatively low average load, even if I have Firefox and
some other programs running.
Both audio signals were completely free of pops or crackles - and there
were no "holes" in the audio output of either. Those holes were plaguing
PA all the time when pulseaudio was new to Fedora :-("

> I will continue to try and help folks with sound related problems. I do not 
> believe that pulseaudio is necessary for sounds to work, and sounds worked 
> with Alsa long before pulseaudio existed (FC1).
> 
I know that alsamixer already worked well around F7 era or so. Now I
need two sound cards working simultaneously with different streams to be
used in my SDR (Software-Defined Radio) experiments. I can't see how
alsamixer could handle that.
> No doubt this will start some flame or other, but is the way I answer sound 
> related problems, whether on Fedora, Debian, or Kubuntu/Ubuntu lists. So so 
> be it.
> 
Well, it has generated a few rather even-tempered comments so far. I
doubt that this will develop into a flame war on this list.

To conclude, I understand that if someone - especially a newbie - has
trouble getting *any* sounds from his/her system, minimizing the number
of possible culprits (such as pulseaudio) can perhaps be justified. Now
that PulseAudio has reached a stable state, more often than not the
problem is probably elsewhere. Of course, my experience is based only on
the hardware I use. It might not be as plain sailing for other HW
combinations.

BR, Antti