On Thu, 2006-09-14 at 19:22 +1200, Robert Fisher wrote: > On Thursday 14 September 2006 6:12 pm, Robert Fisher wrote: > > Could somebody please help me set up my mic to work (with skype.) > > > Well I started my computer again and Skype worked but when I tried to make a > second call it would not and my sound was gone again - all without changing > any settings. > > The guy I spoke with (on Skype) said that Skype does not play well with Linux > yet but he has heard that there is a new version out in the last week or so > which is better.
Older versions of Skype for linux were OSS only and so it would prevent other sound apps running by hogging the sound device. Running XMMS with skype, for example, was a nightmare. There was also a major bug that meant if you tried to use skype immediately after finishing a call, skype would lock up / crash / claim the sound device was in use etc. The new version of skype released a couple of weeks ago is now using ALSA and so plays a lot better with other sound applications. Saying that, it's far from perfect. I still have problems running it with XMMS - often having to quit MMS, stop the artsd sound server and then starting skype to avoid choppy sound, the other person not hearing me, or error messages re: the sound device being unaccessible. I suspect that some of my other sound settings may be part of the problem (I messed around with .arsound files etc tryign to get the old version to work), but I'm not sure. All in all, with the new version Skype is getting much better - I still use it every day. Hopefully the new versions for linux will continue.
