On Thu, 2013-03-28 at 16:58 -0600, Daniel Fussell wrote: > > Can you even name any of the issues that PulseAudio addressed? > Yes, network audio; and I've never see pulse do even a half decent job > of that. If there was another problem it solved, I'm not aware of it.
Bzzzt, wrong. When PulseAudio was released one of the most popular complaints was that it didn't support network audio. PulseAudio has made life so much better you probably take it for granted. It introduced: - Seamless output switching. As sound hardware got cheaper and dumber, software became responsible for handling the transition from speakers, to headphones, to bluetooth, and back. Ever buy a fancy new laptop only to discover plugging in your headphones did nothing if there was already sound coming out the speakers? I did. - Per-application volume control. So subtle you've probably never noticed it happening. - Re-sampling so different apps could play at different frequencies. Remember the bad old days when some apps could play audio at the same time but others couldn't? This was part of the problem. - Lower power usage. Your snide remarks aside, previous solutions used more power because they relied on frequent wakeups to avoid underflow while PulseAudio was carefully designed to dynamically readjust to wake up a little as possible while still maintaining responsiveness. And that's just what I remember off the top of my head. Lennart published several fascinating blog posts diving into the Windows, Mac, and Linux audio stacks and explain the trade offs he chose. I don't feel like digging up all the articles, but here's a good example: http://0pointer.de/blog/projects/pulse-glitch-free.html /* PLUG: http://plug.org, #utah on irc.freenode.net Unsubscribe: http://plug.org/mailman/options/plug Don't fear the penguin. */
