With PulseAudio, you can also get application audio over the network.
Today, the headset might be Bluetooth or USB, so no such hacks are possible. On-the-fly output device switching: In “the old days”, you could plug in a headset and the hardware would disconnect the speakers and play through the headset only.The following things are a non-exhaustive list of convenient features that a layer like PulseAudio can provide: However, there is a lot more to a smooth audio experience. 90% of use cases are covered by allowing a single app to play audio at any one time. “I just want to play sound, I don’t need all these crap features” In terms of features, ALSA is to PulseAudio what SVGALib is to X11. Even when it came out, it was way behind Windows (but far ahead of OSS). ALSA works ok as an output mechanism, but it’s not a sound layer worthy of a modern operating system. Second, we definitely do need another sound system. Replace ALSA with PulseAudio, and you could have seen it in any forum today. It never works, but people say it’s because you’re a noob.” Then two people immediately chime in saying “works fine here”. “Yeah, I’m starting to think ALSA is like the emperors new clothes. I have IRC logs from 2004 where the conversation goes “My sound is gone.
Most critics have been appeased as PulseAudio has matured and distros make setup smoother, but there are still a number of troll^Wusers who trash it at every opportunity.Ĭommon objections to Pulseaudio includes:įirst of all, that’s what we said when ALSA was introduced. PulseAudio has been on the receiving end of quite a bit of flaming.