[ale] Fixing systemd and pulseaudio: was UEFI vs BIOS understanding

[Steve Litt]

On Mon, 21 Dec 2020 12:37:50 -0500
Jim Ransone via Ale <ale at ale.org> wrote:

> As a relatively non-technical person who uses my computer for audio 
> stuff, having to deal with alsa, pulseaudio, and jack has been a 
> confusing hassle. What I gathered from spending way too much time 
> reading and watching tutorials to figure this stuff out is that alsa
> is the base level, pulseaudio rides on top of that and handles audio
> for most common applications but lacks the low-latency necessary for
> audio recording. Hence the need for Jack. 

I was under the impression that Jack substitutes for ALSA and
Pulseaudio.



> Then you need to figure out
> how to make jack and pulseaudio play nice and function along side
> each other. 

I'm pretty sure if you have Jack, you can get rid of Pulseaudio. If a
specific application *demands* Pulseaudio, in otherwords, the
Redhat/Freedesktop monopolism patrol has gotten to them, then I think
you can usually use apulse to run that one specific application.

> It's a mess. Thankfully, the new version of Ardour
> recommends just using alsa by itself. 

On Void Linux, I've used Void by itself for years. Your mileage may
vary, but I've found Pulseaudio to be a land of a thousand mutes, each
one harder to find than the last.


> It makes sense that this would
> be faster. And it prevents me from spiraling down a rabbit hole of
> confusion trying to figure out why my audio isn't working. So now I
> have no need for Jack at all, and pulseaudio does whatever it does
> without bothering me. 

Then you're more fortunate than I.

> The only downside is that when Ardour is
> running, youtube videos will not play. A little annoying, but I can
> live with it.

That's pretty darn annoying.

SteveT

Steve Litt 
Autumn 2020 featured book: Thriving in Tough Times
http://www.troubleshooters.com/thrive