Arch Linux

jlindgren

Member

Registered: 2011-02-27

Posts: 260

[SOLVED] How to set GStreamer to use ALSA instead of PulseAudio

The Arch Wiki has instructions[1] on how to set up PulseAudio on a system unintrusively, so that applications can still use ALSA/dmix without going through PulseAudio.  I've tried to follow these, but I'm stymied by this part:

"Also make sure common frameworks like Xine, Gstreamer and Phonon are configured to use ALSA: by default if they detect PulseAudio is installed they will try to use it before ALSA."

How can I tell GStreamer to use ALSA directly instead of PulseAudio?  libgstpulseaudio.so is part of gst-plugins-good, which I can't uninstall completely.  I can manually delete/move libgstpulseaudio.so, which works, but I would like to find a cleaner method that won't get reverted the next time gst-plugins-good is updated.

All I can find from Google is an old "Ask Ubuntu" post[2] that seems to be quite out of date (GStreamer 0.10 and GConf are both obsolete, I believe).  Has anyone found a method that works on a modern Arch system?

[1] https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Pu … pe_to_ALSA
[2] https://askubuntu.com/questions/356052/ … pulseaudio

Last edited by jlindgren (2019-10-18 14:06:32)

V1del

Forum Moderator

Registered: 2012-10-16

Posts: 21,620

Re: [SOLVED] How to set GStreamer to use ALSA instead of PulseAudio

I have wondered this as well (though in another context as I like to use pulse) and didn't find anything worthwhile, FWIW what you can do is add the libgstpulseaudio.so to a NoExtract= directive

Lone_Wolf

Member

From: Netherlands, Europe

Registered: 2005-10-04

Posts: 11,911

Re: [SOLVED] How to set GStreamer to use ALSA instead of PulseAudio

The ubuntu ask post may still be valid and just need adapting to gnome/gtk changes , as the alsasink plugin still exists.

I have also found info about selecting plugins from command line at Using Gstreamer .
If applications support using an external player, that info may be enough to make them use alsa.

A simpler solution might be to ditch pulseaudio* and use alsa exclusively.
Do you need features provided by pulseaudio ?

* On archlinux you usually need to have libpulse installed.

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Disliking systemd intensely, but not satisfied with alternatives so focusing on taming systemd.

(A works at time B)  && (time C > time B ) ≠  (A works at time C)

jlindgren

Member

Registered: 2011-02-27

Posts: 260

Re: [SOLVED] How to set GStreamer to use ALSA instead of PulseAudio

I didn't know about NoExtract, so thanks for that tip.

I had pulseaudio installed only for Firefox.  After some trial and error I got that working with ALSA also though (I had to update my ALSA config to work with floating-point audio).

I'll mark this solved.

progandy

Member

Registered: 2012-05-17

Posts: 5,190

Re: [SOLVED] How to set GStreamer to use ALSA instead of PulseAudio

For firefox you can also use apulse.

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| alias CUTF='LANG=en_XX.UTF-8@POSIX ' |

jlindgren

Member

Registered: 2011-02-27

Posts: 260

Re: [SOLVED] How to set GStreamer to use ALSA instead of PulseAudio

For firefox you can also use apulse.

Interestingly, apulse was what clued me in to the floating-point issue, since it complained and refused to do the format conversion.  But now that the floating-point issue is fixed, firefox 69.0.3-1 works with ALSA out-of-the-box for me, no apulse and no sandbox white-listing.

I was very pleasantly surprised!