3 ms·

I'm curious, what's the use case here? Not that it's wrong to do or anything, just intrigued.

jeroenhd 5y ago
Not the parent post, but I've been thinking about unifying all devices in my home by sending all audio streams into a single, unified "sound server" from which I can easily switch between TV audio, Bluetooth, headphones, etc. The idea is to be able to take a call on my phone and receive notifications on my laptop while developing on my PC. It'd also be nice for streaming stuff in general. As many people who have also looked into this stuff probably already know, interactive audio is really sensitive to latency. I've given it a quick shot by running pulse over the network, but honestly I wasn't impressed. I've given up for now, but some suggested software here might be good enough for a second shot, based on pipewire and its JACK backend this time.
- getcrunk 5y ago
  Hear hear. I was just thinking about a putting all my music and a mpd on my pi then running clients on tv/computers/phones. But ur idea is the next step!
  - Shared404 5y ago
    > I was just thinking about a putting all my music and a mpd on my pi then running clients on tv/computers/phones I actually do something similar to this to run music for an online D&D campaign I'm in, except I use the http output so none of the other players have to install a client. I do like the idea of the home audio server use case, I think it'll go on my back burner!
- smaudet 5y ago
  That sounds too connected - I like the idea of some sort pulseaudio network services but with better latency. I'd like to see pulseaudio with a better cross platform UI and a set of decentralized services versus introducing a single point of failure like you are proposing. Maybe a solution with dns-sd with stun support and a slick UI for desktop/mobile?
- iostream23 5y ago
  Or AVB as I note above, depending upon your lan and hardware
hunterb123 5y ago
My wife and I play video games together on separate PCs. Our computers are beside each other so we need to use headsets, it's important to hear 360 audio for footsteps and other sounds in shooters. We need to hear each other, game audio, teammates voices, and each other's voice. Our voices can sometimes bleed through the headsets so we need there to be little to no lag to reduce reverb. Plus the faster our voices reach each other the faster we can react to the command / callout. We can't use voice channels in the game, discord, or anything that goes over the internet. Currently we use teamspeak with a local server, which works well, looking to reduce it more. Sometimes we simply play with one headphone ear partially off, but that ruins the surround sound.
- Shared404 5y ago
  Ah, makes sense, thanks for satisfying my curiosity!
- Ugohcet 5y ago
  You probably should try to do it old analog style: just plug your microphones into each other’s PCs and set up soundcard's mixer to add mic input into the mix
- Moru 5y ago
  Did you try a local mumble server? Haven't played with it for a long time but last time it was much faster than teamspeak and we used it happily at home sitting next to eachother. That and get better headphones that close out sound from environment :-)
  - hunterb123 5y ago
    Mumble was a bit slower for us than TS3 actually. Around 40ms avg where TS3 is 15-30ms.

Not the parent post, but I've been thinking about unifying all devices in my home by sending all audio streams into a single, unified "sound server" from which I can easily switch between TV audio, Bluetooth, headphones, etc. The idea is to be able to take a call on my phone and receive notifications on my laptop while developing on my PC. It'd also be nice for streaming stuff in general. As many people who have also looked into this stuff probably already know, interactive audio is really sensitive to latency. I've given it a quick shot by running pulse over the network, but honestly I wasn't impressed. I've given up for now, but some suggested software here might be good enough for a second shot, based on pipewire and its JACK backend this time.

getcrunk 5y ago
Hear hear. I was just thinking about a putting all my music and a mpd on my pi then running clients on tv/computers/phones. But ur idea is the next step!
- Shared404 5y ago
  > I was just thinking about a putting all my music and a mpd on my pi then running clients on tv/computers/phones I actually do something similar to this to run music for an online D&D campaign I'm in, except I use the http output so none of the other players have to install a client. I do like the idea of the home audio server use case, I think it'll go on my back burner!
smaudet 5y ago
That sounds too connected - I like the idea of some sort pulseaudio network services but with better latency. I'd like to see pulseaudio with a better cross platform UI and a set of decentralized services versus introducing a single point of failure like you are proposing. Maybe a solution with dns-sd with stun support and a slick UI for desktop/mobile?
iostream23 5y ago
Or AVB as I note above, depending upon your lan and hardware

hunterb123 5y ago

My wife and I play video games together on separate PCs. Our computers are beside each other so we need to use headsets, it's important to hear 360 audio for footsteps and other sounds in shooters. We need to hear each other, game audio, teammates voices, and each other's voice. Our voices can sometimes bleed through the headsets so we need there to be little to no lag to reduce reverb. Plus the faster our voices reach each other the faster we can react to the command / callout. We can't use voice channels in the game, discord, or anything that goes over the internet. Currently we use teamspeak with a local server, which works well, looking to reduce it more. Sometimes we simply play with one headphone ear partially off, but that ruins the surround sound.

Shared404 5y ago
Ah, makes sense, thanks for satisfying my curiosity!
Ugohcet 5y ago
You probably should try to do it old analog style: just plug your microphones into each other’s PCs and set up soundcard's mixer to add mic input into the mix
Moru 5y ago
Did you try a local mumble server? Haven't played with it for a long time but last time it was much faster than teamspeak and we used it happily at home sitting next to eachother. That and get better headphones that close out sound from environment :-)
- hunterb123 5y ago
  Mumble was a bit slower for us than TS3 actually. Around 40ms avg where TS3 is 15-30ms.