| Summary: | Pulseaudio Volume Control (pa-applet) wakes up all audio devices when opening | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Product: | [Plasma] plasmashell | Reporter: | z411 <z411> |
| Component: | Audio Volume widget | Assignee: | Plasma Bugs List <plasma-bugs-null> |
| Status: | CONFIRMED --- | ||
| Severity: | minor | CC: | isma.af, mith3113, nate, pav, serdarthtux, sitter |
| Priority: | NOR | ||
| Version First Reported In: | 6.4.3 | ||
| Target Milestone: | 1.0 | ||
| Platform: | Arch Linux | ||
| OS: | Linux | ||
| Latest Commit: | https://invent.kde.org/plasma/plasma-pa/-/commit/0af59f92acbe817e55d053c426c97b71a0aa1ad1 | Version Fixed/Implemented In: | |
| Sentry Crash Report: | |||
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Description
z411
2025-07-18 21:29:48 UTC
Additional: I thought disabling "Play audio feedback for changes to audio volume" in the sound options would serve as a workaround but it doesn't; the audio connections are still being made and wake the devices up. There's a VU meter in the volume bar that requires listening in on the output. The fact that this wakes up the device seems more like a problem in alsa or pipewire since we don't actively produce any new output. Right. I asked the guys over at PipeWire but I don't think I'll be getting a reply anytime soon. The Qt theme I use makes the VU meter invisible anyway so as a workaround I patched the applet so it doesn't open audio streams. It obviously disables the VU meter but it doesn't wake up my audio devices. If anyone reading needs this, just comment out the createStream() call inside the setTarget method in src/volumemonitor.cpp (line 84 at the time of writing). Unfortunate. I wonder if there's benefit to be had from an option that disables the meters. There have also been problems with bluetooth profiles switching around because of them. Mhm, I think the VU meter is fine and you're right to observe that not sending audio to the device shouldn't wake it up. While an option to disable it could be useful in some cases, I think it'd be only there as a workaround for issues that shouldn't be caused by a mere VU meter. If I remember correctly, the VU meter in Windows didn't wake up my devices so I don't think it's some kind of hardware limitation but indeed an implementation quirk somewhere along Linux's audio chain. The pa-applet probably should set PA_STREAM_DONT_INHIBIT_AUTO_SUSPEND when it is monitoring sinks/sources. See https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/pulseaudio/pavucontrol/-/commit/1f58c43347c8fe36b88165064ba8196b477525ef for pavucontrol. A possibly relevant merge request was started @ https://invent.kde.org/plasma/plasma-pa/-/merge_requests/385 Thanks for noticing - I'm not knowledgeable about PulseAudio workings but wouldn't this let the device go to sleep, but still wake it up whenever it opens? Git commit 7000439d260199bd49d9fd9b6bf2cc62d5b1f431 by Harald Sitter. Committed on 14/11/2025 at 06:55. Pushed by sitter into branch 'master'. volumemonitor: don't inhibit auto suspend of device the volume monitor stream is entirely passive and only observes what other streams are doing. as such it has no business holding up auto suspend M +1 -1 src/volumemonitor.cpp https://invent.kde.org/plasma/plasma-pa/-/commit/7000439d260199bd49d9fd9b6bf2cc62d5b1f431 Git commit 0af59f92acbe817e55d053c426c97b71a0aa1ad1 by Harald Sitter. Committed on 14/11/2025 at 06:59. Pushed by sitter into branch 'Plasma/6.5'. volumemonitor: don't inhibit auto suspend of device the volume monitor stream is entirely passive and only observes what other streams are doing. as such it has no business holding up auto suspend (cherry picked from commit 7000439d260199bd49d9fd9b6bf2cc62d5b1f431) Co-authored-by: Harald Sitter <sitter@kde.org> M +1 -1 src/volumemonitor.cpp https://invent.kde.org/plasma/plasma-pa/-/commit/0af59f92acbe817e55d053c426c97b71a0aa1ad1 Unfortunately the fix had to be reverted as it caused a memory leak that is still under investigation. Thanks for your work. I can confirm the patch fixed this issue completely, but the regression was unfortunate. I hope it turns out to be a simple fix. |