Ubuntu
alsa-plugins package

  1. Bug #503174
  2. Comment #15

Comment 15 for bug 503174

Revision history for this message
Alistair Buxton (a-j-buxton) wrote : Re: PulseAudio ALSA plugin opens and closes the PulseAudio sink several times per second for no reason

Here is a modified example which deliberately underruns the buffer 200 times per second. This is what top looks like on a 3.2ghz Phenom II:

  PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND
 2613 al 20 0 274m 5760 3636 S 56 0.1 4:21.61 pulseaudio
 2152 root 20 0 886m 33m 14m S 6 0.8 4:18.38 Xorg
 2629 al 20 0 323m 34m 7456 S 6 0.9 0:54.97 gnome-settings-
 2750 al 20 0 287m 38m 9572 S 5 1.0 0:42.42 gnome-volume-co
 2722 al 20 0 316m 52m 17m S 4 1.3 1:23.50 compiz.real
 2828 al 20 0 215m 20m 10m S 4 0.5 0:24.41 gnome-terminal
 3464 al 20 0 132m 2920 2188 S 3 0.1 0:14.89 alsatest

If pavucontrol is running things get a lot worse:

 PID USER PR NI VIRT RES SHR S %CPU %MEM TIME+ COMMAND
 3483 al 20 0 297m 24m 15m R 91 0.6 0:05.29 pavucontrol
 2613 al 20 0 338m 9944 7820 S 35 0.2 4:42.49 pulseaudio
 2152 root 20 0 887m 33m 14m R 20 0.9 4:21.08 Xorg
 2629 al 20 0 324m 35m 7456 S 11 0.9 0:57.65 gnome-settings-
 2722 al 20 0 316m 52m 17m S 9 1.3 1:24.36 compiz.real
 2750 al 20 0 288m 39m 9572 R 6 1.0 0:44.13 gnome-volume-co
 3464 al 20 0 132m 2936 2188 S 5 0.1 0:16.37 alsatest

This is while running the suggested alsa-source modules.