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0e1f616
(Get the code!)
There are three possible behaviors here, when you press down in a slider trough between the thumb and one end.
(1) Move in steps towards that end, up to and right past the pointer, stopping at the end. This is what upstream GTK does.
(2) Move in steps towards that end, but only up to where the pointer is, and stop there. This is what Windows does (tested in Windows 7).
(3) Move the thumb immediately to where the pointer is, and allow dragging. This is what Mac OS X does (tested in 10.8 preview).
I don't know of anyone who thinks that (1) is a good idea, and it causes the accidental silence/blaring that Charles describes. But Lars is right, it shouldn't be changed piecemeal, it should be changed in GTK for every slider.
The advantage of (2) are that it's consistent with how standard scrollbars behave. (OS X has a setting for whether scrollbars should do the equivalent of (2) or (3), but (2) is the default, and scrollbars are hidden by default anyway.)
The advantages of (3) are that it's consistent with how scrub bars behave, such as in a music or movie player (though there are many fewer scrub bars than scrollbars); and that it allows immediate dragging to fine-tune the setting, without first having to release and re-click.
I prefer (2), though not strongly -- I'd be happy with either (2) or (3).