Bug 188444 – playback is unreliable and broken in Amarok and JuK using phonon gstreamer backend

This problem seems similar to mine, on Kubuntu Jaunty and a HDA Intel ALC861.
When I use Gstreamer Phonon engine, Amarok doesn't play anything at all, although other apps do.

When I switch to the Xine backend (the default one in Kubuntu) from systemsettings panel, then Amarok plays. But then, Amarok sound volume doesn't follow the KMix sound volume. By experimenting (Xine backend) I found out that Amarok "follows" the "Front" channel while KMix gives me only the PCM channel (the Front channel can only be muted, there's no apparent way to adjust it).

I found a similar bug report in KDE bugzilla, but the developers say it's a Phonon issue. I' m not sure about that, since Amarok2 plays OK in Manriva 2009.1.
See: https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=189755

I run Kubuntu Jaunty with these packages installed:
amarok 2:2.0.2mysql5.1.30-0ubuntu3
amarok-common 2:2.0.2mysql5.1.30-0ubuntu3
phonon-backend-gstreamer 4:4.3.1-0ubuntu3
phonon-backend-xine 4:4.3.1-0ubuntu3
libxine1-ffmpeg 1.1.16.3-0ubuntu1
gstreamer0.10-fluendo-mp3 0.10.7.debian-1
gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg 0.10.6.2-1ubuntu2
gstreamer0.10-alsa 0.10.22-5

>>With the Xine backend installed, I've had no similar problems so far.

Can you say how change playback backend in gnome to make amarok works?

Oh, I found that sudo apt-get install phonon-backend-xine helped

same problem with karmic

installing libxine1-ffmpeg solved on 9.04

install libxine1 isn't a solution for gstreamer backend, ma xine-backend.

In Karmic: Installing phonon-backend-xine didn't help, but after also installing libxine1-ffmpeg then it works.

May I suggest that as a temporary fix libxine1-ffmpeg is added as a dependency to the packages with this problem..

I can confirm this. The bug is not Amarok specific, it applies to any Phonon app using the Gstreamer backend.

I'm not sure if I have the same issue, but with Kubuntu Natty 11.04 beta the gstreamer backend produces no sound at all, only the Xine backend works properly. My audio device is:

00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801I (ICH9 Family) HD Audio Controller (rev 02)

referred to as "Intel HDA (ALC889A Analog)" in the Multimedia->Phonon settings.

It's probably not the same problem, given the differences in software versions and symptoms. You'll also probably get more attention if you file a separate bug.

Chris: you are using a very outdated setup, the xine backend is deprecated upstream since over 3 years now, you really should consider an upgrade to a more recent Amarok and KDE version, 11.04 is not exactly new and has reached its End of Life on October 28, 2012. I suggest you use version 13.04 which is the current release.

the release has reached its EOL on October 28, 2012

Hi Myriam, my last comment was from 2011, using the beta of what was to be 11.04. :-)