My initial problem was that some mp3\'s hung up amarok\'s backend. Files would go to the playlist and the status bar would say \"Playing:...\" but no audio. The GUI was still responsive until another action was taken resulting in the GUI hanging also. The only way out then was to do a \"killall amarokapp\"

I initially put the problem down to my contorted setup:
[ul][*]linux 2.6.15-smp with realtime.ko
[*]jackd 0.100.1 with alsa backend at realtime scheduling
[*]artsd for kde apps with jackd backend
[*]gstreamer 0.8.11
[*]amarok-1.4-beta1[/ul] with amarok using the gstreamer engine with artsdsink.

I dismissed the contorted jackd -> artsd -> gstreamer link as being the problem by running the offending files through:
[ul][*]gst-launch filesrc location=\"file.mp3\" ! mad ! artsdsink[/ul] which worked fine with multiple pipelines and multiple files playing concurrently via arts and jack.

I then thought it may be a taglib error with corrupted tags in the mp3 which amarok was reading. After removing all tags there was no change. Same hang.

I then decoded the mp3 into a plain wav and tested it with alsaplayer \"file.wav\" which worked fine. Also
[ul][*]gst-launch filesrc location=\"file.wav\" ! wavparse ! artsdsink[/ul] worked fine. I expected this basic wav file to work in amarok. But no.. same hang! On checking the format i found it was 22050hz mono. I used sox to resample to 44100 thinking the resolution was the problem. Nope! Same problem! Then used sox to double up the original\'s channel to stereo so I had a 22050hz stereo wav. This played fine in amarok! I went back to my original mp3 and made that stereo (without altering the frequency) and that to was fine in amarok!

So i reached the conclusion that amarok has an issue with mono streams... Whether its right or not or some affect of my particular setup i don\'t know... But i thought i\'d leave the feedback anyway.

My current workaround is converting any file that causes amarok problems to stereo. Obviously this is not ideal.

Despite this issue, Amarok has still replaced xmms as my media player. The fact that I can still play (using gstreamer engine) all my mod, sid and xm files as well as catalogued mp3 and ogg albums is excellent! Keep up the good work guys!

Cheers.
Adam.