Hi there,
first thing, I would like to say that amarok is cool and really give a different mean of playing audio files from all others players I used and tried.

But there\'s only one reason at all I don\'t use it. Comparing the sound quality with XMMS (Cross Fade plugin 0.3.5) and Amarok with is poor Equilizer control and limited Audio Engines... I\'ve got a question. Is it me, or the sound quality is so cheap comparing to XMMS or WinAmp (and DirectX plugin) on Windoze...

I hope I\'m wrong and it exist something I didn\'t setup corectly. In that case, I\'ll be happy to know what I can do to have a better control on my sound quality.

Regard,
- Fred

it\'s you or your distro or just your setup or your audio backend

but not amaroK, as the sound in amaroK is even better than in xmms here

Le_MuLoT:

But there\'s only one reason at all I don\'t use it. Comparing the sound quality with XMMS (Cross Fade plugin 0.3.5) and Amarok with is poor Equilizer control and limited Audio Engines... I\'ve got a question. Is it me, or the sound quality is so cheap comparing to XMMS or WinAmp (and DirectX plugin) on Windoze...

Did you try turning the equalizer off? For some reason the equalizer seems to have a rather nasty influence on sound quality. At least on FreeBSD with xine engine. Without it, sound quality is pretty good, actually.

Regards,
Mario

Yeah, I noticed that... but I would like to use the Equilizer.

I found that overall sound quality is pretty better with GStreamer 0.8 than 0.7. Great !

amaroK hasn\'t supported 0.7 for a while. o.O

I find, no great problem with the sound quality per se.
However, I have found that, when playing .ogg files encoded at Q10 (500kbps) there is a scratching, almost static like sound, it\'s fairly low & only noticeable in quiet passages. Xmms or others do not have this noise..
What the hell is it?!

Suse 9.3
kernel 2.6.11
Amd Athlon
(Nine inch nails - With teeth (well that\'s what it was while I was writing this! ) )

Oops... It wasn\'t AmaroK, it seems that noise is actually being generated by my soundcard :blush: I just hadn\'t heard it in anything else at that stage...
Sorry!
(Playing: Icehouse - Don\'t believe anymore (Ivan & collins mix))

I am certainly no pro, but I found different engines have their own strenghts and weaknesses. The sound quality for me - using the Xine engine - is dynamite. So, my recommendation is to try out your various engines. Someone mentioned the EQ. Turning it off may work for you. For me, I like the EQ B)

Also, make sure that you are using a current release of amaroK as well as current engines

I\'m not a \"matured\" linux user, but I do know that the ALSA audio \"backend\"(as someone put it) inhibits significant improvements in audio quality in comparison to kde\'s ARTS sound thing. Much like foobars kernal streaming (which improves sound quality immensley in windows)

Moz wrote:

I\'m not a "matured" linux user, but I do know that the ALSA audio "backend"(as someone put it) inhibits significant improvements in audio quality in comparison to kde\'s ARTS sound thing. Much like foobars kernal streaming (which improves sound quality immensley in windows)

I think you have it backwards, aRts can screw up the audio quality for ALSA.