My PC is Ryzen 5800x, RTX3070. Seasoned Windows user (hate 11, ok with 10). Audio enthusiast, can code some stuff, play games sometimes. I wanted to test if I can replicate Windows stuff that I use all the time (can’t live without it) on Linux: Voicemeeter, EqualizerAPO + Realphones VST plugin. Just check manuals of Voicemeeter and Realphones, you will be blown away what they can do. Proprietary by the way, cost every penny in my opinion.
Turns out it may be possible but it is too much hassle and drawbacks. List of most annoying problems.
Welcome menu crashes, same on old weak laptop with Intel Celeron. I think something broke with last major update. Works in VM. I saw same problem in some youtube videos’ comments.
My Audient id14 works as 4 channel surround. Meanwhile on Windows it is 2 stereo devices, you can connect headphones and speakers and change routing to have separate audio. Similar problem with input devices. I’ve spent a few hours figuring out how to make sinks, breaking pipewire service (only OS restart fixed audio), realizing how configs and config.d directories works. Stuff like that should be managed by some nice tool with GUI, but it seems such tool does not exist.
Got yabridge. Only old (older than 2.0, goodbye new features) version of Realphones VST “works”, or it loads at least. And yabridge recommends using wine staging 9.21, I was not able to install this exact version, so maybe 9.21 should be added to repositories.
There are several Virtual Mixers similar to Voicemeeter but their UIs are not that great.
I’ve managed to install nvidia driver but DE started to constantly crash (BTW Welcome menu works with drivers installed). I did not manage to install older version manually and decided that is too much tinkering and just removed the driver. By the way Production Branch Version is 570 and New Feature Branch - 575. 575 in the repo. Would be great to have simple way to install Production version.
Minor annoyances: searching what exact dependencies some program need to “make install” and sometimes for python programs.
I appreciate that by default there GUI almost for everything, except maybe services. And that KDE provides UI and customization that Windows should have.
I can provide crash logs if given proper instructions how to get them.
We fixed om-welcome in a newer version than you probably installed. Asking us for support probably would have sorted that out.
As far as nvidia and the other proprietary bits, we need to make the best use of the time that we spend volunteering to create OMLx. Nvidia drivers can be installed from the download on their website if you need a specific version and you would then be responsible for making sure it works. Since it is proprietary, there is no way we can guarantee that it works or does what they say it does. It is provided in our non-free repo as a convenience and is a more recent version than most distros. You also need to understand more about our process when it comes to using nvidia and which version (open or closed).
Basically, if you had bothered to interact with us in a way that wasn’t just providing criticism (which is fine) some of these things could be addressed. Support is where you do that, and you must follow the directions in the template. You must also read any other pinned threads in that section so you can bring what is needed in terms of logs.
@Estetig we’ll be happy to assist you.
Please start new topics in Support category.
One issue = one topic.
Also please fill the template with all the informations you can provide.
As for the crash logs, usually start the application from console and copy/paste the output (the whole output, including your command/s until the end) can help.
For any other log, someone will suggest the commands to run depending on the case.
I have -20db headphone output in the Audient control panel itself and AlsaMixer do not affect it, because of that I had very quiet audio. I had to create .state file and use some command to save AlsaMixer state
Turns out by default the volume is 40% in sound settings and its tied to same volume in alsamixer but when select box on the right is changed to “pro audio” it keep that 40%. Bad UX…
There was a systemd + Pipewire + Wireplumber bug that resets to 40% after a restart or some system commands. I think it was resolved, but it comes back sometimes.
