The PipeWire 1.4 new version released, which arrives after eight months of development and comes with a new series of improvements and optimizations.
This multimedia server, which has become the successor to PulseAudio, stands out not only for its advanced sound management with low latency, but also for its ability to handle video streams and its focus on security and access control.
PipeWire 1.4 Key New Features
Without a doubt one of the great improvements that this new version of PipeWire 1.4 presents are the Advances in support for RISC-V systems, a growing architecture in the world of open hardware. Now, compatibility with RISCV CPUs has been improved, as well as new assembler optimizations to improve performance on these devices.
Also, PipeWire now features a native implementation of the JACK server, called pipewire_jackserver, which allows users to leverage the PipeWire JACK Control API. This facilitates integration with professional applications that rely on Jack Audio Connection Kit (JACK) for advanced audio connection management.
Support for MIDI 2.0 has also been improved.or with the implementation of Universal MIDI Packet (UMP), which optimizes data transmission and conversion between old and new formats.
As for Bluetooth, Pipe Wire Now allows you to send audio to multiple devices simultaneously, thanks to the implementation of the Basic Audio Profile (BAP), which optimizes audio handling in Bluetooth Low Energy (LE). It has also been added ASHA Hearing Aid Compatibility (Audio Streaming for Hearing Aids), improving latency and adding support for the G722 codec.
Another improvement that PipeWire 1.4 presents is that The “client-rt.conf” configuration no longer exists. Well from now on, All clients will depend on “ client.conf ”, which will give them real-time priority in your data threads.
On the part of the Module improvements, it is mentioned that the moduleo ROC has more configuration options, while the module SAP now only sends SDP updated when something changes and the module netjack-manager supports automatic connection of streams.
Other improvements featured:
- DSD support in ALSA: Support for Direct Stream Digital (DSD) format playback in the ALSA sound system is added.
- New Telephony API: Support for oFono has been integrated, making it easier to manage audio in calls.
- Video Conversion Optimization: A new FFmpeg-based plugin improves video conversion within PipeWire.
- More control over playback and capture rules: It is now possible to block audio playback or capture via rules in pulse.rules.
- HDMI Improvements: Detection of supported codecs such as PCM, AC3, EAC3 and TrueHD using HDMI EDID information is optimized.
- Improved watch information: Version v4l2 now offers more accurate clock data, which is essential for video and audio synchronization.
- Converting video streams: It is possible to use an ffmpeg-based conversion plugin in conjunction with the video adapter to perform stream conversions efficiently.
- The native protocol supports abstract sockets.
- The Pulse server supports blocking playback and capture in pulse.rules.
- The blocked state of the stream is now reported correctly in pulse-server.
- Fixed backflips in pulse-server.
- Added support for loopback and raop-sink latency settings.
- The RTP source now has a standby mode where it remains idle when no data is received.
- Added PTP timing support to RTP streams.
- The VBAN receiver can now dynamically create streams when detected.
- Improved error reporting when making links.
- Support for returning (canceling) an unqueued buffer in pw-stream.
- Added support for emitting events to pw-stream.
- pw-cat now supports stdin and stdout.
Finally, if you are interested in being able to know more about it, you can consult the details in the following link
It is worth mentioning that PipeWire is currently being adopted in most current Linux distributions and if you need to know if you have PipeWire, just run:
pipewire --version