Linux, Audio – Options for Using Skype 4.3 Without PulseAudio, Only ALSA

alsaaudiolinuxpulse-audioskype

I have been using Skype for over 10 years now, almost since the initial release, and most of my friends/family/colleagues use it too. So switching IM is not an option.

Microsoft has recently changed Skype protocol to force users to update to newer version. I will skip the emotional part a.k.a "What do I think about MicroSoft". If this info is new for you, feel free to read:

The situation is simple I have to update to newest version even on my Linux Mint machine. Newest version for Linux is 4.3

The problem I have faced is that in v 4.3 as part of improvements, Microsoft has dropped the support of ALSA:

So now Skype can only be used with PulseAudio. I have uninstalled PulseAudio long time ago because it was the source of countless bugs and glitches. Here is the list (not the full one) of issues I was experiencing with PulseAudio:

  • Mute button mutes the sound but does not unmute it
  • Slider of Pavucontrol gradually increases the sound to ~60%, then just jumps to 100%
  • When playing movies, pause buttons stops the video, but the sound continues to play for ~5 seconds.
  • When switching between songs or rewinding/seeking in Audacious sound becomes choppy
  • Choppy sound in Youtube
  • High CPU usage by PulseAudio process.
  • Sound is choppy in VirtualBox guest (tested with win XP only)

I am not the author of the phrase, but I will quote it here, because I strongly agree with it:

Most problems with the sound in Linux can be solved by removing PulseAudio

So now I face the dilemma: I have to use Skype, because I cannot force all my friends/family colleagues who are mostly Windows users to switch to other IM software. But to continue using Skype I now need to install PulseAudio (thanks to Microsoft). And, (hurrah!) I get all the old bugs, that I missed so much.

Does anyone have a workaround to this problem? Is there a way to use Skype 4.3 with ALSA? Or is there a way to trick the system and log in with the older version of Skype? Or maybe (in the worst case) run PulseAudio just for Skype and make sure it does not interfere with the rest of applications, drivers and system sound?

I am using Linux Mint 13: Maya

Any suggestions, thoughts, links will be much appreciated.

Best Answer

You can try using apulse: it is minimalistic pulseaudio emulator made specifically to run Skype 4.3 with ALSA. You need 32-bit build even on 64-bit machine.

I personally had troubles with microphone on Ubuntu 14.04, but for most people it works fine.

To build apulse on Ubuntu (and related distros), you must install following packages: pkg-config build-essential cmake libglib2.0-dev:i386 libasound2-dev:i386 gcc-multilib (probably some other too).

The build process more or less follows the one described in README:

mkdir build && cd build
PKG_CONFIG_PATH=/usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/pkgconfig CFLAGS=-m32 cmake -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/usr -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release ..
make
sudo make install
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