Generated preset audio degrades after pause/resume on EasyEffects + PipeWire (possible WirePlumber node-suspend interaction)

[guillermomirandagar]

I used this tool to convert my Dolby Atmos config to an EasyEffects preset on Kubuntu 26.04. The preset sounds correct when EasyEffects starts, but degrades (quieter, distant, slightly distorted) after pausing and resuming audio playback in the browser. I've opened a detailed report on the EasyEffects side here, including diagnostics (pw-top, qpwgraph): wwmm/easyeffects#5159 It may also be related to this existing EasyEffects issue about audio corruption when EasyEffects' virtual sink goes idle and resumes: wwmm/easyeffects#4942 Flagging here too in case it's relevant to how this tool structures the generated convolver-based preset, or just for visibility since users of this tool are likely to hit the same issue.

[antoinecellerier]

Thanks for raising this. I've had the same happen to me once a couple of days back. I don't think it's something this converter project can address as all it does is generate presets for Easy Effects. This is likely an Easy Effects problem. Do you have a reliable repro? I've only hit it once so far so not sure how to repro to dig further in debugging this.

[antoinecellerier]

Also looks like your link to issue 4942 directs to 5159 for some reason

[guillermomirandagar]

No worries, thanks for the response. The repro steps that have worked for me are:

1. Reboot the system (fresh EasyEffects + WirePlumber state)
2. Confirm Easy Effects Sink is the active default audio sink (wpctl status)
3. Play audio/video in Firefox — sounds correct
4. Pause playback for roughly 10+ seconds
5. Resume playback

After this, the audio is degraded ( it has distant/muffled feel and slightly distorted) compared to step 3, even though the EasyEffects pipeline remains visually connected, confirmed via qpwgraph. Firefox stays linked through Easy Effects Sink → Convolver → EQ → Multiband Compressor → Limiter → physical sink the whole time). In pw-top, I sometimes observed the ee_soe_* filter nodes drop to "I" (idle) status after the pause, though this wasn't 100% consistent across every test. It seems to happen most reliably after the very first pause/resume cycle following a fresh EasyEffects start, though I haven't fully isolated whether timing (e.g. exact pause duration) matters.

Totally, I just opened the issue here to let you know about it.

[antoinecellerier]

Interesting. I'm definitely not getting the same here despite being a heavy Firefox user. In case it's useful, I run Debian Unstable which ships easyeffects 8.2.4. I think when I hit the issue it was after a Gnome logout / login loop ... but that hasn't reproduced it yet.

Also while you're here, if the converted output is working well for you (outside of this bug), would you mind sharing --speaker-info output from the conversion script so I can reference your device as known working? unless it's already one of the listed devices.

[antoinecellerier]

And wireplumber 0.5.15

[antoinecellerier]

btw I'm curious if you tried the pipewire filter chain option if easy effects is showing to be problematic. That doesn't address the underlying bug but might be a good workaround to try? https://github.com/antoinecellerier/speaker-tuning-to-easyeffects#pipewire-filter-chain-instead-of-easyeffects