Hi guys! Is there a way to get my KDE Neon to prefer aptX over ldac_HQ? If I understand it correctly, ldac seems to be a bit more unstable jumping over different bitrates when having interference, and aptX might be more stable? I’d like to try the difference, but not sure how to force Neon to work with the aptX codec with my headsets (Sony XM2 and XM5). I’m trying all this because I don’t seem to be able to get any decent audio quality. It’s super broken, stuttering constantly. Even changing from A2DP sink to the HFP mode (which I understand it to have lower bitrate and latency due to being designed for talking) improves it just very slightly, with the stutter continuing. This doesn’t happen if I boot into windows on the same computer, audio works flawlessly.
Your headset doesn’t support anything above sbc I think.
That…is not correct. As mentioned, these are the higher end Sony XM2 and XM5. They support LDAC, at least the XM2 also AptX and HD, and some others.
Yeah, I added later, you might need to add the bluez stack to get proper ldac and aptx support, pulseudio only supports sbc by default.
…on OP I did mention that ldac_HQ was already being selected, and stuttering. I wanted to change to aptX instead. So bluez stack is/was installed. But nevermind, I ended up changing the whole audio stack to pipewire. Seems to work much better than pulseaudio, and has more options to individually choose my specific codec, not just the container (sbc/a2dp sink).
Pulseaudio is… bad.
I’m just wondering how you knew you were on ldac if it didn’t show up in output settings, I mean I have a led that says, but I’d want to know from linux too.
Hmmm some of the console commands I was using for troubleshooting listed the enabled codec. But no idea on how to change it from there.
Sorry, I sent this reply to myself:
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Bluetooth_headset
Anyway, had the same fight with bluez5, pipewire fixed it too, is there nothing it can’t solve?