Bluetooth audio is my least favorite part of using Linux and it seems like my coworkers agree. I hear a lot of praise for pipewire, but it doesn’t match what I experience. Does any system work well for anyone?
To clarify, it can work. But it’s a harsh experience compared to say Android. I’ve used Ubuntu, Fedora, and PopOS. I’ve tried a few different headphones, using Galaxy Buds 2 current. Pulseaudio tends to “do as it’s told” but doesn’t automatically switch to the right (confusingly named) profile. With Ubuntu 23.10, using pipewire, it does automatic switch profiles. Sometimes this works great. But very often, it gets stuck on on a profile or just stops working. I have to reconnect bluetooth to fix it.
Is there some magic combination of things that works or is this just how it is for everyone?
So I’ve recently moved over to using my Pixel buds pro almost full time and am hoping you stoke a convo here to revisit.
KDE Connect affords us the ability to fire off commands from a phone to do any number of things. One use case of mine is to disconnect/reconnect Bluetooth devices from the desktop since it is greedy and tends to bogart my earbuds when playback stops on other connections. This has worked pretty well so far but with that in mind, I have only just started playing around with things and so I look forward to refining the experience with other utilities.
That said, I find Bluetooth is buggy on almost every OS out there (Android is constantly in what feels like a state of repair…)
Best of luck!