PipeWire 1.6 has begun development, aiming to enhance audio and video stream management on Linux systems. This upcoming version introduces several significant features, including Bluetooth Audio Streaming for Hearing Aids (ASHA support) and MIDI 2.0 clip compatibility.
Additionally, PipeWire 1.6 promises improvements in explicit synchronization, a new timer-queue helper for better timeout scheduling, and examples of Dolby Surround and Dolby Pro Logic II filter configurations. There’s also added support for the Razer BlackShark v3 headset, ensuring that users can experience top-notch audio quality.
The architectural updates include a robust control stream parser designed to safely handle concurrent updates while parsing, and modifications to the ALSA node setup aimed at achieving low latency with the ALSA Firewire driver. Furthermore, the code related to link negotiations has seen substantial refactoring to enhance performance.
For more detailed changes in PipeWire 1.6, users can refer to the release notes available on the project’s GitLab page. This is a pre-release version, meant for testing, and not recommended for production environments.