Voice issues with the new voice servers
needs info
aamufalkland Resident
When toggling voice via a viewer hotkey there is a static sound for a few seconds, and voice cuts out or goes robotic far more often than they used to. This started the day the new voice service was activated on the parcel my friends and I use.
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Maestro Linden
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needs info
Maestro Linden
Hi aamufalkland Resident, I have a few questions:
- To be clear, is this issue specifically about using the 'Voice' hotkey to speak, in push-to-talk mode? In other words, does the issue notreproduce when toggling voice by either clicking either 'Speak' (microphone icon) UI button or when pressing the 'Toggle Voice' hot key (default: middle mouse button) to speak?
- Which environment are you seeing this under? Please include your 'About Second Life' or 'About Firestorm' text for each of the users involved. As Hecklezz mentions, Firestorm 7.2.3 release has a number of known bugs with voice compared to either Second Life Release 26.1.1.23806384790 or the Firestorm beta 7.2.4 (80703). The full text includes valuable information about your system.
- For the user who is generating static, which hardware model of microphone are they using for voice chat, and what is the connected interface (3.5mm analog, built-in laptop mic, USB, Bluetooth, etc)?
- For the user who is generating static, what are their voice recording settings listed in viewer Preferences? The 3 that come to mind are:
- Microphone noise suppression
- Echo cancellation
- Automatic Gain Control
- You mention that "If I mute mic outside of SL the problem does not happen.". To be clear, is that you hear other agents correctly when your own mic is muted? Or are you saying that others hear your voice garbled when speaking in SL voice andalso recording/broadcasting on a 2nd application? If so, which 2nd application are you using?
Hecklezz Resident
Maestro Linden Just a small fyi for future reference, our latest 7.2.4 (80703) beta that went out yesterday, is now in-line with LL's 26.2 in-terms of WebRTC support and fixes (minus nearby voice moderation).
They did mention below they tried using both the latest SL Viewer and using our nightly 7.2.4.80676 (which is up to date with LL's 26.2 WebRTC support and fixes, just like our 7.2.4.80703 beta).
Maestro Linden
Hecklezz Resident: Thanks, good to know. That feature set includes at least 1 more voice fix over what SL 26.1 offers.
Hecklezz Resident
Maestro Linden I cherry-picked them in and there was a few that were in 26.2-
- WebRTC voice being muted after quickly toggling the speak button.
- Incoming voice audio not working after editing audio settings.
- P2P voice not working if in a parcel with nearby voice disabled.
- WebRTC connection's task outliving the connection.
- Delaying voice renegotiation on disconnect to allow it to recover on its own.
There was a 6th one regarding toggling the speak button state while voice is moderated, but we couldn't include it as the nearby voice moderation isn't merged yet (will be merged when the rest of 26.2 is merged after it is fully released by LL).
Hecklezz Resident
Are you using Firestorm or Second Life Viewer? If you are using Firestorm 7.2.3 Release instead of Second Life Viewer, there has been quite a number of fixes that LL have made after our 7.2.3 release which resolves a lot of problems with WebRTC.
Our 7.2.4 Beta has quite a lot of those fixes already, but there is even more fixes not available in our current beta but are available in our nightly builds (we plan to have a new beta out hopefully soon which will include those fixes too).
Wesley Huntsman
Hecklezz Resident
the voice issues are persisting even through the 7.2.4 beta that includes voice quality, private calls not working or group voice and in most cases breaking the users experience because of this issues. While can have appreciation for the Work of Firestorm team that does not correct the problems with the voice servers which is clearly under LL control.
Put plainly Voice service is not working!
Hecklezz Resident
Wesley Huntsman The private and group voice you mention not working, is this perhaps when on a parcel that disables nearby voice? If so, that issue is fixed in our nightlies that I talked about and in our upcoming beta. If it is some different issue, can you please try on LL's 26.2 viewer and let us know if everything behaves there or not. You can find it here-
Wesley Huntsman
Hecklezz Resident
I am using both FS 7.2.4.80676 Nightly, and the current LL viewer..
as I stated in IM ...
" I am on the current Beta and Nightly build but the issue with Private calls is that it can be started on sim or region that allows them but then once the user travels to a sim that doesn't the call will be dropped. If that is how it is supposed to function that is unacceptable because vivox behavior would allow the Private call to persist as long as the call was started on a sim that would allow the call and because the call was private it would not interfere with anyone else." and "As to the quality of the Audio seem to be a lot less then previous vivox. those behaviors seem to be the result of server side issues not the end to end clients"
Maestro Linden
Wesley Huntsman: it sounds like you're describing https://secondlife.canny.io/server-bugs/p/voice-disconnects-when-you-teleport about voice calls disconnecting after teleport. There's a pending fix for that issue.
If you have other issues which are not exactly as what aamufalkland describes in the parent comment, you should file a separate Canny issue with appropriate information. For issues related to voice quality, we'll need details similar to what I asked in this issue, including specifics about voice settings, audio hardware, and what the steps to reproduce the issue are.
Wesley Huntsman
Maestro Linden It maybe related but I noticed that WEBRTC handles user voice interaction differently to how Vivox handled.
For instance under Vivox once a User Logs into Second life it would tell the OS to make available the users Microphone and connect to the voice service.
However under Web RTC it acts differently, were the System Will not always connect to voice service until the user toggles voice through button and if no voice is being used after toggling it seems to timeout and disconnect from the service which may not be a bug or glitch but a programed function to keep the voice server from being overloaded with too many communication requests?
Maestro Linden
Wesley Huntsman: That sounds like a separate viewer bug. Please file it separately. For that sort of issue, we'll want your 'about second life' text and probably also details about what audio hardware you're using for voice chat.
Wesley Huntsman
Maestro Lindenthat would not be caused by the audio hardware but OS and software. usually how Slplugin is interacting with audiodg of the Windows OS in my Case
Wesley Huntsman
Maestro LindenWhat I was describing could be an explanation of the quality drop which is feedback for this Listing of Static and voice drops in Local Where usesrs are in the same sim/region and parcel at the same time.