Applet Bug: Enhanced Sound Applet causes full Cinnamon hangs on song changes

[Pxtl]

Applet version/Build date

Version 13.6.1 (2025-11-06 12:42:49) and Version 13.7.4 (2025-12-01 08:59:34)

Cinnamon version

Cinnamon 6.4.8

Distribution

Linux Mint 22.2 Zara

Graphics hardware and driver used

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 driver version 570.195.03 (from NVIDIA-smi)

Applet name and maintainer

sound150@claudiux @claudiux

What happened?

Using music player applications (both Youtube Music in web-browsers as well as native applications like RhythmBox), when the song changes (either automatically or by user intervention) the Cinnamon UI locks up momentarily - only the mouse-pointer is still able to move. The music starts before the halt ends.

The hang only appears if Cinnamon has been running for a long time (hours? Days? Unsure, difficult to measure obviously). Initially a second or two, but can drag up towards a minute. It may always be there but is too small to notice when Cinnamon is fresh.

Restarting Cinnamon makes it go away.

This appears to occur regardless of options used within Enhanced Sound Applet - I was assuming it was a problem related to album art loading, but if the Music Controller feature is turned off it still occurs.

The problem persists even if Sound150 has been removed from the panel... which would indicate that it's not sound150's fault, except that if I restart Cinnamon without Sound150 loaded, the problem does not occur.

Other information

No response

[Pxtl]

On further inspection: it apparently also happens with sound-effects on a smaller scale... I'm still figuring this one. I don't use a lot of sound-effects.

[claudiux]

Hi @Pxtl,

Thanks for reporting this issue, which I've never encountered. glxgears runs smoothly. I'll remain vigilant.

[claudiux]

@Pxtl Please try v13.7.5.

[Pxtl]

Will do. And thanks for pointing out glxgears - I'd been trying nonsense like mixing typing with hotkeys or dragging windows around to detect it. With glxgears I can see it much more clearly. Song changes are currently with the age of my current session (since morning) about a second of jank. Shorter clicky sound-effects seem to limit the halting to the length of the sound-effect.

I'll get latest and restart my Cinnamon and let you know how it turns out.

[Pxtl]

@claudiux

Okay, after getting latest and restarting Cinnamon: there's still definitely a momentary stutter in glxGears when I switch tracks. If I restart Cinnamon without Sound150 loaded, there is no visible reaction in glxGears. I'll leave both running while I work to day and see if the halt still climbs to be more substantial over time.

[Pxtl]

Video of bug in v13.7.5:

gh-sound150-bug-demo.mp4

[claudiux]

I do not have a nVidia graphic card to test it. I'll try to test it on another computer.