Amarok/Archives/Audio Engine Comparison
Feature Table
| Engine | Actively Maintained | Crossfading | KIO-Streaming† | Scope | Equalizer | Formats Supported |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| xine | Yes | Yes | HTTP only, with 1.1.4 smb | Yes | Yes | xine features |
| Helix | Yes | Yes in 1.4 | http, rtsp | Yes | Yes | Lots, with Real almost everything‡ |
| NMM | No | No | No | No | No | Lots |
† this means streaming from any protocol (eg FTP, SSH, FISH, etc.), this is also required for AudioCD playback
‡ yes, we really do mean every format known to man, yes even WMA
Engine Specific Texts
xine-engine
- Can play using a selection of installed xine-lib output plugins, such as OSS, ALSA, aRts, or ESD.
- Has gapless playback
Helix Engine
- Supports native outport to alsa with current realplayer nightly builds and soon--realplayer 11. Now also supports direct alsa output even with realplayer 10.
- Requires either Helixplayer 1.0+ or Realplayer 10.0+. Realplayer 10.0+ is recommended; Helixplayer is the same codebase as Realplayer, but without many of the more popular plugins (for example, no mp3 plugins).
- Doesn't work on AMD64 platform (works only on i386 and SUN Sparc).
NMM-engine
- Has video support.