[Asterisk-Users] mpg123 issue and solution

[Philipp von Klitzing]

Hi!

> If you put mp3 files into your mohmp3 directory and these files have ID3v2
> tags, mpg123 will throw an error message "Found new ID3 Header",
> regardless of the -q flag.  
> 
> This, in turn, will cause Asterisk to crash (yes), although it's a soft
> crash (exits cleanly).
> 
> It took me forever to figure this out, since the default mp3 and
> everything else was working fine.  And the lack of any meaningfull error 
> messages made diagnosis even more difficult....
> 
> My work around was to open the file in WinAmp and remove the ID3 tags
> entirely.  mpg123 and Asterisk were both happy and there was much
> rejoycing.

See also:
http://www.voip-info.org/wiki-Asterisk+config+musiconhold.conf
(as well as the Wiki Asterisk FAQ section concerning variable bit rate)

> It might be a good idea to move away from mpg123 as it is no longer
> supported and there are bound to be more problems like this.  MAD seems to
> be what everyone is migrating to...

Indeed mpg123 is known to be the cause for many problems.

Cheers, Philipp

> Finally, if anyone has any ideas about how to improve IAX voice quality,
> I'd be happy to hear them.  Everything is hearable, but there are an
> awfull lot of clicks and pops in the background.

This is probably due to the IAX software phone that you are using (and 
its underlying library). On * server to * server connections this 
shouldn't be the case (if yes: try to enable/disable the jitter buffer, 
see other mails here).

-Philipp-