Sound cache¶
Sounds in Second Life arrive in a compressed form and have to be unpacked (decoded) before they can play. Most viewers throw the unpacked sounds away when you log out, so every sound has to be unpacked again next time. In places with a lot of ambient sound that costs time and frame rate, and sounds can start late.
Slipstream keeps decoded sounds on disk between sessions, in their own folder with their own size limit, so sounds you've heard before play straight away.
The settings are in Me → Preferences → Advanced, in the cache section at the top.
Options¶
| Option | What it does |
|---|---|
| Keep decoded sounds between sessions | On (default): sounds you've heard are kept for next time. Off: the sound folder is emptied when you quit (and at the next start, in case the viewer crashed). |
| Sound cache size | How much disk space decoded sounds may use, from 32 MB to 4096 MB. The default is 1024 MB (1 GB). When it's full, the sounds you haven't heard for longest are deleted; they are simply decoded again if they play later. Changes apply straight away. |
| Sound cache location (decoded sounds) | Where the sounds are kept. By default a folder called sounds inside your cache folder. Browse picks another folder, Default Location goes back to the standard one. A new location takes effect after a restart. |
Under the size you can see how much space is used and how many sound files there are. Hover over it to see the folder and how many sounds were removed this session.
Clear Cache (on the same tab) empties the sound folder too, whatever these options are set to.
When to change them¶
- Lots of disk space? Raise the size so sounds from all your usual places stay cached.
- Small or slow system drive? Move the sound cache to another drive with Browse, or lower the size.
- Want nothing left behind? Turn off Keep decoded sounds between sessions.
Advanced
Debug settings: SlipstreamKeepDecodedSounds, SlipstreamSoundCacheSizeMB and
SlipstreamSoundCacheLocation (empty = the default sounds folder). If the chosen folder can't be
written to, the default is used and a warning goes to the log.