mpd going silent for a second every few minutes

[rynnon]

curious problem that I can't figure out: every few minutes, mpd is silent for about a second.

this only started recently (I've been running Mint 18 + i3-gaps + mpd + ncmpcpp + nfs for a year without issues), so I thought that it was due to me using new software, but even after uninstalling/disabling said software it keeps happening. does anyone have an idea what could be happening here?

CPU: i5-6500 (load average ~0.28)

OS: Linux Mint 18

Kernel: 4.13

WM: i3-gaps 4.14.1

terminal: urxvt

mpd: 0.19.12

music player: ncmcpp 0.7.7

polybar (with mpd module active): 2.5.2

music directory served per NFS over ethernet

new software I recently started using / tried out: KDE Plasma, KDE PIM, LXQt + i3, Akregator (KDE's RSS reader), dunst, falkon (flatpak version), Virtualbox 5.2 via PPA

I disabled or uninstalled all of the new applications, but maybe I missed something?

On another system with a very similar config, but less playing around with different DEs, mpd works without hickups. This should rule out issues with the file server.

Things I tried:

• I deleted the 5MB log file, but the effect of that was modest at best.

• Tried increasing audio buffer; even 32MB audio buffer don't work.

~/.mpd/mpd.conf:

music_directory     "/home/rynnon/TERA/Musik/"                                                                                            

playlist_directory  "/home/rynnon/.mpd/playlists"                                                                                         

db_file         "/home/rynnon/.mpd/mpd.db"                                                                                                

log_file        "/home/rynnon/.mpd/log"                                                                                                   

pid_file        "/home/rynnon/.mpd/pid"                                                                                                   

user            "rynnon"                                                                                                                  
group           "rynnon"                                                                                                                  

bind_to_address     "localhost"                                                                                                           

bind_to_address     "~/.mpd/socket"                                                                                                       

port            "6601"                                                                                                                    

input {                                                                                                                                   
        plugin "curl"                                                                                                                     
#       proxy "proxy.isp.com:8080"                                                                                                        
#       proxy_user "user"                                                                                                                 
#       proxy_password "password"                                                                                                         
}                                                                                                                                         

audio_output {                                                                                                                            
    type        "pulse"                                                                                                                   
    name        "MPD"                                                                                                                     
##  server      "remote_server"     # optional                                                                                            
##  sink        "remote_server_sink"    # optional                                                                                        
}                                                                                                                                         

audio_buffer_size "32000"                                                                                                                 

buffer_before_play "20%"

excerpt from log file (it doesn't show anything out of the ordinary that matches the times of the hickups, though):

Mar 04 13:22 : player: played "instrumental hiphop/Red Snapper/Red Snapper_Prince Blimey/12 Lo-Beam.mp3"
Mar 04 13:22 : client: [0] opened from 127.0.0.1:39312
Mar 04 13:22 : avahi: Service 'Music Player' successfully established.
Mar 04 13:23 : client: [1] opened from 127.0.0.1:39324
Mar 04 13:23 : client: [2] opened from 127.0.0.1:39326
Mar 04 13:23 : client: [0] closed
Mar 04 13:23 : client: [3] opened from 127.0.0.1:39336
Mar 04 13:28 : player: played "instrumental hiphop/Red Snapper/Red Snapper_Our Aim Is To Satisfy Red Snapper/04 Don't Go Nowhere.mp3"
Mar 04 13:33 : player: played "instrumental hiphop/Red Snapper/Red Snapper_Our Aim Is To Satisfy Red Snapper/09 Alaska Street.mp3"
Mar 04 13:38 : player: played "instrumental hiphop/Red Snapper/Red Snapper_Our Aim Is To Satisfy Red Snapper/07 Bussing.mp3"
Mar 04 13:44 : player: played "instrumental hiphop/Red Snapper/Red Snapper_Our Aim Is To Satisfy Red Snapper/11 They're Hanging Me Tonight.mp3"
Mar 04 13:49 : player: played "instrumental hiphop/Red Snapper/Red Snapper_Our Aim Is To Satisfy Red Snapper/10 Belladonna.mp3"

[MaxKellermann]

Your MPD version is ancient and unsupported.

[rynnon]

That mpd version is the current one in Ubuntu LTS. Even if it is unsupported by the mpd developers, surely you have an idea of what causes this kind of issue?

[MaxKellermann]

No, I won't even dare to look at problems with old MPD versions because over the years I've learned it just wastes my time. Ask Ubuntu for support if they decide to not ship MPD bug fixes.