Playing multiple compressed audio files in iOS 3.0+, with Unity iphone v1.7

Unity Engine
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  1. Can this be achieved?
    (I understand that from iOS 3.0 onwards, it is possible to use software decoding for multiple mp3’s. I tried doing exactly that in unity iphone, but whenever i try to play an mp3 while one is already playing, the previous one will stop playing. There doesn’t seem to be an option to choose between hardware decode or software decode)

  2. In the release notes of unity 3.0, one of the feature stated is:
    “Hardware audio decoder is now shared between audio clips.”
    What does this mean exactly? It sounds like pre-unity 3.0 multiple compressed is impossible and only with unity 3.0 it is made possible?

Thank you!

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  1. If you don’t use unity all all to play sound then yes. Otherwise no.
    The iphone hardware does not play multiple compressed sound through hardware and Unity iPhone 1.x therefor opted to give you good performance instead of CPU killers as using multiple compressed sounds + pre 3GS devices = no game commonly because you are going to burn through up to 25% cpu just for the sound decompression, reducing your draw call budget among other things “below ground”

  2. Correct