Multichannel sound

[nstamoul]

Installing pulseaudio breaks multichannel sound,not only upmix (which I have no idea how to implement with pulseaudio) but also native multichannel sound.

[nstamoul]

Replying to nstamoul:

Installing pulseaudio breaks multichannel sound,not only upmix (which I have no idea how to implement with pulseaudio) but also native multichannel sound.

Ok got native multichannel working by setting the device to surround71 in default.pa. I just cant implement the upmix :( .

[jbglaw]

I think I got the same problem, which results in very slow sound playing through the two stereo speakers. The initial submitter's problem is probably solved by using the "surround71" device instead of hw:0, but I failed to figure out how to use something like that with multiple sound cards. I eg. do have three cards in my box and would like to be able to use any of them for multichannel output, not only the first one. Any hints for that?

[nstamoul]

Replying to jbglaw:

I think I got the same problem, which results in very slow sound playing through the two stereo speakers. The initial submitter's problem is probably solved by using the "surround71" device instead of hw:0, but I failed to figure out how to use something like that with multiple sound cards. I eg. do have three cards in my box and would like to be able to use any of them for multichannel output, not only the first one. Any hints for that?

First you have to find out if hw:0 includes all channels of your sound card or just a pair (e.g. front).Mine (audigy) has 4 seperate hw files (hw:0,0 hw:0,1 hw:0,2 hw:0,3) each bound to a stereo pair.

Then you need to use the combine-module sink to bind them,cant help you with that,havent done it ;).

[jbglaw]

Replying to nstamoul:

Replying to jbglaw:

I think I got the same problem, which results in very slow sound playing through the two stereo speakers. The initial submitter's problem is probably solved by using the "surround71" device instead of hw:0, but I failed to figure out how to use something like that with multiple sound cards. I eg. do have three cards in my box and would like to be able to use any of them for multichannel output, not only the first one. Any hints for that?

First you have to find out if hw:0 includes all channels of your sound card or just a pair (e.g. front).Mine (audigy) has 4 seperate hw files (hw:0,0 hw:0,1 hw:0,2 hw:0,3) each bound to a stereo pair. Then you need to use the combine-module sink to bind them,cant help you with that,havent done it ;).

I *really* have three surround-capable sound cards. "surround71" just addresses the first one, but up to now, I fail to find out how to access something like "surround71" on hw:1 or hw:2 instead of hw:0.

In your mentioned case, with several stereo channels that need a combine to bring up a "complete" surround card, I'd already know how to do that :-)

[nstamoul]

Got anything on the upmix problem? Its definatelly a .asoundrc problem! Any suggestions welcome!

[meden]

I managed to configure Pulseaudio with multichannel audio on multiple soundcards. It is a manual configuration, of course, because the hal module has only a basic use. So, manually loading the module-alsa-sink you have to specify the device in the format given by 'aplay -L'. As example here is my configuration:

# Loads In/Out Alsa modules for the Audigy
load-module module-alsa-sink device=front:CARD=Audigy,DEV=0 sink_name=Audigy_Out_2.0
load-module module-alsa-sink device=surround51:CARD=Audigy,DEV=0 sink_name=Audigy_Out_5.1
load-module module-alsa-source device=hw:0,0 source_name=Audigy_In
#
# Loads In/Out Alsa modules for the IntelHDA
load-module module-alsa-sink device=front:CARD=Intel,DEV=0 sink_name=IntelHDA_Out
load-module module-alsa-source device=hw:1,0 source_name=IntelHDA_In
#
# Loads In/Out OSS modules
load-module module-oss device="/dev/dsp" sink_name=Audigy_OSS source_name=Audigy_In_OSS
load-module module-oss device="/dev/dsp1" sink_name=IntelHDA_OSS source_name=IntelHDA_In_OSS

Anyway, I still have some minor issue with that configuration, because Pulsaudio cannot attach mixer (errors for both sinks and sources):

ALSA lib control.c:909:(snd_ctl_open_noupdate) Invalid CTL front:CARD=Audigy,DEV=0
I: alsa-util.c: Unable to attach to mixer front:CARD=Audigy,DEV=0: No such file or directory
I: alsa-util.c: Unable to attach to mixer hw:(null): No such device

[...]

ALSA lib control.c:909:(snd_ctl_open_noupdate) Invalid CTL surround51:CARD=Audigy,DEV=0
I: alsa-util.c: Unable to attach to mixer surround51:CARD=Audigy,DEV=0: No such file or directory
I: alsa-util.c: Unable to attach to mixer hw:(null): No such device

[...]

ALSA lib control.c:909:(snd_ctl_open_noupdate) Invalid CTL front:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
I: alsa-util.c: Unable to attach to mixer front:CARD=Intel,DEV=0: No such file or directory
I: alsa-util.c: Unable to attach to mixer hw:(null): No such device

Despite that, volme control works fine, as do switching streams and down/upmixing.

Another oddity is that in sink devices I have Audigy_Out_OSS (! - why not Audigy_In_OSS?) but not IntelHDA_OSS; in source devices I have only IntelHDA_In_Oss but not Audigy_In_OSS. Maybe these problems are to be reported in a separate ticket...

In attach the startup log (verbosity 3).

[meden]

Pulseaudio startup log

[lennart]

PA perfectly supports surround sound these days and does a simple but automatic up and downmixing. Closing this bug.