Hi, I just bought me some nice 5.1 Creative Sound System Speakers and couldn't wait to exploit them at full 'speed'.
Unfortunetly I ran into some problems regarding 5.1 output. Apperently my soundcard, an integrated CMedia i810 card (fully capable of 5.1), can output only 4.0 with ALSA. Or this is the best configuration I was able to achive. I read many documents and tried some custom made PCMs and other tricks. The fact is that -Dplug:Surround51 only outputs in 4 speakers. Center and Woofer don't get any attention. This is what aplay was able to do with the test waves from Surround-SDL-testfiles, specially chan-id.wav. The fact is that my sound card uses, besides line out, line in and mic for additional output (i.e. the line in and mic are actually input and output capable). This setting, strange as it may sound, runs perfectly with Windows drivers (had to install Windows to make sure it's not a hw problem). Some other strange problems I encountered is that, apparently, the only settings the sound is sensitive to is PCM, LFE and Center. The rest is useless. I can set 2ch/4ch/6ch the output is still the same. I can mute Master, I can mute Surrround and change jack state as I please. Everything runs the same. Even stranger is that PCM controls my front-left and front-right speakers, LFE my rear-left one and Center my rear-right one! Another thing I noticed is that speaker-test gets an I/O error when attempting to play it through the surround5.1 plug-in. My distro is Slackware. I stay with current kernel 2.6.17.11 and my ALSA version is 1.0.11. Here are some logs (for amixer these are the default volumes that alsaconf sets-up after soundcard detection, I thought these were the most objective one that I could post): speaker-test 1.0.11 ==+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++== Playback device is plug:surround51 Stream parameters are 48000Hz, S16_LE, 6 channels Using 16 octaves of pink noise Rate set to 48000Hz (requested 48000Hz) Buffer size range from 3 to 5461 Period size range from 3 to 5461 Using max buffer size 5461 Periods = 4 was set period_size = 5461 was set buffer_size = 5461 buffer to small, could not use Unable to determine current swparams for playback: Input/output error Setting of swparams failed: Input/output error ==+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++== amixer.log ==+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++== Simple mixer control 'Master',0 Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right Limits: Playback 0 - 31 Mono: Front Left: Playback 23 [74%] [on] Front Right: Playback 23 [74%] [on] Simple mixer control 'PCM',0 Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right Limits: Playback 0 - 255 Mono: Front Left: Playback 230 [90%] [on] Front Right: Playback 230 [90%] [on] Simple mixer control 'Surround',0 Capabilities: pswitch Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right Mono: Front Left: Playback [on] Front Right: Playback [on] Simple mixer control 'Surround Jack Mode',0 Capabilities: enum Items: 'Shared' 'Independent' Item0: 'Independent' Simple mixer control 'Center',0 Capabilities: pvolume pvolume-joined pswitch pswitch-joined Playback channels: Mono Limits: Playback 0 - 31 Mono: Playback 31 [100%] [on] Simple mixer control 'LFE',0 Capabilities: pvolume pvolume-joined pswitch pswitch-joined Playback channels: Mono Limits: Playback 0 - 31 Mono: Playback 31 [100%] [on] Simple mixer control 'Line',0 Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-exclusive Capture exclusive group: 0 Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right Limits: Playback 0 - 31 Front Left: Playback 20 [65%] [on] Capture [off] Front Right: Playback 20 [65%] [on] Capture [off] Simple mixer control 'CD',0 Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-exclusive Capture exclusive group: 0 Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right Limits: Playback 0 - 31 Front Left: Playback 22 [71%] [on] Capture [off] Front Right: Playback 22 [71%] [on] Capture [off] Simple mixer control 'Mic',0 Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-exclusive Capture exclusive group: 0 Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right Limits: Playback 0 - 31 Front Left: Playback 0 [0%] [off] Capture [on] Front Right: Playback 0 [0%] [off] Capture [on] Simple mixer control 'Mic Boost (+20dB)',0 Capabilities: pswitch pswitch-joined Playback channels: Mono Mono: Playback [on] Simple mixer control 'Mic Select',0 Capabilities: enum Items: 'Mic1' 'Mic2' Item0: 'Mic1' Simple mixer control 'Video',0 Capabilities: cswitch cswitch-exclusive Capture exclusive group: 0 Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right Front Left: Capture [off] Front Right: Capture [off] Simple mixer control 'Phone',0 Capabilities: cswitch cswitch-exclusive Capture exclusive group: 0 Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right Front Left: Capture [off] Front Right: Capture [off] Simple mixer control 'IEC958',0 Capabilities: pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-joined Playback channels: Mono Capture channels: Mono Mono: Playback [on] Capture [off] Simple mixer control 'IEC958 Capture Monitor',0 Capabilities: pswitch pswitch-joined Playback channels: Mono Mono: Playback [on] Simple mixer control 'IEC958 Capture Valid',0 Capabilities: pswitch pswitch-joined Playback channels: Mono Mono: Playback [on] Simple mixer control 'IEC958 Playback AC97-SPSA',0 Capabilities: volume volume-joined Playback channels: Mono Capture channels: Mono Limits: 0 - 3 Mono: 3 [100%] Simple mixer control 'IEC958 Playback Source',0 Capabilities: enum Items: 'AC-Link' 'ADC' 'SPDIF-In' Item0: 'AC-Link' Simple mixer control 'PC Speaker',0 Capabilities: pvolume pvolume-joined pswitch pswitch-joined Playback channels: Mono Limits: Playback 0 - 15 Mono: Playback 10 [67%] [on] Simple mixer control 'Aux',0 Capabilities: pvolume pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-exclusive Capture exclusive group: 0 Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right Limits: Playback 0 - 31 Front Left: Playback 20 [65%] [on] Capture [off] Front Right: Playback 20 [65%] [on] Capture [off] Simple mixer control 'Mono Output Select',0 Capabilities: enum Items: 'Mix' 'Mic' Item0: 'Mix' Simple mixer control 'Capture',0 Capabilities: cvolume cswitch cswitch-joined Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right Limits: Capture 0 - 15 Front Left: Capture 0 [0%] [on] Front Right: Capture 0 [0%] [on] Simple mixer control 'Mix',0 Capabilities: cswitch cswitch-exclusive Capture exclusive group: 0 Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right Front Left: Capture [off] Front Right: Capture [off] Simple mixer control 'Mix Mono',0 Capabilities: cswitch cswitch-exclusive Capture exclusive group: 0 Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right Front Left: Capture [off] Front Right: Capture [off] Simple mixer control 'Channel Mode',0 Capabilities: enum Items: '2ch' '4ch' '6ch' Item0: '6ch' Simple mixer control 'DAC Clock Source',0 Capabilities: enum Items: 'AC-Link' 'SPDIF-In' 'Both' Item0: 'AC-Link' Simple mixer control 'External Amplifier',0 Capabilities: pswitch pswitch-joined Playback channels: Mono Mono: Playback [on] ==+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++== Thanks, Paul. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Using Tomcat but need to do more? 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