Stereo sound to 5.1
 

Hi! Is it possible to mix a stereo sound (music for example :)) to 6 channel? Now I use the "Four channel mode" feature in alsamixer, but it only uses the front and the rear speakers, but the centre speaker remains silent. When playing 5.1 sound, it works fine. The subwoofer works, but at a very low volume. On windows, the sound driver could use all the 6 channels, and the subwwofer was much louder. I have a CM8738 sound card and a Trust Soundwave 2000P speaker system. Thanks for the help!

It's actually handled by the sound player for music. Xmms, for example, will play multichannel when using the alsa plugin. It's not true surround, but kind of an intelligent remix (as most music is only recorded in stereo). Also, it depends on whether or not the sound driver fully supports that chip. In alsamixer, you should have controls for Front, Rear, Center, and LFE, if it supports 5.1 channel (Side will also be there for 7.1 surround). If you only have Front and Rear, then you only have 4 channel support.

If you are feeling adventurous, you can try installing the latest snapshot of alsa. Download the driver, lib, and utils at a minimum. Compile them and install. Rerun alsaconf to make sure it is configured correctly.

I don't have even front and rear channels in alsamixer :(
I only have these:
Master
3D Control
PCM
Synth
Line
Line-In
CD
Mic
Mic Boos
Mic-In M
Phone
IEC958 5
IEC958 C
IEC958 I
IEC958 I
IEC958 I
IEC958 I
IEC958 L
IEC958 O
PC Speak
PC Speak
Aux
Four channel mode

In xmms, if I choose surround51 for device, it starts playing, but the speakers are silent. I use alsa-cmpci module for my sound card. If it doesn't fully support this chip, than how can it play 5.1 DVD-s correctly?

Like I mentioned earlier, you may want to upgrade to the latest alsa version. If you type "cat /proc/asound/version", it will tell you what version you are running.

What distro are you running? You mentioned Mandriva, but your profile indicates Fedora Core 2.

I use Mandriva 2006, my profile was old :)I use alsa 1.0.9b, that comes with Mandriva. I couldn't find a newer rpm.

You won't find a newer rpm for a little while. Alsa 1.0.11 just went gold last Tuesday or Wednessday. It won't make it to Mandriva until their 2007 edition at the earliest (beta starts mid September). I'm working on a packaged version next week for work, I'll let you know how it goes. It's GPL, so there's no reason I couldn't share it. I just don't have anyplace to post it to.

What kind of bandwidth do you have? I could email you the driver rpm built specifically for your system, or I can email the big package (all drivers - easier to build, but bigger download).

That would be great! Thanks. I have 1.5 Mbps connection, so you can email the big package. But I have only 25 Mb space in my email account. My adress is sevcsik@citromail.hu

Well, it may take a little longer than I had hoped. I'm having issues with the driver in Mandriva (kernel segfaults). I've reverted back to 1.0.9b (default), and will plug away at this issue tomorrow.

It may be a few days before I get this figured out, so be patient. I'll get back to you as soon as I feel it is semi-stable.

Ok. Keep up the good work :) Thanks

Ok, I think I have it ready to go for now. There are still a few kinks to fix, but it is running on my system just fine.

I'll send you the alsa-lib, alsa-lib-devel, and alsa-utils in binary rpm form, but the driver you should rebuild, simply to make sure it matches the kernel you are running. You'll need to rebuild and reinstall it each time you get a new kernel.

Thanks, I installed it, but nothing changed :( Now I swapped the rear channel with the center/subwoofer, so I have bass :) Thanks for the help

I'm seeing some interesting behaviour too. In testing my 5.1 surround, audio is distributed equally between the channels (i.e. Front right, rear right, LFE are te same, and front left, rear left, and center are the same).

More debugging....

For me, the Center/LFE channel gets nothing :(

Check your mixer settings with alsamixer (open a console window, and type alsamixer at the prompt). To unmute different channels (marked with an mm), press m. Q and Z are Left up and down (for the stereo channels), W & X are both channels, and E & C are the right channels. It's kind of easy to figure out from there. Tab selects between playback, capture, and all channels showing.

I also have a Phillips 5.1 soundcard, which is what you seem to have, sevi. My 5.1 sound was working perfectly for a while, on videos such as LOTR. Then I popped in The Italian Job one day, and sound was messed up, only going out the rear speakers. Someone with a similar problem mentioned that they have Creative Inspire 5.1 5300 speakers, but I don't see how that can be part of the problem. My system has been acting weird for a while, perhaps I should reinstall already. But does anyone know if this is soundcard specific? The one we have uses a C-Media PCI CMI8738-MC6 chipset. Fiddling with alsamixer controls has no effect whatsoever, except sometimes emitting a static sound from my center speaker. I believe it worked at one point, but was never sure.

Seriously, does anyone have any ideas on this? I will reinstall Slackware when I have the time, and report if it helped or not. I never had any problems with this sound card and xine surround sound output in the four years that I have had it.

EDIT: Look here: http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...ad.php?t=23167

Good day,

I am having 4.1 surround problems for over 1 year now.I am using an Abit NV8 ,onboard sound.Alsa is :Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.11rc2 (Wed Jan 04 08:57:20 2006 UTC).

...2.6.15-1.2054_FC5


I cannot get all my 4 speakers running.only one front & one rear + Hub are working.I have 4.1 surrounds .

Trust me,i've tried to get them all working for MONTHSSSSS...

If you can help me please?

Martin.

Guignol: Could you send me the output from "lspci -vn" and "cat /proc/asound/card0/codec#2" (or whatever codec appears). I've been working on alsa drivers for a little bit now, and may be able to spot a fix for you.

Also, try downloading the latest packages (driver/libs/utils) from alsa-project.org. It "may" have already been fixed.

Thx for the reply G,its appreciated,

Here it is:
codec97#0]# cat ac97#0-0
0-0/0: Realtek ALC850 rev 0

PCI Subsys Vendor: 0x147b
PCI Subsys Device: 0x1c13

Revision : 0x00
Compat. Class : 0x00
Subsys. Vendor ID: 0xffff
Subsys. ID : 0xffff

Capabilities :
DAC resolution : 16-bit
ADC resolution : 16-bit
3D enhancement : No 3D Stereo Enhancement

Current setup
Mic gain : +0dB [+0dB]
POP path : pre 3D
Sim. stereo : off
3D enhancement : off
Loudness : off
Mono output : MIX
Mic select : Mic1
ADC/DAC loopback : off
Double rate slots: 7/8
Extended ID : codec=0 rev=2 LDAC SDAC CDAC DSA=0 SPDIF DRA
Extended status : SPCV LDAC SDAC CDAC SPDIF=10/11
SPDIF Control : Consumer PCM Category=0x2 Generation=1 Rate=48kHz


~]# lspci -vn

00:00.0 0580: 10de:005e (rev a3)
Subsystem: 147b:1c13
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, fast devsel, latency 0
Capabilities: [44] HyperTransport: Slave or Primary Interface
Capabilities: [e0] HyperTransport: MSI Mapping

00:01.0 0601: 10de:0050 (rev a3)
Subsystem: 147b:1c13
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, fast devsel, latency 0

00:01.1 0c05: 10de:0052 (rev a2)
Subsystem: 147b:1c13
Flags: 66MHz, fast devsel, IRQ 11
I/O ports at fc00 [size=32]
I/O ports at 1c00 [size=64]
I/O ports at 1c40 [size=64]
Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2

00:02.0 0c03: 10de:005a (rev a2) (prog-if 10)
Subsystem: 147b:1c13
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 225
Memory at fe02f000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2

00:02.1 0c03: 10de:005b (rev a3) (prog-if 20)
Subsystem: 147b:1c13
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 217
Memory at fe02e000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=256]
Capabilities: [44] Debug port
Capabilities: [80] Power Management version 2

00:04.0 0401: 10de:0059 (rev a2)
Subsystem: 147b:1c13
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 50
I/O ports at f000 [size=256]
I/O ports at ec00 [size=256]
Memory at fe02d000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2

00:06.0 0101: 10de:0053 (rev f2) (prog-if 8a)
Subsystem: 147b:1c13
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, fast devsel, latency 0
I/O ports at e000 [size=16]
Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2

00:07.0 0101: 10de:0054 (rev f3) (prog-if 85)
Subsystem: 147b:1c13
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 217
I/O ports at 09f0 [size=8]
I/O ports at 0bf0 [size=4]
I/O ports at 0970 [size=8]
I/O ports at 0b70 [size=4]
I/O ports at cc00 [size=16]
Memory at fe02b000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2

00:08.0 0101: 10de:0055 (rev f3) (prog-if 85)
Subsystem: 147b:1c13
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 225
I/O ports at 09e0 [size=8]
I/O ports at 0be0 [size=4]
I/O ports at 0960 [size=8]
I/O ports at 0b60 [size=4]
I/O ports at b800 [size=16]
Memory at fe02a000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2

00:09.0 0604: 10de:005c (rev a2) (prog-if 01)
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, fast devsel, latency 0
Bus: primary=00, secondary=01, subordinate=01, sec-latency=32
I/O behind bridge: 0000a000-0000afff
Memory behind bridge: fb000000-fcffffff
Prefetchable memory behind bridge: fdf00000-fdffffff

00:0a.0 0680: 10de:0057 (rev a3)
Subsystem: 147b:1c13
Flags: bus master, 66MHz, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 233
Memory at fe029000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
I/O ports at b400 [size=8]
Capabilities: [44] Power Management version 2

00:0b.0 0604: 10de:005d (rev a3)
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
Bus: primary=00, secondary=02, subordinate=02, sec-latency=0
I/O behind bridge: 00009000-00009fff
Memory behind bridge: fde00000-fdefffff
Prefetchable memory behind bridge: 00000000fdd00000-00000000fdd00000
Capabilities: [40] Power Management version 2
Capabilities: [48] Message Signalled Interrupts: 64bit+ Queue=0/1 Enable+
Capabilities: [58] HyperTransport: MSI Mapping
Capabilities: [80] Express Root Port (Slot+) IRQ 0
Capabilities: [100] Virtual Channel

00:0c.0 0604: 10de:005d (rev a3)
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
Bus: primary=00, secondary=03, subordinate=03, sec-latency=0
I/O behind bridge: 00008000-00008fff
Memory behind bridge: fdc00000-fdcfffff
Prefetchable memory behind bridge: 00000000fdb00000-00000000fdb00000
Capabilities: [40] Power Management version 2
Capabilities: [48] Message Signalled Interrupts: 64bit+ Queue=0/1 Enable+
Capabilities: [58] HyperTransport: MSI Mapping
Capabilities: [80] Express Root Port (Slot+) IRQ 0
Capabilities: [100] Virtual Channel

00:0d.0 0604: 10de:005d (rev a3)
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
Bus: primary=00, secondary=04, subordinate=04, sec-latency=0
I/O behind bridge: 00007000-00007fff
Memory behind bridge: fda00000-fdafffff
Prefetchable memory behind bridge: 00000000fd900000-00000000fd900000
Capabilities: [40] Power Management version 2
Capabilities: [48] Message Signalled Interrupts: 64bit+ Queue=0/1 Enable+
Capabilities: [58] HyperTransport: MSI Mapping
Capabilities: [80] Express Root Port (Slot+) IRQ 0
Capabilities: [100] Virtual Channel

00:0e.0 0604: 10de:005d (rev a3)
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0
Bus: primary=00, secondary=05, subordinate=05, sec-latency=0
I/O behind bridge: 00006000-00006fff
Memory behind bridge: f8000000-faffffff
Prefetchable memory behind bridge: 00000000d8000000-00000000dff00000
Capabilities: [40] Power Management version 2
Capabilities: [48] Message Signalled Interrupts: 64bit+ Queue=0/1 Enable+
Capabilities: [58] HyperTransport: MSI Mapping
Capabilities: [80] Express Root Port (Slot+) IRQ 0
Capabilities: [100] Virtual Channel

00:18.0 0600: 1022:1100
Flags: fast devsel
Capabilities: [80] HyperTransport: Host or Secondary Interface

00:18.1 0600: 1022:1101
Flags: fast devsel

00:18.2 0600: 1022:1102
Flags: fast devsel

00:18.3 0600: 1022:1103
Flags: fast devsel

01:08.0 0300: 1002:4754 (rev 41)
Subsystem: 1002:4754
Flags: bus master, stepping, medium devsel, latency 32
Memory at fb000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
I/O ports at ac00 [size=256]
Memory at fcfff000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
[virtual] Expansion ROM at fdf00000 [disabled] [size=128K]

05:00.0 0300: 10de:00ce (rev a2)
Subsystem: 10de:0243
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 5
Memory at f8000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
Memory at d8000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=128M]
Memory at f9000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
[virtual] Expansion ROM at fa000000 [disabled] [size=128K]
Capabilities: [60] Power Management version 2
Capabilities: [68] Message Signalled Interrupts: 64bit+ Queue=0/0 Enable-
Capabilities: [78] Express Endpoint IRQ 0
Capabilities: [100] Virtual Channel
Capabilities: [128] Power Budgeting

Thanks in advance!I'll go & see for the alsa project in the meanwile.

Martin.

Any ideas on my problem? Has there been any progress on the alsa cmedia drivers?

Ok all. I need to take a step back a second. I only just started working on the alsa driver stuff, and am currently only familiar with the Intel HDA audio spec. I'd suggest posting your other soundcard issues in the alsa-project.org bugzilla site. I might be able to help later, but right now I'm concentrating on HDA audio. Sorry.

Keep checking the alsa-project site for new release information.

Alright! Thx anyways Grue ;)