[lundh]

I just upgraded XBMC from 11 to 12. (Actually I have been testing svn versions as well.) and I have found one serious sound related issue with Frodo that will keep me from using it but first something about my setup:
* I run XBMC on a Mac Mini with OS X Mountain Lion.
* I use a USB sound card: Apogee Duet 2 a 24 bit, 196kHz interface with 2 mono inputs and 2 stereo out.
* I have active (powered) speakers directly connected to this sound card.

What happens is that XBMC distorts the the most horrible way imaginable. I sometimes get a really loud harsh sound as is the case with the menu sounds and sometimes mostly loud noise (when I play movies).

I have tried different settings in XBMC with different results:
* 2.0: distorted as described above
* 2.1: Mono
* 3.1: Not distorted but I also dont get all channels downmixed.
* 4.0: No sound at all.
"Boost volume on downmix" or not does not seem to matter and neither does "Output stereo to all channels". Interestingly enough: Output stereo to all channels does nothing at all. It does not change what sound is being outputted in any of the configurations I have tries.

I have been looking in the log file and there is nothing related to sound there as far as I can tell. Any idea what I can do to get Frodo working?

Edit: Routing the audio through a 2 channel Soundflower audio interface works perfectly, its not an ideal solution by any means but it works. I would still like to be able to run XBMC without a software mixer/router though.

[Memphiz]

make sure that the speakerlayout is setup properly in the audio midi setup of macos and then set the same in xbmc

[lundh]

Thank you! I thought I had done that already but I had apparently missed the multi channel setup. That setup still had default settings without any assigned output channels. Selecting the proper output channels there seems to have helped. I'm a bit confused though, looking at the other output devices they appear to have the same default settings and they work.

[maxwellvizion]

I've played around with my sound settings and cannot get this problem to go away. It happens completely at random. Absolutely horrible bug considering the strength of my speakers. I wouldn't wish that noise on even my greatest enemy. Good lord

[prakar]

Same problem here.

The audio distortion can be described as a constant, loud background white noise - such as the sound of constant surf. Audio from the video file just manages to break through this, but requires a lot of focus to clearly distinguish.

Bad bug!

FYI - My XBMC is on a 2007 MacBook Pro and this problem happens when i'm playing streaming online video (YouTube, etc), and over WiFi from my Windows 7 professional networked laptop.

[Memphiz]

Did you try with latest nightlies?

[tixer]

I just encountered this problem myself, and decided I'd create an account to share my findings.

This was a clean xbmc install on an old Athlon 64 3400+ Windows XP sp3 machine, but the problem appears to be specific to the sound hardware I had installed. A Sound Blaster Live (CT4830) card. I had been using the digital coaxial output, and did not think to test the Analog. I am certain that it was the exact problem described above. All audio was "overmodulated." Loud, and distorted.

My "fix" was to remove the SBLive! card, and instead use the Realtek AC-97 codec built into this particular motherboard. (Jetway 754GT-P-VC) I think I trust the quality of the Sound Blaster more, but it is clearly so out of date as to not have much support out there. We'll see how she goes with this.

Thanks! and Good luck!

[Memphiz]

your windows bug is the same by accident. Osx uses complete seperated audio code. So those issues are definitly different...