Hey everbody,
I'm currently strugling to get my media center up and running. Today I installed the AE version by accident to solve a problem with MPEG1 playback. Everything worked fine including audio (either via HDMI or via analog out).
However I want the system to put audio on both outputs so I built myself a nice little .asoundrc. It works wonderful: 5.1 on analog output to an old surround system and 2.0 on HDMI to a stereo TV.
However I could not find the custom output option any more (I am sure it was there before replacing the ubuntu version with the git version). And, as you stated in this thread a couple of times, it is gone.
Whatever, I thought, just replace it in the config file:
Code:
<audiooutput>
<ac3passthrough>false</ac3passthrough>
<audiodevice>ALSA:beide</audiodevice>
<channellayout>8</channellayout>
<dontnormalizelevels>true</dontnormalizelevels>
<dtshdpassthrough>false</dtshdpassthrough>
<dtspassthrough>false</dtspassthrough>
<guisoundmode>1</guisoundmode>
<mode>0</mode>
<multichannellpcm>false</multichannellpcm>
<passthroughaac>false</passthroughaac>
<passthroughdevice>ALSA:beide</passthroughdevice>
<stereoupmix>false</stereoupmix>
<truehdpassthrough>false</truehdpassthrough>
</audiooutput>
The "beide" device is the one which outputs to both devices.
Unfortunately xbmc ignores this setting and chooses to use hw:CARD=Intel,DEV=0 instead (which is the surround system).
The log for that specific part is:
Code:
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: CSoftAE::InternalOpenSink - sink incompatible, re-starting
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: CAESinkALSA::Initialize - Attempting to open device hw:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: CAESinkALSA::InitializeHW - Your hardware does not support AE_FMT_FLOAT, trying other formats
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: CAESinkALSA::InitializeHW - Using data format AE_FMT_S32NE
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 DEBUG: CAESinkALSA::InitializeHW - Request: periodSize 512, periods 16, bufferSize 8192
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 DEBUG: CAESinkALSA::InitializeHW - Got: periodSize 512, periods 16, bufferSize 8192
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 DEBUG: CAESinkALSA::InitializeHW - Setting timeout to 186 ms
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: CSoftAE::InternalOpenSink - ALSA Initialized:
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: Output Device : hw:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: Sample Rate : 44100
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: Sample Format : AE_FMT_S32NE
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: Channel Count : 2
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: Channel Layout: FL,FR
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: Frames : 512
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: Frame Samples : 1024
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 INFO: Frame Size : 8
18:47:52 T:140392427419520 DEBUG: CSoftAE::Initialize - Using speaker layout: 5.1
The full log can be found
here at pastebin.
Dear developers: I need that functionality!
Please please please ... enable us to use stuff that already works. Its really wonderful, that you are doing easier to set up possibilities and the whole settings in AE work just like a charm. Really really great work, to be honest! However the mutliple output thing is not yet done (you state it as a thing to come). So please dont take that funktionality away from us
My suggestion for this problem to stay newby friendly:
You might add all predefined interfaces in .asoundrc or asound.conf to the configuration menu. Like this new users do not get confused by a huge load of possible (partly not working) settings and experienced users still have access to all features provided before.
However, if you can spot a possibility how to use my settings now (or if I just made a dumb configuration mistake) please share your knowledge with me
EDIT: The interesting thing is that the lines in the log above also appear when xbmc is started the first time with "normal" audiooutput chosen in the menu: "ALSA:hw:CARD=Intel,DEV=0". After having a look in the code, adding some debug outputs and recompiling it seems that the sinkName in SoftAE is always empty when xbmc starts. Thus the check at xbmc/cores/AudioEngine/Engines/SoftAE/SoftAE.cpp:277 always fails at startup. I did not get the big picture - so this might be a legit behaviour. However it seems a bit strange to me, since the message sounds like "There is a configuration error".