No Bluetooth audio through Kodi 17.6 (OSMC and LibreElec tried)
#1
Hello

I am trying to play audio from a Kodi 17.6 / Raspberry Pi B+ to a Bluetooth speaker.  

I have successfully played audio from Kodi running under Windows 10 to the USB BT dongle and the Bluetooth speaker, so I know the hardware the “principle” are Ok.  

When I have tried audio on Kodi 17.6 on RPi B+ (both OSMC and LibreElec) I get no sound. I had to install the PulseAudio software on OSMC.

The BT connection to the speaker kept dropping using LibreElec but appears to be completely stable having installed pulseAudio on OSMC so I'm sticking with OSMC for now. I have configured Kodi on RPi to output audio to PulseAudio.

From : https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Configurin...io/Testing

When I run the following command via ssh on to the RPi

pacat < /dev/urandom

The BT speaker outputs loud whitenoise. The volume of the noise cannot be controlled by Kodi volume control. So, there is now some “direct path” on the RPi PulseAudio > BT > Speaker.

However, I still can’t play any music or audio through Bluetooth using KODI 17.6 / OSMC running on a Raspberry Pi with this setup.

So, my assumptions are this:

1. When I run the command, pacat < /dev/urandom, on the console this is causing PulseAudio to directly output a whitenoise stream to the speakers not involving Kodi. Therefore, all the hardware and BT connections are fine.

2. Because I can’t get Kodi to output sound to the speaker I think there is some configuration mismatch between Kodi and PulseAudio where PA is not sending the sound output to the correct “sink” (this is the term PA uses to identify devices it is outputing audio to I believe).

I don’t know if the following is significant but the command, pacmd, produces console output:

No PulseAudio daemon running, or not running as session daemon.

Is there some more configuration needed in Kodi (none seem available) or within PulseAudio configuration files? Or more testing I can do to localise the problem?

Thanks,

Clive
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#2
Did you install the h2dp module?

https://discourse.osmc.tv/t/testing-blue...?u=actiona
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#3
Way Hay!

I followed the instructions you linked to and got the response

a2dp-app-osmc is already the newest version (1.1.3)

so I wasn't hopeful

but it works ! I have Kodi audio on an RPi through Bluetooth.

Thanks for your clear and very speedy help. Much appreciated.

Issue resolved.

Clive
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#4
Hi

I have rebooted the RPi a couple of times since I got audio to BT speaker working..

I can reconnect the BT speaker (KS Boombar +) successfully within Kodi 17.6.

However, I cannot play any audio. The audio output Kodi 17.6 to BlueTooth speaker was working earlier (see post above).

Logfile: https://pastebin.com/gZU2Attg

Are the following lines from the logfile relevant?

13:43:46.769 T:2900255488   DEBUG: BTPlayer: Could not find a player
13:43:47.490 T:2957464320   ERROR: CAESinkALSA - snd_pcm_writei(-32) Broken pipe - trying to recover
13:43:52.502 T:2489316096    INFO: Found input device /dev/input/event3
13:43:52.503 T:2489316096    INFO: opened device 'FC:58:FA:97:7D:96' (file name /dev/input/event3), m_bSkipNonKeyEvents 0
13:43:53.863 T:2564813568   DEBUG: Connected status differs

Thanks

Clive
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#5
I can get sound to play from the RPi to a speaker connected using a jack plug lead when Audio in Kodi is configured to either

1. PI: Analog
or
2. ALSA : Using Pulse audio server

So my "mental image" and my gut tells me that Pulseaudio is currently configured to send its output to the RPI analog audio jack output. To get output to the Bluetooth speaker surely PA needs to direct its output to the bluetooth attached speaker.

Any suggestions on how to verify this and if true what change to make in Kodi or elsewhere?

Thanks

Clive
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#6
Hi

After many false dawns I seem to have a reliable series of steps to get Kodi Bluetooth audio working on RPi. All steps seem to be necessary and in the following order. I will try and see if I can eliminate some of the steps but first I want to make sure the following process is reliable.

Same hw and sw configuartion as above: Rpi B+ with Bluetooth dongle and OSMC 17.6 and A2DP package installed

Steps to get Bluetooth audio working:

1. ssh : pulseaudio --start

Rest within kodi

2. My OSMC: remove Bluetooth definition of speaker. Put speaker and Kodi in Bluetooth dicovery mode and reconnect speaker over Bluetooth. May require connect without PIN.

3. Kodi seetings / Audio: Change Audio from ALSA with PulseAudio to PI: Analog then back to ALSA with PulseAudio

I will test this again a couple of times tomorrow and if I have missed any steps I will update this post.

Clive
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