[alexpigment]

Afaik there is no other way, might be some export to SDL (which we use for nav sounds) to tell it to play on plug:hdmi.

Another option is to move to pulseaudio and set default device to hdmi, but that kinof means skipping xbmc live.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I want to do something other than create an asoundrc file. I'm just saying that I'd like to know the simplest way to get that done, given that it's the only way. I've seen asoundrc files with as few as 4 lines, and I've seen some with more than 20. I don't know what each line of the file means, so I don't know what is necessary.