Digital sound oddity

["Larry T" <larryt@xxxxxxxxx>]

I have ALSA working with only one caveat: I cannot readily transition from a Dolby Digital stream to a stereo stream. I play sound to my receiver (Onkyo TX-SR805) using the coaxial output of my SB Live Value card on FC9. When I power on the receiver or play a digital stream, the default displayed on the receiver is Dolby Digital. If I give it a Dolby Digital source, it plays fine. If I attempt to give it a stereo source, no sound is output. However, I have learned that if I play any amount of sound directly to plug:iec958, then it will transition to expecting stereo sound and I can then play either Dolby Digital or stereo sound.

From powering on the receiver:
1) Stereo Sound (mplayer -ao alsa something.mp3 OR aplay something.wav) - nothing heard
2) Dolby Digital sound (mplayer -ao alsa -ac hwac3 something.ac3) - heard
3) Small use of iec958 (aplay -Dplug:iec958 something.wav) - heard
4) Stereo Sound (mplayer -ao alsa something.mp3 OR aplay something.wav) - heard
5) Dolby Digital sound (mplayer -ao alsa -ac hwac3 something.ac3) - heard
6) Goto 1.

My asound.conf is very basic: 
defaults.pcm.card 0
defaults.pcm.device 0
defaults.ctl.card 0

Looking through my receiver's manual and configuration options, I believe it is configured in the most versatile mode for handling the sound but whatever triggers it to listen to the right type of sound only occurs when I play through the iec958. It does not happen when I play through the ALSA default device. Also, I apologize if stereo sound is not the correct wording. Perhaps, it might be pcm sound or analog sound via digital connection. 

Can anybody provide some suggestions for troubleshooting and correcting this inconvenience please? Thanks.


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