On Wed, 2014-01-29 at 14:23 +0100, Richard K?rber wrote: > Hi! > > I think just found an issue with PulseAudio. I'd like to discuss it here > before I open a bug, because I'm not sure if it is really an issue. > > My goal is to connect my notebook to a 5.1 surround amplifier via SPDIF. > For that purpose I have bought a Creative USB Sound Blaster X-Fi HD. It > was a good choice for the features I need. > > The X-Fi HD works almost plug-and-play. When I connected it via USB, it > was immediately detected by PulseAudio. Even the volume knob worked out > of the box. My amplifier also detected a signal on the SPDIF line, and I > selected the IEC958 port in pavucontrol. However, I could not play > anything. The sound was just muted regardless of all the pavucontrol > settings I tried. > > I searched the web and found other people having the same issue, and > also one solution. It seems that the SPDIF output is a different > hardware device. [1] > > In the /etc/pulse/system.pa I added this line: > > load-module module-alsa-sink device=hw:0,1 > > After a restart, I was finally able to hear sound! > > However, the SPDIF output is now shown as a separate Output Device in > pavucontrol. It also does not offer the "Advanced" options for setting > AC3 and DTS. (According to the ALSA vendor matrix, the X-Fi HD SPDIF > output supports AC3 and DTS.) > > The IEC958 port of the original X-Fi HD device is still shown and still > functionless. > > Now I wonder... Shouldn't PulseAudio detect and map the hw:0,1 device to > the IEC958 port, so the system.pa tweak is not necessary? No, alsa should map the iec958:0 device (which pulseaudio uses for spdif) to hw:0,1. This appears to be an alsa bug. -- Tanu
