HDMI audio not working with HD files

(2012-05-07 01:39)Terminum Wrote:  Also, my receiver does say DTS surround sound and Dolby Digital Pro Logic II. The HDMI cable goes to my Panasonic G25 Plasma TV, and I'm using the same input that I previously used for my PS3 which had audio just fine through HDMI. I'm not sure, but I was assuming that's pretty much the same thing.

Wait, you have the HTPC hooked up to both the receiver and the TV? The typical connection is HTPC > Receiver > TV unless your receiver does not do video. With that setup (PC > receiver > TV), you will not get audio out of the TV (why would you want to) because most receivers do not pass audio over HDMI.

^ have you updated your BIOS to the newest revision for your motherboard?

My setup goes from PC > TV > Receiver. The connection from the TV to my receiver is an optical audio cable because the receiver does not do video unfortunately. With this setup I'm pretty sure my TV converts it to 2-channel audio, but I'm fine with that since I only have two speakers and a sub. I'm not sure if that can simplify anything with my XBMC settings or not.

blm14, I'm pretty sure that you are right about my BIOS needing an update. However, it seems the manufacturer only offers a BIOS update utility for Windows. I've been waiting to hear back from their support about this which is one reason I haven't posted in a while. I've also been reading about BIOS flashing and it's a bit intimidating. With my combination of inexperience and luck I'll probably destroy my motherboard if I do it via the terminal.

(2012-05-15 04:40)Terminum Wrote:  My setup goes from PC > TV > Receiver. The connection from the TV to my receiver is an optical audio cable because the receiver does not do video unfortunately. With this setup I'm pretty sure my TV converts it to 2-channel audio, but I'm fine with that since I only have two speakers and a sub. I'm not sure if that can simplify anything with my XBMC settings or not.

blm14, I'm pretty sure that you are right about my BIOS needing an update. However, it seems the manufacturer only offers a BIOS update utility for Windows. I've been waiting to hear back from their support about this which is one reason I haven't posted in a while. I've also been reading about BIOS flashing and it's a bit intimidating. With my combination of inexperience and luck I'll probably destroy my motherboard if I do it via the terminal.

Could you try the optical cable between your PC and Receiver and test the sound.
If you need a quick Windows environment to update your BIOS, try the new Windows 8 preview on USB flash drive. There are guides on Microsofts site.

I have been having the same problem but made some progress

In XBMC audio settings

Turned off AC3 and DTS passtrhough
Set Passthrough to HDMI 0

This gets me audio for the first part of the HD (mkv) file - but I loose audio after that.

I have not made any changes to asound or anywhere else. My particular machine does not allow me to turn off onboard audio through BIOS.

This is the output I get in the logs right at the time I loose audio on an MKV


16:44:25 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: Previous line repeats 2 times.
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 NOTICE: Opening audio stream: 1 source: 256
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 NOTICE: Finding audio codec for: 86019
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: FactoryCodec - Audio: PassthroughFFmpeg - Opening
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: DllAvUtilBase: Using libavutil system library
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: DllAvCodec: Using libavcodec system library
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: DllAvFormat: Using libavformat system library
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 INFO: CDVDAudioCodecPassthroughFFmpeg::Open - Won't transcode for HDMI
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: FactoryCodec - Audio: PassthroughFFmpeg - Failed
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: FactoryCodec - Audio: FFmpeg - Opening
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: DllAvUtilBase: Using libavutil system library
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: DllAvCodec: Using libavcodec system library
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: FactoryCodec - Audio: FFmpeg - Opened
16:44:25 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: CDVDPlayer::HandleMessages - player started 1
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: SetActiveDevice - SetActiveDevice from 2 to 1
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: RemoveActiveDevice - Removing device 2
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CGUIAudioManager::Initialize
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 NOTICE: Creating audio device with codec id: 86019, channels: 6, sample rate: 48000, no pass-through
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 INFO: CPCMRemap: Configured speaker layout: 5.1
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 INFO: CPCMRemap: I channel map: FL,FR,CE,LFE,SL,SR
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CPCMRemap: Forcing side channel map to back channels
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 INFO: CPCMRemap: O channel map: FL,FR,BL,BR,CE,LFE
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CPCMRemap: Downmix normalization is disabled
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CPCMRemap: FL = FL(1.000000*)
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CPCMRemap: FR = FR(1.000000*)
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CPCMRemap: BL = BL(1.000000*)
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CPCMRemap: BR = BR(1.000000*)
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CPCMRemap: CE = CE(1.000000*)
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CPCMRemap: LFE = LFE(1.000000*)
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: RemoveActiveDevice - Removing device 1
16:44:33 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CGUIAudioManager::DeInitialize
16:44:34 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: SetActiveDevice - SetActiveDevice from 0 to 2
16:44:34 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: RemoveActiveDevice - Removing device 0
16:44:34 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: Initialize - using alsa device plug:surround51
16:44:34 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CALSADirectSound::Initialize - frame count:512, packet count:16, buffer size:8192
16:44:34 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CALSADirectSound::Initialize - Channels: 6 - SampleRate: 48000 - SampleBit: 16 - Resample false - IsMusic false - IsPassthrough 0 - audioDevice: default
16:44:34 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CDVDPlayerAudio:: synctype set to 0: clock feedback
16:44:34 T:140407965202176 DEBUG: CDVDPlayerAudio:: Discontinuity - was:90369869.999000, should be:89952022.318480, error:-417847.680520
16:44:34 T:140408240719616 DEBUG: CDVDPlayer::HandleMessages - player started 1

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And . . . . sorry for so many broken posts - but based on a post from http://openelec.tv/forum/68-audio/23681-...-in-stereo
I changed my output to Optical/Coax and everything works.

In general for my case I was able to get everything working for sound on MKV by changing settings in XBMC without any changes to the underlying OS


Running Eden on Precise

Hello,

I've recently created my media box using xbmcbuntu and have been having trouble with HDMI sound. I finally got it working with Analog 2.0 and thought I would have to settle. However I continued my search for extra codecs. So logged off and back into xbmcbuntu to be able to access synaptic and my browser and continued my search. Installed ubuntu-restricted-extras, etc, but still was stuck with 2.0 analog audio. It wasn't till I when to Nooblab.com today and went through the "Important Things/Tweaks to do after Install of Ubuntu 12.10 Quantal Quetzal" when I found this under #33 "Install Codecs" stating that if you like to use multimedia these codecs are very useful to you.

sudo apt-get install gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg libxine1-ffmpeg gxine mencoder libdvdread4 totem-mozilla icedax tagtool easytag id3tool lame nautilus-script-audio-convert libmad0 mpg321

This definitely added some extra codecs that I didn't have installed on my XBMC box.

So I logged back out of XBMCbuntu into XMBC after to see if there was any changes in my audio section (Note you can run XMBC while logged into XBMCbuntu if you want to for testing). Under Audio Output Device there was a new option I've never seen before. "High Definition Audio Controller Digital Stereo (HDMI) (PulseAudio)". As it turns out the new option works and my HDMI digital audio now works without issues. Not sure which thing in the above list added this extra audio option, but it's exactly what I needed. Hope its helpful to others, oh and thanks Noobslab.com for the very helpful post!

Oh by this is working with a NVIDIA Geforce 210 1GB DDR3 in my XBMC box. Got it for $50 if you looking for a cheap HDMI solution under linux.

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Oh sorry, forgot to post my full current configuration since the update.

Audio Output = HDMI
Speaker Configuration = 5.1 (Suppose your configure will change depending on what you have)
Boost volume on downmix = on
Dolby Digital (AC3) capable receiver = on
DTS Capable Receiver = on
Audio Output Device = High Definition Audio Controller Digital Stereo (HDMI) (PulseAudio)
Passthrough Output Device = HDMI (ALSA)

Cheers!

I would suggest installing the latest nightly build instead of messing around with the ALSA configuration. The whole audio engine has been rewritten and the chance that audio works out of the box is way higher than in Eden.