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Major Payne · 2012-06-04, 21:13

Currently I'm having trouble getting sound to work in XBMC or the desktop. My current setup is as follows

core 2 duo
PNY 520 with 1 gig Ram and HDMI (perferred audio choice)
On board audio (not sure what brand right now)

I have done a ALSAmixer and made sure nothing is muted

I have done the aplay -l and tossed in the hw commands nothign has worked so far

the pulseaudio seems to already be installed as it states as such...

How can I tell if the rivers are installed right or where do i look next. please help.

Plaguester · 2012-06-05, 03:06

Post a screenshot of your Settings > System > Audio screen and descibe the connections between the HTPC and the speakers (PC > Receiver > speakers, PC > TV, etc.).

Major Payne · (This post was last modified: 2012-06-05, 06:42 by Major Payne.)

I'll post a image tomorrow

as for the connections It's going from the HDMI port on the Video card straight to the TV... No other cables/devices are involved...

Plaguester · 2012-06-05, 07:03

A common mistake with that setup is to have the "Audio Device" set to HDMI (implying digital output). Many TVs can only handle analog input as it is going to be downmixed to stereo anyway.

Set the "Audio Device" to "Analog" and flip through the HDMI devices in the list until you find the one that works. If you still can't get it working, set it to "Custom" and enter the lines from "aplay -L" (should look like "hdmi:CARD=NVidia,DEV=0") one at a time until you get sound.

Major Payne · 2012-06-05, 13:11

Plaguester,
Wow, I had no clue about that. I will have to check that out when i get home. I'm going to hook it up to a pair of speakers before I hook it to the TV to make sure the sound is working that least one way.

kneighbour · 2012-06-06, 23:27

I have the same problem. I just installed the XBMCBuntu 11.0 Eden ISO onto a fresh desktop computer. I installed onto the hard disk. XBMC fires up well. I have installed a few movies and the like, so Windows SMB is working, and everything seems fine. It connects to the Internet and I have video going to a computer monitor (have not tried the TV yet).

The problem is I have no audio. When I try to play a movie, it comes up with a 'cannot initialize audio device' error message. I simply have a set of powered PC speakers plugged into the green audio out socket on the motherboard. I quit XBMC and I went back to the Ubuntu desktop. The speaker/volume Control icon is in the traybar, and it comes up and I can adjust the volume slider. It is not not muted.

In XBMC I tried all the audio options in the System Audio screen. I cycled through every setting (HDMI, optical, etc). None worked.

That is the extent of my Ubuntu knowledge. I could not see anywhere how to setup/choose audio devices, like in Windows. I don't even know how to get debug files, or do any other debugging. If someone can point me in the direction to go to I would appreciate it.

Plaguester · (This post was last modified: 2012-06-07, 15:34 by Plaguester.)

For speakers plugged directly to Line Out on the sound card, you should use an "Audio Ouput Type" of "Analog" and an "Audio Output Device" of "defaults (ALSA)" or something with "pulse" in it. If that doesn't work, make sure the volume is up on the PC (XBMC uses the +/- buttons or the volume up/down buttons on your keyboard).

Log back into the desktop, bring up a terminal, and run "alsamixer". Make sure your PCM, Master, and Front (aka Line Out) channels are all unmuted.

If all of that fails, you can run "aplay -L" in a terminal, copy the line that looks like "front:CARD=NVidia,DEV=0" (yours may differ slightly) and enter a custom audio device with that line exactly (Linux is almost always case-sensitive).

kneighbour · 2012-06-07, 11:49

(2012-06-07, 01:22)Plaguester Wrote: If all of that fails, you can run "aplay -L" in terminal, copy the line that looks like "front:CARD=NVidia,DEV=0" (yours may differ slightly) and enter an custom audio device with that line exactly (Linux is almost always case-sensitive).

YES!!! That worked. The mixer stuff was all unmuted....so that was not it. When I went to custom, and entered 'front:CARD=SB,DEV=0', that worked just fine.

Thanks again.

Plaguester · 2012-06-07, 15:29

No problem. Do you still need help with sound in the desktop?

Major Payne · 2012-06-07, 17:04

Plaguester, I was finally able to test everything out. First went to the desktop and it was working with normal speakers.. So I plugged it into the TV launched XBMC and change the settings to Analong and it worked.

thank you so much for your knowledge of this common mistake.