Acer Revo R3700 and 5.1 sound issues

Hey all,

I new something was not right with my surround sound setup so I downloaded a few 5.1 surround sound test files. The results are...

Front right Speaker - front left
Front left Speaker - front right
Centre Speaker - Back left
Back right Speaker - Base (i think)
Back left Speaker - Centre
Base Speaker - Rear right (i think)

As you can see completely off! The amp and speakers are cabled correctly and to be honest I have no idea what to look at next. Can anyone provide any suggestions? Below is my HW setup...

ONKYO AV Receiver TX-SR308 -> HDMI -> Acer Revo R3700
XBMC 11
Audio output - HDMI
Speaker config - 5.1
Boost volume level on downmix - Y
Dolby Digital (AC3) capable receiver - Y
DTS capable receiver - Y
Audio output device - hdmi (ALSA)
Passthrough output device - hdmi (ALSA)

The amp says "HDMI" and "PCM" on the screen and only speakers A are in use

Do you have /etc/asound.conf or ~/.asoundrc on your system? If so, post it. Also post the output of aplay -l and aplay -L.

To be more sure about the channels that need remapping, use speaker-test -D plug:hdmi -c6.

Hi Plaguester, thank you for your reply.

/etc/asound.conf or ~/.asoundrc - I cannot find both of these files.

aplay -l

aplay -L

Results of speaker-test -D plug:hdmi -c6 (very helpful!)
Front Left Speaker - Front Right
Front Right Speaker - Front Left
Centre Speaker - Rear Left
Back Right Speaker - LFE
Back Left Speaker - Centre
Base Speaker - Rear Right

Put this .asoundrc file in your home directory:

Then try speaker-test -D hdmi-remap -c 6

Once that works, try Custom=hdmi-remap for both audio and passthrough device in XBMC.

Hi Plaguester,

Sorry for the late reply, great the audio tests now works!

But, there appears to be an issues with films with 5.1 sound.

with "Audio Output" I have the following results...
> Analog - all appears fine and I have surround sound
> HDMI - a loud stuttering sound (but, while switching between Audio Outputs in one film, started outputting fine!?)
> Optical/coax - a loud stuttering sound

I notice that in System Settings, with Analog set Passthrough is disabled. If I change Passthrough too hdmi (ALSA) and Audio output as Custom all appears to work correctly.

Does that sound correct? Do both need to match?

Thanks for all your help,
tim

Audio Device and Passthrough Audio Device don't need to be the same. On many systems they are the same. Use whatever works for your setup.

I would guess that the correct settings for your setup are:

Type: HDMI
Speaker Config: 5.1
Dolby and DTS: Yes
Audio Device: Custom
Custom Audio Device: hdmi-remap
Passthrough Device: Custom
Custom Passthrough Device: hdmi-remap

Start up a video with AC3 or DTS audio. Does it still produc the stuttering sound?

Hi Plaguester,

with the above settings playing a video with AC3 audio results in a loud hiss, changing Passthrough to hdmi (ALSA) all appears to be fine.

If they can differ then I guess this is fine.

Thank you for your help on this, would of been lost without your assistance. one last question if you dont mind me asking, what do the Audio Device and Passthrough Device setting do?

I have looked on the wiki but info is limited: http://wiki.xbmc.org/index.php?title=Set...dio_output

Audio Device gets PCM when XBMC is doing the audio decoding (usually for MP3, AAC, etc.). You might want this to go to multiple outputs on the system (headphone out and line out in addition to HDMI/optical). Passthrough Audio Device gets sent the original audio (AC3 or DTS) and XBMC doesn't do any audio decoding. Many receivers have features that you may not be able to take advantage of unless the receiver is doing the encoding.

Thanks Plaguester

(2012-06-13 01:44)Plaguester Wrote:  Put this .asoundrc file in your home directory:

Code:

pcm.hdmi-remap {
   type route
   slave.pcm hdmi
   ttable.0.1 1
   ttable.1.0 1
   ttable.2.4 1
   ttable.3.5 1
   ttable.4.2 1
   ttable.5.3 1
}

Then try speaker-test -D hdmi-remap -c 6

Once that works, try Custom=hdmi-remap for both audio and passthrough device in XBMC.

Does this only work for HDMI output? Could the same be done for optical?

I'm having a similar problem, please see my thread here