[Centorix]

Hi,

I'm not getting any sounds either for GUI navigation or from my music library with Frodo XBMCBuntu (RC1). Sounds from Movies seem fine though as well as playing media from plugins such as NAVI-X.

I'm not sure why movies would work and not music. My first thought was to check is anything was muted in the mixer but I can't see anything obvious. My set up is using a Dell D610 laptop and it is not currently connected to a TV. I'm not sure what the best settings are to tell you about so I'll just list off the ones which seem relevant:

Audio Output - Analog
Speaker Configuration - 2.0
Boost level on downMix - Yes
Output stereo to all speakers - Yes
Output audio device - Intel CH6, Intel CH6
Play GUI sounds - always

Hopefully, this info may be useful for diagnostics.

Thanks in advance.

[negge]

Try unchecking "Output stereo to all speakers". I really don't know why everybody keeps checking it...

[Centorix]

Thanks Negge,

I've unchecked it now but it makes no difference unfortunately.

I've also just noticed that during music playback, the current timer is counting up but keeps resetting to zero for a fraction of a second before continuing to count up. I'm not sure if this is an important detail or not but it sounds like it might be.

[negge]

I think I know what the problem is, it's a fairly complicated fix. You should start with running "aplay -l" (you can post the output here). It should look something like this:

Code:

**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: SB [HDA ATI SB], device 0: VT1818S Analog [VT1818S Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: SB [HDA ATI SB], device 1: VT1818S Digital [VT1818S Digital]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: SB [HDA ATI SB], device 2: VT1818S HP [VT1818S HP]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 7: HDMI 1 [HDMI 1]
  Subdevices: 0/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

This is a list of all sound output devices your computer recognizes. Usually only one is the "correct" one. To find out which, use a program called "speaker-test". For example if I want to test the last device in my list I would run "speaker-test -Dplughw:1,7". The 1 and 7 means "card 1, device 7". You should modify your command according to what "aplay -l" says.

When you have found a device that outputs pink noise to your speakers, you should remember the two numbers you used and add the following to /etc/asound.conf (create it if it doesn't exist. If it exists but contains something, comment the other lines out by adding a # in front of them):

Code:

pcm.!default {
  type plug
  slave {
    pcm "hw:1,7"
  }
}

The "hw:1,7" is the same number combination you used in speaker-test. What it does is tells your computer "if you don't know what audio output device to use, use the one defined here".

Try that and report back if you get stuck on something!

---

I've also just noticed that during music playback, the current timer is counting up but keeps resetting to zero for a fraction of a second before continuing to count up. I'm not sure if this is an important detail or not but it sounds like it might be.

I could be wrong but I don't believe this is related.

[Centorix]

Thanks for the clear instructions.

I've tried it and rebooted the system but it's made no difference. It may be that I've misunderstood something so I'll just explain exactly what I've done so you can check it:

I ran the instruction aplay -l and got the following result:

**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: ICH6 [Intel ICH6], device 0: Intel ICH [Intel ICH6]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: ICH6 [Intel ICH6], device 4: Intel ICH - IEC958 [Intel ICH6 - IEC958]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0


....Quite an old lapop so not many devices lised.

When I use "speaker-test -Dplughw:0,0", I get the noise and when i use "speaker-test -Dplughw:0,4", I get no sound. So I then checked for a /etc/asound.conf file but there wasn't one so I created one which now looks like this:

pcm.!default {
type plug
slave {
pcm "hw:0,0"
}
}

I then rebooted but there was no difference.

Did I do it right?

[un1versal]

Remove /etc/asound.conf and post a screenshot of audio settings in XBMC

uNi

[negge]

Congratulations, you did everything right, it's obviously a different issue since it didn't solve anything. I don't use the GUI sounds myself (had terrible problems with them in the past) so I'm out of ideas.

@uNi: he posted his settings in the first post. Removing asound.conf will not make matters any better either.

[un1versal]

Information posted about xbmc settings is incomplete at best so my question is valid still. a screenshot is best, no settings will be missed then.

asound.conf is not needed in frodo in a vast majority of cases and only complicates things, rename for now as it wont make a difference.

Now in addition to all the info I asked for I would like also a screenshot of alsamixer with all devices.

uNi

[Centorix]

Here's the screenshot of the sound settings in XBMC:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/w382i75pusvn5q...hot002.png


....and the alsamixer screenshot:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/3b1j20q6i3y7ep...01_003.png

[negge]

asound.conf is not needed in frodo in a vast majority of cases and only complicates things, rename for now as it wont make a difference.

I could be wrong but last time I checked XBMC still uses SDL for the GUI sounds and SDL can't figure out anything on its own so it has to be told what device to use (hence asound.conf).

@Centorix: This certainly is a bit weird, it's not every day you see something with a broken 2.0 setup. Could you please enable debug logging (you do it from the System settings), restart XBMC, play an MP3 that you know won't work then copy the log from ~/.xbmc/temp/xbmc.log, upload it to xbmclogs.com and paste a link here? I would understand GUI sounds not working, but music not working is not right.

[un1versal]

The output device seems to be correct but the pasthough device is greyed out.

How is this machine connected to TV? or something else? Please post what and how.

Ideally when this works, select the output devices available to you instead of the current the idea is when the correct one is selected you will hear navigation sounds straight away.

@negge, the navigation sounds are not important at all right now and AE takes care of the audio part that makes the asound.congf unneeded , howver that doesnt equate to unusable, I still use asound.conf because IONS have e.g. HDMI channels are not mapped correctly. but without it all works just fine with the obvious wrong channels.

uNi

[Centorix]

Posted the log file at the following location:

http://xbmclogs.com/show.php?id=24668

There do seem to be some relevant errors in there but I'm not sure what it all means or what to do about it (still quite new to this).

---

@uNiversal: The laptop is completely standalone at moment (not connected to a TV yet) as I'm trying to keep everything simple until ironing out some of the current issues.

[un1versal]

Again your output device and passthorugh device need to be defined properly. The passthrough is greyed out as is, which doesnt seem right anyway.

The errors on the log says that something is not setup properly which is what Im saying.

Code:

12:40:59 T:3037959936   ERROR: CAESinkALSA::InitializeHW - Unable to find a suitable output format
12:40:59 T:3037959936    INFO: CAESinkALSA - ALSA: pcm.c:1096:(snd_pcm_drop) PCM not set up

^ that needs to be fixed again passthrough device is not setup at all.

another error unrelated at all but still error.

Code:

ERROR: Error loading special://profile/advancedsettings.xml, Line 14 Error reading end tag.

You could have a look at that too.

Essentially your setup needs doing properly, and personally I dont have a laptop to compare it to.

uNi

[negge]

@uNi: Passthrough device is obviously disabled when Analog output is selected.

[un1versal]

Right, though something is clearly not configured properly as per errors.

I recon because of the advancedsettings.xml error that its more likely to be a user error - misconfiguration issue rather than a software problem.

uNi