[mythtv-users] Configuring SPDIF digital out.

[Marius Schrecker]

> I  recently replaced my home theatre reciever with one that has digital
> inputs (old one was  5.1 analog), 2 coax and 1 optical.  Naturally I would
> like to get the best sound from my  HD-MythTV box,  (that might be the
> reason I bought the new reciever but don't tell that to my wife), so I
> removed the SB Live! 5.1 (analog) sound card that i had installed, went
> into
> the BIOS settings and enabled the onboard soundcard  that has a SPDIF coax
> connector.  When I rebooted, KDE told me that it could not find the sound
> card, So I went under System Settings - Soundcard Detection, and it foud
> it
> rightaway. Cool. ( I have the line out  from the mother board connected to
> my TV and the Coax connected to my reciever) Sound comes out of the Tv but
> not the reciever. I go into Myth Frontend, and select a HD  recording to
> play, Again sound out of the TV but not the reciever.  I then gointo
> settings and switch between the 3 settings available to me, and when i try
> to play a HD recording Myth informs me that it cannot find the sound card.
> Well at this time i figure that the ALSA mixer has muted the SPDIF
> connector
> so I  try to open up alsamixer and get the following error message:
> alsamixer: function snd_ctl_open failed for default: No such file or
> directory
>
> I tried to google that, but I only found people who had the same error
> message, not what  they had done to fix it.  I tried looking in my
> /etc/modprob.conf file:
>
> alias eth0 sk98lin
> options snd-emu10k1 index=0
> remove snd-emu10k1 { /usr/sbin/alsactl store 0 >/dev/null 2>&1 || : ;
> }; /sbin/modprobe -r --ignore-remove snd-emu10k1
> alias char-major-81 cx8800
> alias usb-controller ehci-hcd
> alias usb-controller1 uhci-hcd
> alias ieee1394-controller ohci1394
> # nvidia kernel module
> alias char-major-195 nvidia-1_0-7174
> alias nvidia nvidia-1_0-7174
> options snd-intel8x0 index=1
> remove snd-intel8x0 { /usr/sbin/alsactl store 1 >/dev/null 2>&1 || :
> ; }; /sbin/modprobe -r --ignore-remove snd-intel8x0
> alias snd-card-0 snd-intel8x0
> options snd-card-0 index=0
> options snd-intel8x0 index=0
> remove snd-intel8x0 { /usr/sbin/alsactl store 0 >/dev/null 2>&1 || :
> ; }; /sbin/modprobe -r --ignore-remove snd-intel8x0
>
> and I am not sure what to do with it. The options snd-intel8x0 index=1
> line
> is refering to my newly detected sound caard, and the emu10k1 is the old
> one.
>
> Also if I type aplay -l, the following is displayed:
>
> **** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
> card 1: ICH5 [Intel ICH5], device 0: Intel ICH [Intel ICH5]
>   Subdevices: 1/1
>   Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
> card 1: ICH5 [Intel ICH5], device 4: Intel ICH - IEC958 [Intel ICH5 -
> IEC958]
>   Subdevices: 1/1
>   Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
>
> I am at a loss for what to do.  Sorry for the long post, but I wanted to
> give as much information as possible. -Mat
>
>
I take it you've looked at the digital sound howto (link from Jarods
wonderful guide).
there's a sample asoundrc there that might help you.

Cheers

Marius