[mythtv-users] Audiophile and TV audio?
Alen Edwards
allen.edwards at oldpaloalto.com
Mon Jun 23 19:31:58 UTC 2008
Joe Henley wrote:
> Allen,
>
> When you say "SPDIF for my surround processor" I assume you mean you
> want to output a signal from your sound card SPDIF connector into a
> receiver/amp which will convert the digital signal from the SPDIF into
> analog and then output that thru your speakers. Ie., the digital to
> analog takes place in the receiver/amp.
>
> If so, then from my experience, I'd recommend you use alsa drivers to
> send the signal thru the SPDIF. STAY AWAY from PukeAudio, it is still
> far too buggy to use in complex environments. With a receiver/amp to do
> your digital to analog conversions, you don't need to care about alsa's
> up-conversion capabilities.
>
> As for drivers for your sound card, it's one I'm unfamiliar with. You
> would probably do best by googling the primary dsp chip for info. There
> are fewer of those than you might imagine, so many folks have luck with
> drivers for other card brands, but same dsp. In my case, I found the
> alsa and alsa wiki sites helpful.
>
> On the less positive side, if I recall correctly, there aren't many
> folks who have had success getting simultaneous output of SPDIF and
> analog (some output jack on the sound card). You would probably have
> more success getting SPDIF to your reveiver/amp to work, then grab the
> additional analog you want from an auxillary output on the receiver/amp.
>
> Good luck! It's possible to do what you want with enough time, energy,
> and money. ;-)
>
> Joe Henley
> ______________
Hi Joe,
Thanks for the reply. I actually have s/pdif and analog R+L working
fine, just not at the same time.
I concluded that ALSA and Pulseaudio would not work, which is why I was
looking for help getting into the driver, which must be part of
Mythbuntu or more likely Ubuntu. I say this because I don't want the
computer doing any decoding as my decoder is high end and does some nice
things like move base around depending on speaker crossovers.
What I am doing now is using S/PDIF passthrough output to TWO external
sound decoders, one 5.1 and one 2.0 (for the TV). I have not actually
hooked both up physically, but I am sure it can be done either with a
splitter or with the second spdif output on the MB.
This is not very elegant which is why I wanted help finding something
about the driver. The HDA spec is too low a level, there is a linux
ALC883 driver but without any documentation, and the ASUS has no Linux
driver for the M3A. For those reasons, I conclude that the driver must
be in the Ubuntu distribution as I didn't load anything special.
I know that a HDA chip can do but I may need to modify the driver.
Thanks again for the reply,
Allen
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