5.1 surround not working for DVD's

[Nuwanda]

Hi.

If I run VLC by doing:

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vlc --aout alsa --alsadev surround51

I can successfuly hear the 5.1 channels for .mkv and .ac3 files.

However, if I open a DVD disc (which I know the audio track has 5.1 channels), I only hear stereo sound.

Any clues?
Thanks!

[digitall2]

Hi Nuwanda.
What is the Hardware Speaker System? Player Preferences Settings configured for "Use SPDIF....: ?
A few more details may help?

[Nuwanda]

The speakers are Logitech X-530 (I didn't think that detail would help).
I tried both S/PDIF on and off, no difference.
If I go to Audio->Audio Channels, the only options are "Stereo", "Reverse Stereo", "Left" and "Right" for DVD's, and I have no "Audio Device" item.
If I open a .mkv file instead, I get an Audio->Audio Device item, with options "5.1" (selected), and "A/52 over S/PDIF".
Like I said in my previous post, the sound module is ALSA and the device name is "surround51" (y tried others, no luck either).
I know the audio track of the DVD has 5.1 channels because I can hear them with xine. I did however had the same problem with mplayer, maybe that's a clue...

Thanks.

[xtophe]

What's the codec reported for the audio in view/messages ?

Distro ? vlc version ? how did you installed it ?

[Nuwanda]

What's the codec reported for the audio in view/messages ?

I hope this is what you asked for:

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main debug: looking for decoder module: 23 candidates main debug: using decoder module "a52" main debug: thread 1163884880 (decoder) created at priority 0 (input/decoder.c:159) a52: A/52 channels:5 samplerate:48000 bitrate:448000 main debug: looking for audio output module: 4 candidates alsa warning: audio device: surround51 is already in use alsa warning: audio device: surround51 is already in use alsa debug: failed to find a useable alsa configuration oss error: cannot open audio device (/dev/dsp) main debug: using audio output module "aout_sdl" main debug: output 's16l' 48000 Hz Stereo frame=1 samples/4 bytes main debug: mixer 'fl32' 48000 Hz Stereo frame=1 samples/8 bytes main debug: filter(s) 'fl32'->'s16l' 48000 Hz->48000 Hz Stereo->Stereo main debug: looking for audio filter module: 23 candidates main debug: using audio filter module "float32tos16" main debug: found a filter for the whole conversion main debug: looking for audio mixer module: 3 candidates main debug: using audio mixer module "float32_mixer" main debug: input 'a52 ' 48000 Hz 3F2R frame=1536 samples/1792 bytes main debug: filter(s) 'a52 '->'fl32' 48000 Hz->48000 Hz 3F2R->Stereo main debug: looking for audio filter module: 23 candidates main debug: using audio filter module "a52tofloat32" main debug: found a filter for the whole conversion main debug: filter(s) 'fl32'->'fl32' 52800 Hz->48000 Hz Stereo->Stereo main debug: looking for audio filter module: 23 candidates main debug: using audio filter module "bandlimited_resampler" main debug: found a filter for the whole conversion

Distro ? vlc version ? how did you installed it ?

Arch Linux.
vlc version 0.8.6i
sudo pacman -S vlc

[xtophe]

[quote="Nuwanda]

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main debug: looking for decoder module: 23 candidates alsa warning: audio device: surround51 is already in use alsa warning: audio device: surround51 is already in use alsa debug: failed to find a useable alsa configuration oss error: cannot open audio device (/dev/dsp) main debug: using audio output module "aout_sdl"

[/quote]


That's the problem. something is already using surround51 so the alsa audio output module can't use it. So it defaults to the sdl audio module which can't do 5.1
It would be interresting to see if you have the same warnings with the .mkv



Do you have esd, arts or pulse-audio running, if yes try to install and use the matching vlc module

[Nuwanda]

That's the problem. something is already using surround51 so the alsa audio output module can't use it. So it defaults to the sdl audio module which can't do 5.1
It would be interresting to see if you have the same warnings with the .mkv

With .mkv's (or .ac3's), everything works fine.

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a52: A/52 channels:6 samplerate:48000 bitrate:384000 main debug: looking for audio output module: 4 candidates alsa debug: opening ALSA device `surround51' main debug: thread 1084143952 (aout) created at priority 0 (alsa.c:662) main debug: using audio output module "alsa" main debug: output 's16l' 48000 Hz 3F2R/LFE frame=1 samples/12 bytes main debug: mixer 'fl32' 48000 Hz 3F2R/LFE frame=1 samples/24 bytes main debug: filter(s) 'fl32'->'s16l' 48000 Hz->48000 Hz 3F2R/LFE->3F2R/LFE

Do you have esd, arts or pulse-audio running, if yes try to install and use the matching vlc module

ps ax |grep esd doesn't show anything, but lsof |grep esd shows libesd.so is being used.
Nothing for arts or pulse-audio.

I'll look into the matching vlc module for esd.

Thanks!