[SOLVED] Please help me with my asound.conf (2 soundcards/spdif)

Rasi · 2011-09-04 19:48:53

well, i have an ESI juli@ card, that i want as my playback card and an intel onboard card which i want for the microphone part.
So what i need is to define those 2 default devices, but i cant for the sake of it get it to work.

My juli@ card is listed as:

> aplay -L
null
    Discard all samples (playback) or generate zero samples (capture)
sysdefault:CARD=Juli
    ESI Juli@, ICE1724
    Default Audio Device
front:CARD=Juli,DEV=0
    ESI Juli@, ICE1724
    Front speakers
surround40:CARD=Juli,DEV=0
    ESI Juli@, ICE1724
    4.0 Surround output to Front and Rear speakers
surround41:CARD=Juli,DEV=0
    ESI Juli@, ICE1724
    4.1 Surround output to Front, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround50:CARD=Juli,DEV=0
    ESI Juli@, ICE1724
    5.0 Surround output to Front, Center and Rear speakers
surround51:CARD=Juli,DEV=0
    ESI Juli@, ICE1724
    5.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround71:CARD=Juli,DEV=0
    ESI Juli@, ICE1724
    7.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Side, Rear and Woofer speakers
iec958:CARD=Juli,DEV=0
    ESI Juli@, ICE1724
    IEC958 (S/PDIF) Digital Audio Output

and my intel card as:

sysdefault:CARD=Intel
    HDA Intel, VT1828S Analog
    Default Audio Device
front:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, VT1828S Analog
    Front speakers
surround40:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, VT1828S Analog
    4.0 Surround output to Front and Rear speakers
surround41:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, VT1828S Analog
    4.1 Surround output to Front, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround50:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, VT1828S Analog
    5.0 Surround output to Front, Center and Rear speakers
surround51:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, VT1828S Analog
    5.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround71:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, VT1828S Analog
    7.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Side, Rear and Woofer speakers
iec958:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, VT1828S Digital
    IEC958 (S/PDIF) Digital Audio Output

My momentary (not working) asound.conf looks like this:

pcm.!default { 
  type plug
  slave.pcm {
      type dmix
      ipc_key 1478
      slave {
          pcm "hw:0,0"
          format S32_LE
          period_time 0 
          period_size 1024 #useful if you ear scratch or have a crappy sound (try other values if it doesn't work)
          buffer_size 8192 #useful if you ear scratch or have a crappy sound (try other values if it doesn't work)
          rate 44100 #set to 44100 or other.
 
} } }
 
 
pcm.usb
{
    type hw
    card Intel
}
 
pcm.!default
{
    type asym
    playback.pcm
    {
        type plug
        slave.pcm "dmix"
    }
    capture.pcm
    {
        type plug
        slave.pcm "usb"
    }
}

The microphone part seems to work just fine, but i cant manage to get the spdif device as default.

Anyone can help me?

Last edited by Rasi (2011-09-05 20:13:40)

Rasi · 2011-09-04 21:58:58

btw.. if i remove the usb part of my asound.conf playback works, but as soon as i add it, i have a working microphone, but no playback.

archwiki says that part shouldnt effect the playback device at all. LINK

pigiron · 2011-09-05 17:00:03

That Juli@ card looks good! I really like how it "flips"... never seen that before.

Now to the problem(s). ALSA configuration is confusing, complex, and poorly documented. So I'm not too surprised you're having problems. I guess we should just be thankful that there's at least some documentation.

I think there should only be a maximum of one "pcm.!default" object and a maximum of one "ctl.!default" object in a configuration. Otherwise, which one is the default?

The microphone part seems to work just fine, but i cant manage to get the spdif device as default.

Confusion. Are you saying that you can't get the Juli@ card to be the default for playback, or you can't get the spdif ports on the Juli@ card to be the default for playback?

As a learning exercise for me, I took on your challenge by trying to get something similar to work on my box. It has an internal Intel HDA audio chip, and an external USB webcam (for the microphone part)... as shown here:

$ cat /proc/asound/cards
0 [Intel ]: HDA-Intel - HDA Intel
HDA Intel at 0x502c0000 irq 44
1 [J ]: USB-Audio - A4 TECH USB2.0 PC Camera J
A4 TECH A4 TECH USB2.0 PC Camera J at usb-0000:00:1d.7-4, high speed

Card 0 has the name "Intel" and the webcam on card 1 has the name "J".

And here are the devices on those cards:

$ cat /proc/asound/pcm
00-00: ALC662 rev1 Analog : ALC662 rev1 Analog : playback 1 : capture 1
00-01: ALC662 rev1 Digital : ALC662 rev1 Digital : playback 1
01-00: USB Audio : USB Audio : capture 1

So Card 0 (the card named "Intel), has both an analog playback and analog capture device ("00-00"), along with a digital playback device ("00-01"). In the ALSA world, these are known as "hw:0,0" and "hw:0,1" respectively.

While Card 1 (the card named "J") only has a capture device ("01-00"), known as "hw:1,0" in the ALSA world.

Next, I went to these web pages:

http://alsa.opensrc.org/.asoundrc
http://www.alsa-project.org/alsa-doc/al … ugins.html

and started playing around with the most simple "pcm.!default" object in ~/.asoundrc that would work when using the "type asym" plugin. At least in 2 channel stereo, since that's all I'm interested in. Then I kept adding to it (testing after each little change), until I got somewhat near to what I think you are looking for. But, as I'm sure you're aware, there are many ways to accomplish something in an ALSA configuration file. Anyway, I ended up with this:

pcm.!default {                         # declare the default PCM device

        type asym                      # combine playback and capture devices

        playback.pcm {                 ### Playback object ###
                type plug              # convert audio to mixer format
                slave.pcm {
                        type dmix      # mix multiple audio streams
                        ipc_key 6969   # shared memory key; must be unique
                        ipc_key_add_uid true      # add UID to shared mem key
                        ipc_perm 0600             # shared mem file permissions
                        slave {
                                pcm {
                                   type hw        # define the playback hardware
                                   card "Intel"   # playback card name
                                   device 0       # playback device on that card
                                }
                                format S16_LE     # bits per sample format
                                rate 44100        # samples per second
                                channels 2        # number of audio channels
                        }
                }
        }

        capture.pcm {                   ### Capture object ###
                type plug               # convert audio format from the hardware
                slave {
                        pcm {
                                type hw        # define the capture hardware
                                card "J"       # capture card name
                                device 0       # capture device on that card
                        }
                }
        }
}

Obviously, you'd need to change the card names ("Intel" and "J" in my case), and the "device" numbers, to what's on your box. Along with anything else that fits what you are trying to accomplish. Including adding and deleting things; but perhaps you can use it as a starting "template". But it's well worth it to read those two confusing web pages at least 4 or 5 times.

OBTW: Not sure if you plan on doing any "professional" type of audio work with that Juli@ card, but be aware that when you use the "plug" and/or "dmix" plugins (among others), that ALSA may dither/resample/mix your audio in software before sending it to/from the audio hardware device. So the audio format you think you're using may not be what's actually being used.

Hope this helps.

Rasi · 2011-09-05 17:37:56

THANKS.. this helped me setting it up the right way...

Arch Linux

#1 2011-09-04 19:48:53

[SOLVED] Please help me with my asound.conf (2 soundcards/spdif)

#2 2011-09-04 21:58:58

Re: [SOLVED] Please help me with my asound.conf (2 soundcards/spdif)

#3 2011-09-05 17:00:03

Re: [SOLVED] Please help me with my asound.conf (2 soundcards/spdif)

#4 2011-09-05 17:37:56

Re: [SOLVED] Please help me with my asound.conf (2 soundcards/spdif)

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