[pulseaudio-discuss] 0.9.8 - Invalid value for card

[Jim Duda]

This whole entire issue simply turned out to be a permissions issue.  Even a permissions issue while attempting to run 
pulseaudio as root.

It turns out that I need to chmod 666 /dev/snd/* for this to work.

chmod 660 /dev/snd/* causes pulseaudio to not be able to open the alsa device.

I don't quite understand why, but this issue is now resolved for me.

Jim


"Jim Duda" <jim at duda.tzo.com> wrote in message news:47EC5B46.9060103 at duda.tzo.com...
> Lennart,
>
> aplay -c 6 -f S16_LE -r 44100 -v -D a52encode < /dev/urandom
>
> works great, I get noise out of all 6 speakers via spdif and my AC3/DTS
> audio decoder.  Also, in this case, I didn't have to throw any switches
> in alsamixer to get the sound out.
>
> It would be wonderful if I could get pulseaudio attached to a52encode.
> This way, I wouldn't need ac3 passthrough, I would just convert ac3 to 6
> channel through pulse and route back through a52 to my external decoder.
>
> However, device=a52encode in default.pa results in:
>
> lroom# pulseaudio --system -v
> I: core-util.c: Successfully gained nice level -11.
> I: main.c: Found user 'pulse' (UID 499) and group 'pulse' (GID 499).
> I: main.c: Successfully dropped root privileges.
> W: main.c: setrlimit(RLIMIT_NICE, (31, 31)) failed: Operation not permitted
> W: main.c: setrlimit(RLIMIT_RTPRIO, (9, 9)) failed: Operation not permitted
> I: main.c: Page size is 4096 bytes
> I: main.c: Dude, your kernel stinks! The chef's recommendation today is
> Linux with high-resolution timers enabled!
> ALSA lib conf.c:3949:(snd_config_expand) Unknown parameters {AES0 0x6
> AES1 0x82 AES2 0x0 AES3 0x2 }
> ALSA lib pcm.c:2145:(snd_pcm_open_noupdate) Unknown PCM iec958:{AES0 0x6
> AES1 0x82 AES2 0x0 AES3 0x2 }
> E: alsa-util.c: Error opening PCM device a52encode: Invalid argument
> E: module.c: Failed to load  module "module-alsa-sink" (argument:
> "device=a52encode"): initialization failed.
> E: main.c: Module load failed.
> E: main.c: failed to initialize daemon.
> I: main.c: Daemon terminated.
>
> I upgraded to 0.9.8 via an upgrade to fedora 8.  WHich uses alsa-lib 1.0.15
>
> alsa-lib.i386                            1.0.15-1.fc8
> installed
> alsa-lib-devel.i386                      1.0.15-1.fc8
> installed
> alsa-oss.i386                            1.0.14-3.fc8
> installed
> alsa-oss-devel.i386                      1.0.14-3.fc8
> installed
> alsa-oss-libs.i386                       1.0.14-3.fc8
> installed
> alsa-plugins-jack.i386                   1.0.15-2.fc8
> installed
> alsa-plugins-oss.i386                    1.0.15-2.fc8
> installed
> alsa-plugins-pulseaudio.i386             1.0.15-2.fc8
> installed
> alsa-plugins-samplerate.i386             1.0.15-2.fc8
> installed
> alsa-plugins-upmix.i386                  1.0.15-2.fc8
> installed
> alsa-plugins-vdownmix.i386               1.0.15-2.fc8
> installed
> alsa-tools.i386                          1.0.12-4.fc7
> installed
> alsa-utils.i386                          1.0.15-1.fc8
> installed
> a
>
>
> Jim
>
> Lennart Poettering wrote:
>> On Thu, 27.03.08 13:27, Jim Duda (jim at duda.tzo.com) wrote:
>>
>>> Yes, I do understand that I can only get PCM stereo through the spdif using pulseaudio at this time (no AC3/DTS).
>>>
>>> My understanding (from reading all the posts) is that it's really a flaw with ALSA, which pulseaudio doesn't have a
>>> means to resolve (poor API with alsa spdif support).
>>>
>>> I really would love pulseaudio with AC3/DTS passthrough, but I understand we don't have it yet.
>>>
>>> I'm really just playing with stereo support through spdif at this time.
>>>
>>> What might be a useful interim solution is to use the alsa a52 encoder.
>>>
>>>
>>> The alsa a52 encoder will take a 6 channel "analog" audio source and encode it to a52 digital and then route out the
>>> spdif port.  It has worked very well for me to upmix 2 channel stereo to 6 channel a52.
>>>
>>> In .asoundrc, I have:
>>>
>>> pcm.a52encode {
>>>     type a52
>>> }
>>
>> My recommendation: first try to get alsa to work, than make PA work on
>> top of it. Try testing your a52 device with aplay first:
>>
>>   aplay -c 6 -f S16_LE -r 44100 -v -D a52encode < /dev/urandom
>>
>> If this doesn't work, then please contact the ALSA guys.
>>
>> Lennart
>>