No sound in multiple applications with 5.1 upmix

Question

Hello,
I already did some research about my problem but I did not find a solution for my problem yet. I configured my .asoundrc so that I have a permanent upmix from 2.0 to 5.1. But with the current configuration I cannot have multiple applications play sound at the same time.
This is the latest .asoundrc i tried
#define card
pcm.snd_card {
type hw
card 0
device 0
ctl.snd_card {
type hw
card 0
device 0
# softwaremixing
pcm.dmixer {
type dmix
ipc_key 1024
ipc_perm 0666
slave.pcm "snd_card"
slave {
period_time 0
period_size 1024
buffer_size 4096
channels 6
bindings {
0 0
1 1
2 2
3 3
4 4
5 5
#dsnoop plugin
pcm.dsnooper {
type dsnoop
ipc_key 2048
ipc_perm 0666
slave.pcm "snd_card"
slave
period_time 0
period_size 1024
buffer_size 4096
channels 2
bindings {
0 0
1 1
#upmix
pcm.ch51dup {
type route
slave.pcm dmixer
slave.channels 6
ttable.0.0 1
ttable.1.1 1
ttable.0.2 1
ttable.1.3 1
ttable.0.4 0.5
ttable.1.4 0.5
ttable.0.5 0.5
ttable.1.5 0.5
pcm.duplex {
type asym
playback.pcm "ch51dup"
capture.pcm "dsnooper"
pcm.!default {
type asym
slave.pcm "duplex"
With this configuration Exaile gives an error on playback "Cannot open device for playback". VLC plays just stereo...
What I want to have is this:
Stereo should be upmixed to 5.1. But signals that already are 5.1 should not be changed. With pulseaudio on Ubuntu this was easy to do but I don't want to have pulseaudio at the moment. I had some trouble with it.
I tried some .asoundrc from this thread but they did not work.
Maybe someone can help me?

Answer 1

For some reason it shows nothing. Sound is still not working but the output of mplayer is different now:
[AO_ALSA] alsa-lib: conf.c:1645:(snd_config_load1) _toplevel_:41:26:Unexpected char
[AO_ALSA] alsa-lib: conf.c:3425:(snd_config_hook_load) /home/florian/.asoundrc may be old or corrupted: consider to remove or fix it
[AO_ALSA] alsa-lib: conf.c:3286:(snd_config_hooks_call) function snd_config_hook_load returned error: Invalid argument
[AO_ALSA] alsa-lib: conf.c:3671:(snd_config_update_r) hooks failed, removing configuration
[AO_ALSA] Playback open error: Invalid argument
Failed to initialize audio driver 'alsa:device=ch51dup'
Could not open/initialize audio device -> no sound.
Audio: no sound
Video: no video
Exiting... (End of file)
VLC shows the same error and Exaile says "konfigured audiosink 'bin1' does not work". But in .asoundrc there is no "bin1"...
It's exactly the same .asoundrc you posted above.
Edit:
I noticed that nano messed the line breaks up. So longer comments started in a new line and were not commented of course. I fixed that. Now the output is:
[AO_ALSA] alsa-lib: pcm_direct.c:936:(snd1_pcm_direct_initialize_slave) unable to set buffer size
[AO_ALSA] alsa-lib: pcm_dmix.c:1030:(snd_pcm_dmix_open) unable to initialize slave
[AO_ALSA] Playback open error: Invalid argument
Failed to initialize audio driver 'alsa:device=ch51dup'
Could not open/initialize audio device -> no sound.
Audio: no sound
Video: no video
Edit2
I set a different Buffer size in .asoundrc as the comment told.
Now
[AO_ALSA] Unable to get initial parameters: Invalid argument
Failed to initialize audio driver 'alsa:device=ch51dup'
Could not open/initialize audio device -> no sound.
Audio: no sound
Video: no video
cat /proc/asound/card0/pcm0p/sub0/hw_params
closed
speaker-test -c 6 -D surround51 -t wav gives output on front left and front right And I read it might be a problem since kernel 2.6.34
Last edited by McFlow (2010-09-07 12:36:59)