HDMI audio...(again!)

[Murdock]

I wish I could reproduce it, but I can't on my hardware and we've ruled out the easy answers.

What does your setup look like (i.e. all the hardware involved, especially video card - i can tell it's an nvidia by the output you've provided)?

Is the machine with the issue a core/hybrid combo or is it a media director off the core?

What i'd try next is:
Kubuntu install --> MCE install --> Select HDMI for video AND HDMI for audio (say yes you can hear the first screen with general volume and say no to the other two (one is DTS and the other is dolby i think), your receiver may not be able to play it anyway - this tells the database to play sound via HDMI when viewing/listening to media within MCE) --> install the latest alsa (odd that the alsa rev for 1004 doesn't auto detect your hardware, I'm assuming this hardware is pretty new?) --> run the command: amixer scontents - ensure you have the IEC958 entries --> run alsamixer and unmute (with the M key) the IEC958 entries --> test audio within MCE

You can always go back into the avwizard to reset these parameters via the advanced menu in the OSD orbiter, or by holding the shift key upon boot.

[gtsupport]

Hi Murdock, thanks for plugging away with me on this...
My machine is a core/hybrid that I built about 10 months ago now.  The spec is as follows:-
Asus M4A87TD Evo AMD 870 (Socket AM3) DDR3 Motherboard
AMD Phenom II X2 Dual Core 555 3.20GHz Black Edition (Socket AM3)
Asus GeForce GT 430 1024MB GDDR3 Low Profile PCI-Express Graphics Card
G.Skill RipJaw 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C8 1333MHz Dual Channel Kit
Akasa PaxPower 500W Ultra Quiet Power Supply
Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 1.5TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (ST31500341AS)
Samsung SH-B123L/BSBP 12x BluRay ROM DVDRW DL & RAM Lightscribe SATAII Optical Drive - OEM Black
Edimax EN-9260TX-E 10/100/1000 Gigabit PCI Express Network Card (EN-9260TX-E)
ThermalTake DH202 Black VJ80051N2Z with 7" Touch Screen Case

I actually posted the spec on the forum before I bought it all, and there were no issues raised with any of the hardware.  As of this afternoon, I've basically already tried the things you suggested.  I know my amp is fine with the dolby digital and DTS, because it works fine using the optical SPDIF output, and I can play audio from LMCE with this setting in the avwizard.  I went back and tried the hdmi setting again, but said no to the other two in the avwizard, still not working.
Here is a list of my amixer scontents file as of now:-
http://pastebin.com/FTMtj31x
I do have one question though, my Nvidia card is listed as card 1 in alsamixer, and the onboard as 0.  Everywhere I see the settings for the audio, I see 0 selected, like in the multimedia settings on the kde desktop, and in the asound.conf files.  Is this just something I'm reading wrong, or is it valid?

As I mentioned before, I have had it working through the kubuntu desktop, pre-mce install so I know it can work, but maybe this is irrelevant for LMCE??
(Also I can't replicate that again now, I tried so many fixes previously that I can't remember which one actually got it to work!)
Will keep digging!

Thanks again.

[Murdock]

I don't see anything wrong with the hardware either, the only thing is that it's relatively recent (looks like about a year old). I don't think this is your problem though outside of the fact that until we move up to 12.04 you may need to install alsa outside of our installer process.

In alsamixer (CLI utility) is everything unmuted right now - or specifically when you're in the MCE orbiter? If not can you test playing media when everything is unmuted?

Since you have the IEC958 entries I don't see (at first glance) why this isn't working.


 For example here's my amixer scontents:

Code: [Select]

root@moon370:~# amixer scontents
Simple mixer control 'Master',0
  Capabilities: pvolume pvolume-joined pswitch pswitch-joined penum
  Playback channels: Mono
  Limits: Playback 0 - 31
  Mono: Playback 25 [81%] [-9.00dB] [on]
Simple mixer control 'Headphone',0
  Capabilities: pswitch penum
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Mono:
  Front Left: Playback [on]
  Front Right: Playback [on]
Simple mixer control 'Speaker',0
  Capabilities: pvolume pswitch penum
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: Playback 0 - 31
  Mono:
  Front Left: Playback 25 [81%] [-9.00dB] [on]
  Front Right: Playback 25 [81%] [-9.00dB] [on]
Simple mixer control 'Front',0
  Capabilities: pvolume pswitch penum
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: Playback 0 - 31
  Mono:
  Front Left: Playback 25 [81%] [-9.00dB] [on]
  Front Right: Playback 25 [81%] [-9.00dB] [on]
Simple mixer control 'Mic',0
  Capabilities: pvolume pswitch penum
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: Playback 0 - 31
  Mono:
  Front Left: Playback 0 [0%] [-34.50dB] [off]
  Front Right: Playback 0 [0%] [-34.50dB] [off]
Simple mixer control 'Mic Boost',0
  Capabilities: volume penum
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: 0 - 3
  Front Left: 0 [0%]
  Front Right: 0 [0%]
Simple mixer control 'IEC958',0
  Capabilities: pswitch pswitch-joined cswitch cswitch-joined penum
  Playback channels: Mono
  Capture channels: Mono
  Mono: Playback [on] Capture [off]
Simple mixer control 'IEC958 Default PCM',0
  Capabilities: pswitch pswitch-joined penum
  Playback channels: Mono
  Mono: Playback [on]
Simple mixer control 'IEC958',1
  Capabilities: pswitch pswitch-joined penum
  Playback channels: Mono
  Mono: Playback [on]
Simple mixer control 'Beep',0
  Capabilities: pvolume pswitch penum
  Playback channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: Playback 0 - 31
  Mono:
  Front Left: Playback 0 [0%] [-34.50dB] [on]
  Front Right: Playback 0 [0%] [-34.50dB] [on]
Simple mixer control 'Capture',0
  Capabilities: cvolume cswitch penum
  Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: Capture 0 - 31
  Front Left: Capture 0 [0%] [-16.50dB] [on]
  Front Right: Capture 0 [0%] [-16.50dB] [on]
Simple mixer control 'Capture',1
  Capabilities: cvolume cswitch penum
  Capture channels: Front Left - Front Right
  Limits: Capture 0 - 31
  Front Left: Capture 0 [0%] [-16.50dB] [on]
  Front Right: Capture 0 [0%] [-16.50dB] [on]

The only apparent difference I see between your output and mine in that regard is that I have one more entry (IEC958,1).

If everything is unmuted and you've tested and you're still not hearing any output over hdmi the next thing I'd test is installing the latest nvidia driver set http://www.nvidia.com/object/linux-display-ia32-285.05.09-driver.html - reboot - and then re-installing the latest alsa (to pick up any changes that occur from the nvidia driver install) and checking out the amixer scontrols to see if you have any different output.

[gtsupport]

Having a few problems here now, I have run the latest Nvidia installer and then rebooted.  When I select the avwizard in advanced, or even try holding shift down when the system boots, I get the "Failed to start X" message.  It seems that the latest driver is interfering with or messing up LMCE somehow.  I've tried reloading kubuntu and running the mce-install.sh file again, so basically I'm at a fresh install, and the same thing happened again when I loaded the Nvidia drivers and ran the avwizard.  If I reboot, the system loads again, and I'm back to the orbiter, but I just can't run the AVWizard.  How can I check to ensure that the latest Nvidia drivers did in fact install, and are being used by LMCE, or whats the proper way to roll back the driver to the previous version if at all possible so I don't have to keep doing a fresh install all the time?

This is all baffling, and being fairly new to LMCE a bit above me tbh, its frustrating that I once got  it to work in Kubuntu, but never with LMCE.  Do you think its purely down to the graphics card being too new??

Matt.

[kyfalcon]

 Sounds like your xorg.conf is hosed. Edit the xorg.conf or run nvidia-xconfig.

[Murdock]

I agree, it most likely does have to do with your xorg file, try removing it completely, edit the /etc/pluto.conf file and change the AVWizardOverride to = 1, then reboot.

The reason why I say remove it completely is because MCE will completely take control of the file creation and create it based on your hardware. The problem is that it assumes the configuration (if the file previously existed) was a solid working configuration. The nvidia driver updates the xorg file in some way that breaks MCE, so when you attempt to go into the AVWizard whiplash gives the 'Failed to start X' error message.

To answer your previous question, the reason I suspect why you're having so much difficulty is due to the relative 'newness' of hardware. My assumption is based on the fact that the hardware you're utilizing was released in late 2010 and running it on an OS designed in early 2010. I had the exact same problem as you did on the 810 revision as the hardware I had was built in 2009 so I couldn't get alsa to properly send audio over hdmi.

I would suspect your manual workaround issues will be resolved once we move to 12.04 and everything will 'hopefully' work out of the box for you.

[gtsupport]

Hmm, seems to have made things worse.
By removing the xorg.conf file it prevented the system from starting at all.  A new one was auto generated, but it failed to start X even without trying to run the AVWizard.  Tried running nvidia-xconfig which allowed the system to start up, but the resolution was so far off that I couldn't even get to the advanced tab to reboot it.
I had made a backup of the previous xorg.conf file, so renamed it back to the original and the system boots, but I still get the Failed to start X whenever I try and run the AVWizard.  I noticed that it has its own xorg.pluto.avwizard.conf file or something similar, I have tried backing that up, and removing it, but it has the same effect.  I did remember to alter that option in the /etc/pluto.conf file too, which didn't help.  As I have got the new driver installed, I would like to try the hdmi option again in the AVWizard, however it just won't run.  Very frustrating.
Just to confirm, the system will load, generate orbiters etc and appears normally on my screen (allbeit without hdmi audio)
I try to run the avwizard, and get the "Failed to start X" message.
I reboot again, and the system is fine again.  Its only the AVWizard that I'm having trouble with atm.
Oh, and I even tried copying the working xorg.conf file to the xorg.pluto.avwizard.conf (or whatever its called) file, so that it has a working setup to start with, but this didn't work either.
Sorry that this has gone on for so long, I know this version is a bit experimental, so I'm happy to keep playing around with it, as long as I can get some direction.
Cheers.
Matt

[Murdock]

I just picked up a new ZOTAC ZBOX Intel Atom D525 1.8 GHz Dual Core Barebone Mini-PC ZBOX-ID41-U:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004WO8O9Y

And I'm having the exact same issue as you are now with this hardware. It looks like it has an nvidia ION GT218 and my amixer output looks identical to yours. I'm going to be experimenting with some configuration changes and updates, specifically what i've been finding is:

http://www.mythtv.org/wiki/User_Manual:HDAudioPassthrough

http://forum.xbmc.org/showthread.php?t=69601

http://www.nvnews.net/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=2312420&postcount=7

http://wiki.xbmc.org/?title=HOW-TO_set_up_HDMI_audio_on_nVidia_GeForce_G210%2C_GT220%2C_or_GT240

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1552250

Additional card details:
The command lspci -nn | grep -vi "non-vga" | grep -i vga | sed 's/.*://;s/\].*//' results in:
  Second Generation ION    0x0A64

Code: [Select]

root@moon393:~# aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: ALC892 Analog [ALC892 Analog]
  Subdevices: 0/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 1: ALC892 Digital [ALC892 Digital]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 3: NVIDIA HDMI [NVIDIA HDMI]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

root@moon393:~# aplay -L
null
    Discard all samples (playback) or generate zero samples (capture)
hdmi:CARD=NVidia,DEV=0
    HDA NVidia, NVIDIA HDMI
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=NVidia,DEV=1
    HDA NVidia, NVIDIA HDMI
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=NVidia,DEV=2
    HDA NVidia, NVIDIA HDMI
    HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=NVidia,DEV=3
    HDA NVidia, NVIDIA HDMI
    HDMI Audio Output
front:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC892 Analog
    Front speakers
surround40:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC892 Analog
    4.0 Surround output to Front and Rear speakers
surround41:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC892 Analog
    4.1 Surround output to Front, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround50:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC892 Analog
    5.0 Surround output to Front, Center and Rear speakers
surround51:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC892 Analog
    5.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround71:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC892 Analog
    7.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Side, Rear and Woofer speakers
iec958:CARD=Intel,DEV=0
    HDA Intel, ALC892 Digital
    IEC958 (S/PDIF) Digital Audio Output

I'll let you know what i find out.

[gtsupport]

I've been playing with all sorts of things today trying to get this working.  I even formatted the partition and installed a brand new version of Kubuntu 11.10, just to see what would happen.  It picked up the extra channels ok, but still needed the latest nvidia driver to get sound working over hdmi.  With my minor success I then gave the linuxmce installer a go, but it really didn't like that kernel!!  After about 6 hours of fiddling, trying to get it happy, I gave up and went back to 10.04.  I'm now at the stage where I have hdmi audio working in the kde desktop again.  I installed the latest alsa drivers, and the Nvidia driver.  After a bit of fiddling with the multimedia settings, it works every time.  I can play music from Amarok, and even the startup jingle plays when the machine boots into KDE.
Anyway I'm now in the process of running the mce-install.sh script again on this fresh install to see how it goes.  I checked the output of amixer scontrols, and its no different to before, when it didn't work, so no help there.  I'd be happy to provide any information to anyone who might be able to see whats different now its working.  I'll report back once mce is up and running, with the result of this installation.
Cheers.
Matt.
**Could anybody tell me how to archive the mce installation files locally, i.e. on a different partition of this machine, or on my nas?  I must have downloaded the complete installation at least 20 times in the last week, and it seems a waste of time to keep downloading the same set of files.  Thanks.**

[locutus]

I've been playing with all sorts of things today trying to get this working.  I even formatted the partition and installed a brand new version of Kubuntu 11.10, just to see what would happen.  It picked up the extra channels ok, but still needed the latest nvidia driver to get sound working over hdmi.  With my minor success I then gave the linuxmce installer a go, but it really didn't like that kernel!!  After about 6 hours of fiddling, trying to get it happy, I gave up and went back to 10.04.  I'm now at the stage where I have hdmi audio working in the kde desktop again.  I installed the latest alsa drivers, and the Nvidia driver.  After a bit of fiddling with the multimedia settings, it works every time.  I can play music from Amarok, and even the startup jingle plays when the machine boots into KDE.
Anyway I'm now in the process of running the mce-install.sh script again on this fresh install to see how it goes.  I checked the output of amixer scontrols, and its no different to before, when it didn't work, so no help there.  I'd be happy to provide any information to anyone who might be able to see whats different now its working.  I'll report back once mce is up and running, with the result of this installation.
Cheers.
Matt.
**Could anybody tell me how to archive the mce installation files locally, i.e. on a different partition of this machine, or on my nas?  I must have downloaded the complete installation at least 20 times in the last week, and it seems a waste of time to keep downloading the same set of files.  Thanks.**

look into apt-mirror, thats what i used when i was testing, if you need additional help feel free to pm me

[gtsupport]

Thanks locutus, I'll look into that shortly.

Update regarding the hdmi audio...
The new install is the same as the previous installs, in the fact that it doesn't work, however I have noticed some things:-
1. LMCE overwrites the Nvidia driver with its own favourite one, even though that one is older.  When I reload the latest one again it stays current.
2. I don't have sound in my kde desktop again, so LMCE has altered something there, and I can't get it working again.
3. In the system settings -> multimedia setup there are two audio output options that are now greyed out and can't be selected.  One of these is an Nvidia hdmi audio output.  The other is the IEC958 SPDIF digital output on the onboard sound card.  Now what is interesting is that this has only happened since the LMCE install, so it appears as though LMCE has grabbed those two options as its own.  I can't do anything with them, i.e select them for testing, or use them as the default output option.  Now the digital SPDIF one is the optical output, and this is working, I can hear Sarah talking to me on this one when I select the other input on my amp.  I'm wondering if LMCE has grabbed the hdmi one as well, but got the wrong one??  The one that I got working previously was one called HDA Nvidia (HDMI 0) #9.  The greyed out one is called HDA Nvidia, HDMI 0 (HDMI Audio Output).
Is there any way of getting LMCE to take the other hdmi output for its own??  I notice that in the /etc/asound.conf file there is some info about this, but I have tried changing things here which didn't make any difference before.  (Blind guessing with the plughw:0 options).
Anyone shed any more light on this??
Matt.

[gtsupport]

The only thing I haven't tried is running the AVWizard again with the new NVidia drivers installed.  Because it won't run.

It seems as though the AVWizard has its own xorg.conf.pluto.avwizard file that is auto-generated, and somehow not compatible.  I've tried copying the normal xorg.conf as xorg.conf.pluto.avwizard but it gets overwritten as soon as the AVWizard starts.  I also tried copying the xorg.conf.pluto.avwizard file as the standard xorg.conf, and then the system hangs on a normal boot without the avwizard running, so it seems as though these settings are whats preventing the AVWizard from running.  Can anyone tell me where the xorg.conf.pluto.avwizard file is generated, or how to alter its settings to match a working xorg.conf file??

Here is the last bit of the Xorg.2.log that was generated after trying to run the AVWizard:-

(**) NVIDIA(0): Option "UseEvents" "true"
(**) NVIDIA(0): Option "AddARGBGLXVisuals" "true"
(**) NVIDIA(0): Option "ModeValidation" "NoDFPNativeResolutionCheck, NoEdidMaxPClkCheck, NoMaxPClkCheck, AllowInterlacedModes, AllowNon60HzDFPModes, NoEdidModes"
(**) NVIDIA(0): Option "DynamicTwinView" "false"
(==) Oct 17 00:18:12 NVIDIA(0): Using HW cursor
(**) Oct 17 00:18:12 NVIDIA(0): Enabling RENDER acceleration
(==) Oct 17 00:18:12 NVIDIA(0): Video key set to default value of 0x101fe
(==) Oct 17 00:18:12 NVIDIA(0): Not mapping the primary surface by default.
(**) Oct 17 00:18:12 NVIDIA(0): ConnectedMonitor string: "CRT"
(EE) Oct 17 00:18:12 NVIDIA(0): Failed to initialize the NVIDIA kernel module. Please see the
(EE) Oct 17 00:18:12 NVIDIA(0):     system's kernel log for additional error messages and
(EE) Oct 17 00:18:12 NVIDIA(0):     consult the NVIDIA README for details.
(EE) NVIDIA(0):  *** Aborting ***
(II) UnloadModule: "nvidia"
(II) UnloadModule: "wfb"
(II) UnloadModule: "fb"
(EE) Screen(s) found, but none have a usable configuration.

Fatal server error:
no screens found

Please consult the The X.Org Foundation support

[gtsupport]

Still can't run the AVWizard with the new Nvidia driver installed.  I've been through a few log files, and found this information which applies to the failing in the previous log I posted:-

Oct 17 00:17:42 dcerouter kernel: [   32.009167] vgaarb: device changed decodes: PCI:0000:07:00.0,olddecodes=none,decodes=none:owns=io+mem
Oct 17 00:17:42 dcerouter kernel: [   32.009264] NVRM: loading NVIDIA UNIX x86 Kernel Module  260.19.29  Wed Dec  8 12:09:09 PST 2010
Oct 17 00:17:42 dcerouter kernel: [   32.011018] NVRM: API mismatch: the client has the version 285.05.09, but
Oct 17 00:17:42 dcerouter kernel: [   32.011020] NVRM: this kernel module has the version 260.19.29.  Please
Oct 17 00:17:42 dcerouter kernel: [   32.011020] NVRM: make sure that this kernel module and all NVIDIA driver
Oct 17 00:17:42 dcerouter kernel: [   32.011021] NVRM: components have the same version.
Oct 17 00:17:57 dcerouter kernel: [   46.868311] NVRM: API mismatch: the client has the version 285.05.09, but
Oct 17 00:17:57 dcerouter kernel: [   46.868312] NVRM: this kernel module has the version 260.19.29.  Please
Oct 17 00:17:57 dcerouter kernel: [   46.868313] NVRM: make sure that this kernel module and all NVIDIA driver
Oct 17 00:17:57 dcerouter kernel: [   46.868314] NVRM: components have the same version.
Oct 17 00:18:12 dcerouter kernel: [   62.175586] NVRM: API mismatch: the client has the version 285.05.09, but
Oct 17 00:18:12 dcerouter kernel: [   62.175588] NVRM: this kernel module has the version 260.19.29.  Please
Oct 17 00:18:12 dcerouter kernel: [   62.175589] NVRM: make sure that this kernel module and all NVIDIA driver
Oct 17 00:18:12 dcerouter kernel: [   62.175589] NVRM: components have the same version.


Why does this happen only when I run the AVWizard??

Matt.

[kyfalcon]

I have it working on mine with nvidia 260 driver. My suggestion is to remove the nvidia 285 driver and install the nvidia 260 driver on your md.

[gtsupport]

Hi kyfalcon, can you just confirm that, you have the HDMI audio working with a Nvidia GT*** series graphics card and the 260 driver.  If thats the case I'll downgrade mine to that version, but I couldn't get the HDMI audio options to show up without the latest driver.  Perhaps you can share the secret, as its been driving me crazy for the last 10 days!!

Even Kubuntu 11.10 wouldn't give me audio over HDMI without the newest 285 driver from Nvidia.

Cheers.

Matt.