Hi,
I have a creative sound card (ca106 driver) detected and working. This is a 5.1 capable soundcard and i also have 5.1 speaker system.
The sound card works, however, the problem is that only the front speakers are working.
I have checked vlc settings, in which front speakers, centre and rear are seen as different devices.
Pls help me figure out the solution as i am missing my 5.1 movie experience.
Thanks…
You can use VLC and once you insert a DVD you can select Dolby Digital as your Audio choice 
Also on my remote control for my 5.1 speaker system there is a button called 5.1; there maybe a button on your remote similar to this.
Cheers!
etech97
How does your speakers connect to the sound card? Is this an analog setup or digital setup?
I use a creative Audigy card with coaxial connection to a receiver and a stereo audio connection. For normal operation, I use the stereo connection to the receiver with the receiver set for multi-stereo mode. Which means all left speakers have left sound and all right speakers have right sound and the stereo pulls off lows, sending them to the woofer and a mono mix is sent to the center channel.
This functionality as described was something the creative driver could do, but not a standard function in Linux. For real movie watching, I switch to the coaxial output on the receiver and use the Kaffeine version from KDE3, set for spdiff passthrough. This setup is the only thing I have got to work for me. My speakers are standard speakers made for a multichannel 5.1 or 7.1 sound system and I let the receiver do all of the work for me.
Thank You,
Surround sound in Linux can be a bit confusing. Here is the thread where I recorded my experience in learning about this: Exploring surround sound in Linux
Thanks oldcpu…his setup is over my head