No sound on HDMI output

English Multimedia
1

Greetings All,

I am attempting to set up a machine to use as a movie/video viewer.
When I connect this machine using an HDMI cable to an HDMI TV, I get video, but no audio.
No beeps, no system sounds, no noise of any kind.

I’ve run the following mixers and set all volume controls to maximum:Gmixer, Kmix, AlsaMixer and pavucontrol.

When playing a video, pavucontrol meter shows signal from the application and shows output signal to the HDMI device,
but where that output is going to is beyond me.

Using the Sound setup of Yast, I attempt to play a test sound on the HDMI, nothing.

Built in Audio adapter works fine. I have disabled it in pavucontrol in attempts to get the sound directed to the HDMI output,
but, silence is all I get. I’ve also tried enabling and disabling simultaneous output with no difference in results.

I’ve tried a few suggestions from other posts with the same issue (creating /etc/asoundrc.conf, modifying /etc/pulse/default.pa), but no joy.

If I boot up that other operating system (starts with a W), all sounds (system & video) show up on the HDMI input with no adjustments needed.

Why must this be so difficult???

The technical details:

Suse 11.4
EVGA GeForce 8400GS Video card (HDMI)

*** all commands below were issued while HDMI cable connected, and video playing (using VLC).

rpm -qa ‘alsa’
alsa-oss-1.0.17-32.1.i586
alsa-firmware-1.0.24.1-3.1.noarch
java-1_6_0-sun-alsa-1.6.0.u26-0.2.1.i586
alsa-plugins-pulse-1.0.24-6.1.i586
alsa-tools-1.0.24.1-4.5.1.i586
alsa-1.0.24.1-4.7.1.i586
alsa-devel-1.0.24.1-4.7.1.i586
alsa-utils-1.0.24.2-3.1.i586
alsa-plugins-1.0.24-6.1.i586

tvs:/home/tv # rpm -qa ‘pulse’
libpulse-devel-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
qmmp-output-pulse-0.5.1-1.pm.1.2.i586
pulseaudio-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
pulseaudio-module-zeroconf-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
libpulse-browse0-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
pulseaudio-esound-compat-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
alsa-plugins-pulse-1.0.24-6.1.i586
libpulse-mainloop-glib0-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
libpulse0-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
audacious-plugins-output-pulse-2.5.2-1.pm.6.1.i586
pulseaudio-module-gconf-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
vlc-aout-pulse-1.1.10-4.8.i586
pulseaudio-module-jack-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
pulseaudio-module-lirc-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
libxine1-pulse-1.1.19-4.4.i586
pulseaudio-module-bluetooth-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
pulseaudio-module-x11-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586
pulseaudio-utils-0.9.22-6.11.1.i586

tvs:/home/tv # cat /etc/modprobe.d/50-sound.conf

options snd slots=snd-hda-intel,snd-hda-intel

wRyD.WL+f1WXqJn7:MCP51 High Definition Audio

alias snd-card-0 snd-hda-intel

NXNs.6dmbWTRI_n9:nVidia Corporation

alias snd-card-1 snd-hda-intel

tvs:/home/tv # aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 0: AD198x Analog [AD198x Analog]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 1: AD198x Digital [AD198x Digital]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 0/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], device 7: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], device 8: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], device 9: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

tvs:/home/tv # aplay -L
null
Discard all samples (playback) or generate zero samples (capture)
front:CARD=NVidia,DEV=0
HDA NVidia, AD198x Analog
Front speakers
surround40:CARD=NVidia,DEV=0
HDA NVidia, AD198x Analog
4.0 Surround output to Front and Rear speakers
surround41:CARD=NVidia,DEV=0
HDA NVidia, AD198x Analog
4.1 Surround output to Front, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround50:CARD=NVidia,DEV=0
HDA NVidia, AD198x Analog
5.0 Surround output to Front, Center and Rear speakers
surround51:CARD=NVidia,DEV=0
HDA NVidia, AD198x Analog
5.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Rear and Subwoofer speakers
surround71:CARD=NVidia,DEV=0
HDA NVidia, AD198x Analog
7.1 Surround output to Front, Center, Side, Rear and Woofer speakers
iec958:CARD=NVidia,DEV=0
HDA NVidia, AD198x Digital
IEC958 (S/PDIF) Digital Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=NVidia_1,DEV=0
HDA NVidia, HDMI 0
HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=NVidia_1,DEV=1
HDA NVidia, HDMI 0
HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=NVidia_1,DEV=2
HDA NVidia, HDMI 0
HDMI Audio Output
hdmi:CARD=NVidia_1,DEV=3
HDA NVidia, HDMI 0
HDMI Audio Output

output of alsa-info.sh:
http://www.alsa-project.org/db/?f=af1a83d7615faaa4944e8e1899b31b998ed4b0da

Any suggestions are well appreciated.

Thanx in advance.

Rich

2

Sorry to read of your frustration. Asking for help like you have is a smart thing to do IMHO as it should help reduce one’s frustration.

wrt pulse audio settings, my apologies but without a screen print of your pavucontrol settings for configuration, output devices, and playback, I can not in truth comment on that … I’ve seen far too many cases where users ignored the “SHOW” setting at the bottom of a pavucontrol tab and in output device tab they failed to SHOW ‘all devices’ and in a playback tab they failed to SHOW ‘all streams’ and then they noted they could not tune pulse audio (but of course they were missing some of the information/settings by a less than helpful ‘SHOW’ menu setting).

I’ll work on the assumption that you had those SHOW settings correct and your comment on ‘pavucontrol’ is based on having applied those settings so as to not filter what is observable, and HDMI sound still does not work.

You could try a permutation/subset of conram’s recommendation from this thread (post#20): Sound to multiple output devices with pulse?

ie since your HDMI devices are hw:1,3 hw:1,7 hw:1,8 hw:1,9 then you could start with an edit to /etc/pulse/default.pa and add this line for your HDMI:


### Load HDMI device
load-module module-alsa-sink device=hw:1,3
load-module module-combine sink_name=combined
set-default-sink combined

and have pulse audio device chooser installed and under configure local sound server. Enabled simultaneous output. After restarting the PC to restart pulseaudio opened pavucontrol and under playback, choose simultaneous output for both onboard and nvidia card.

If hw:1,3 does not work, then replace it with hw:1,7 . and restart as per above , …etc …

ie same for hw:1,8 and hw:1,9 (one at a time).

Those settings come from what you provided:


tvs:/home/tv # aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 0: AD198x Analog [AD198x Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 1: AD198x Digital [AD198x Digital]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
**card 1:** NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], **device 3:** HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 0/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
**card 1:** NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], **device 7:** HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
**card 1:** NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], **device 8:** HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
**card 1:** NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], **device 9:** HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

Once you have that working you can try to tune this further.

3

Thanx for the suggestions.

I tried all 4 (reboot between each) 1,3 gave me a CONNECTION FAILED on pavucontrol. The others gave me an extra control (with a nice bouncing
level indicator on playback). Still no sound.

I would give you a screen shot, but the way this TV display is, I would need about 5 or six per panel, as the pavucontrol panel wants to be FAR bigger than the
screen size. I do have the ALL STREAMS option set on any panel that it can be set (it doesn’t stay selected!). Based on the VU meters, the TV should be blasting. Somewhere there is a disconnect in this audio stream…

Rich

4

Ok, then given everything else you tried, lets make a speculative assumption that the alsa driver hardware configuration is not properly configured at boot. It is ‘possible’ to force specific configurations at boot, using settings from the alsa documentation’s HD-Audio-Models.txt file. …

I note your PC has the 2.6.37.6-0.5-desktop kernel on a 32-bit openSUSE-11.4 with 1.0.23 alsa driver, 1.0.24.1 alsa library and 1.0.24.2 alsa utilities. The hardware audio codec in your PC reported by the script is a AD1986A. So looking in the HD-Audio-Models.txt file for the AD1986A and I see this:


AD1986A
=======
  6stack	6-jack, separate surrounds (default)
  3stack	3-stack, shared surrounds
  laptop	2-channel only (FSC V2060, Samsung M50)
  laptop-eapd	2-channel with EAPD (ASUS A6J)
  laptop-automute 2-channel with EAPD and HP-automute (Lenovo N100)
  ultra		2-channel with EAPD (Samsung Ultra tablet PC)
  samsung	2-channel with EAPD (Samsung R65)
  samsung-p50	2-channel with HP-automute (Samsung P50)

Lets say we start forcing the ‘6stack’ configuration. To do that, edit your PC’s /etc/modprobe.d/50-sound.conf file adding a line at the start of the file so that the file reads like this:


options snd-hda-intel model=6stack
options snd slots=snd-hda-intel,snd-hda-intel
# wRyD.WL+f1WXqJn7:MCP51 High Definition Audio
alias snd-card-0 snd-hda-intel
# NXNs.6dmbWTRI_n9:nVidia Corporation
alias snd-card-1 snd-hda-intel

then save the change, and restart the alsa sound driver with this command


su -c 'rcalsasound restart'

and enter root password when prompted for a password. Select NO if asked to save any old kde configuration. Restart your mixer (‘kmix’ if kde) and then test. That might break your sound. It might make it better. If ‘6stack’ fails, then replace it with the next in the list I provided ‘3stack’, save the change, restart the sound driver, restart your mixer, and test. Do that for each item in the list until it either fails after trying all or works for one.

Do NOT keep backup files in /etc/modprobe.d directory, but keep them elsewhere.

I tried to search the alsa project page to see if there were alsa driver updates for the AD1986A, but that site was not working when I tried. Maybe it can be checked later.

Good luck.

5

Tried them all. No error messages, but no change either. Still no noise.

Rich

6

I don’t have an HDMI setup myself, so there is no further advice I can provide.

If you want THE EXPERT’s advice, you need to write a bug report on openSUSE-11.4 which will get the attention of the SuSE-GmbH packager who is also an alsa sound driver developer. There is guidance here for writing bug reports: openSUSE:Submitting bug reports - openSUSE . Write it on openSUSE-11.4 component sound. Use your openSUSE forum username and password when logging on to bugzilla. Do not bother referencing this thread in the bug report, because the openSUSE packager will NOT read a forum thread. Instead your bug report MUST be self contained.

Be certain to attach a copy to the bug report of the /tmp/alsa-info.txt file you get by running:


/usr/sbin/alsa-info.sh --no-upload

If anyone can solve this, he can.

Its possible others who actually have an HDMI setup at home may also have some advice to this thread. I have no such setup.

7

Well, if you want my opinion about HDMI audio…

  1. If the audio originates from the video card, such as a recent nVIDIA card, don’t use it as it will suck. Often Dolby stereo (2-channel) is the best you can obtain.
  2. Some video cards have a sp/diff connection on top and unless you connect it to a sp/diff audio out on the motherboard, the sound will be silent. This does work OK if you have the right stuff.
  3. My number one suggestion is a separate COAXIAL or OPTICAL connection from your built-in audio to either your receiver or your TV and bypass the HDMI cable audio entirely.

The audio in an HDMI cable is identical to COAXIAL audio. The only time I was able to use HDIM audio satisfactorily was with a Video card that had just a sp/diff input connection (no built-in audio) and a motherboard with a matching sp/diff output which, with the right cable, could be connected together. You need to take my word on this and stop trying to use the built-in audio of a video card should it exist and if at all possible, bypass the video card entirely. Go directly from your built-in audio Coax or Optical output to your TV or Receiver.

Thank You,

8

Hi richardrosa,

I will attempt to help with no guarantee of fixing your HDMI problem.
In your aplay -l which is this:

tvs:/home/tv # aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 0: AD198x Analog [AD198x Analog]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 1: AD198x Digital [AD198x Digital]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 0/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], device 7: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], device 8: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia_1 [HDA NVidia], device 9: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

One of those HDMI from device 3 to device 9 will work so you have to try all of those.
If you will allow my suggestion to please install the xfce mixer, this mixer when you install will show all the switches for your device and easy to look-up and enable and this is the one which I am familiar with.

Now to start trying if your HDMI will work on your tv where it is connected, let us start making it as your default sound by making a file called .asound.conf in /etc. You need to be a superuser to make and save that file.
In the .asound.conf file that you will create you have to input this:

pcm.!default hdmi:NVidia
pcm:iec958 hdmi:NVidia

If you have the xfcemixer now find the switch where you can enable the IEC958 and in pavucontrol configuration choose HDMI have a look also in the pavucontrol playback and select the appropriate stream.

Please post back

Edit:

When you are done making the file .asound.conf in /etc you will need to logout and login to your machine.

9

Thanx to all for your assistance and suggestions.

Having spent the past week banging my head against the wall with this, I think the solution is to use XP, since it works.
Not a good solution, but considering that this machine will seldom be connected to the net, and pretty much used for viewing
pictures & videos, it should suffice.

I’m out of time here, as this machine needs to be handed off to my Daughter tomorrow.

Thanx again.

Rich

10

Most of my friends use XP, so your daughter should be fine as log as she does not catch a virus or trojan.

If I may be so bold to make a suggestion, next time before banging your head for a week, ask for help earlier. I think we had less than 24 hours on the forum to sort this before you gave up (due to time constraints) and decided to move to XP. The forum is NOT the fastest way to exchange technical help and its possible given more time this would have been sorted.

As noted, I’m not an HDMI expert so I focused on the overall PC audio configuration as opposed to HDMI specifics.