Nvidia HDMI - four codecs, which one is the right one?

Bug #716371 reported by David Henningsson
38
This bug affects 5 people
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
pulseaudio (Ubuntu)
Fix Released
Low
David Henningsson
Natty
Fix Released
Low
David Henningsson

Bug Description

Binary package hint: pulseaudio

I've seen a few Nvidia HDMI's recently which have four HDMI codecs
connected to the same HDA controller. The problem is that we don't know
which one(s) of these four that is the real one. So people will have to
try devices "hdmi:Nvidia,0", "hdmi:Nvidia,1", "hdmi:Nvidia,2" and
"hdmi:Nvidia,3" to figure out which one is the right one. (And by
empirical testing we know that it isn't always the first one.)

While having a fix in the kernel for all these devices would be optimal, it isn't going to happen for 11.04, a workaround for 11.04 could be to show all four devices as different profiles for the card.

This is also the outcome of the thread starting here: http://mailman.alsa-project.org/pipermail/alsa-devel/2011-February/036375.html

Revision history for this message
David Henningsson (diwic) wrote :

I hope to be able to provide a fix in a few weeks.

Changed in pulseaudio (Ubuntu):
importance: Undecided → Low
status: New → Triaged
Chris Van Hoof (vanhoof)
tags: added: hwe-blocker
Changed in pulseaudio (Ubuntu):
assignee: nobody → David Henningsson (diwic)
Revision history for this message
David Henningsson (diwic) wrote :
Changed in pulseaudio (Ubuntu):
milestone: none → ubuntu-11.04-beta-1
status: Triaged → In Progress
Revision history for this message
David Henningsson (diwic) wrote :

Fixed bug in the udev rule, here's the updated version.

Revision history for this message
David Henningsson (diwic) wrote :

Pushed to ubuntu-audio-dev's repository for pulseaudio.

Changed in pulseaudio (Ubuntu):
status: In Progress → Fix Committed
tags: added: patch
Revision history for this message
Launchpad Janitor (janitor) wrote :

This bug was fixed in the package pulseaudio - 1:0.9.22+stable-queue-24-g67d18-0ubuntu3

---------------
pulseaudio (1:0.9.22+stable-queue-24-g67d18-0ubuntu3) natty; urgency=low

  [ David Henningsson ]
  * Add separate profile for Nvidia to make it easier to select the right
    codec out of four (LP: #716371)
  * Add workaround to make it possible to control the volume of some
    USB headsets (LP: #749856, LP: #671560)

  [ Luke Yelavich ]
  * debian/control: Demote pulseaudio-module-raop to suggests, as it is
    causing various issues, including crashers, (LP: #742281, #743073)
    and re-opens (LP #688272)
  * Pull some bugfixes from the stable-queue branch:
    - 4fa7495 (vala: Some bugfixes for the vala bindings)
    - ea0a2a6 (vala: delegate FreeCb does not have a target.)
    - 64985aa (vala: move GLibMainLoop class into separate file to fix linker
               errors)
    - 9f52c10 (vala: Fix path error in the last commit.)
    - 1ade8df (build-sys: Link binaries linking libpulse to libpulsecommon too)
    - c25207f (build-sys: Link binaries linking libpulsecommon to libpulse too)
    - 4be49ae (build-sys: Link lirc libraries in right order)
    - fd5b282 (module-jack-sink/source: protect against null return in
               jack_get_ports) (LP: #733424)
    - 93e7a19 (vala: ChannelMap has no destroy function.)
  * debian/patches/0097-explicitly-link-libraries.patch: Dropped, applied
    upstream
  * debian/control, debian/rules: Add dh-autoreconf
 -- Luke Yelavich <email address hidden> Mon, 11 Apr 2011 16:58:14 +1000

Changed in pulseaudio (Ubuntu Natty):
status: Fix Committed → Fix Released
Revision history for this message
Daniel Ellis (danellisuk) wrote :

This didn't appear to be fixed for me when I tried this on 11.04 beta2. This was my comment on another bug which describes how I got it working on my system https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/pulseaudio/+bug/691135/comments/3

Revision history for this message
David Henningsson (diwic) wrote :

Hi Daniel,

Would you mind supplying a Pulseaudio log and an alsa-info according to these instructions? Thanks!
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PulseAudio/Log
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Audio/AlsaInfo

Revision history for this message
Daniel Ellis (danellisuk) wrote :

Hi David, I have done a fresh install to prevent my local changes adding any confusion. Attached are the two files.

Revision history for this message
Daniel Ellis (danellisuk) wrote :

And the other file requested.

Revision history for this message
David Henningsson (diwic) wrote :

@Daniel,
Please make sure you have selected "HDMI Extra nr 4" as your profile on the hardware tab in gnome-volume-control, from looking at the pulseverbose file, this does not seem to be the case. As stated, this will not work automatically in 11.04, but at least it will be a little easier to find than manually change the PA config files.

Revision history for this message
Daniel Ellis (danellisuk) wrote :

Thanks David, after reinstalling again, I have tested "Digital Surround 5.1 (HDMI) nr 4 Output" and audio does work (only after installing the nvidia proprietary driver).

It is good that a user can now configure this via the GUI. However, somehow I missed this after selecting a few options. I had no idea what "nr 4 Output" meant. Looking to get an out-of-the-box solution, what could we do about this?

When I edited the alsa config to limit the available interfaces exposed to pulseaudio, the drop down box displayed:-

  Digital Stereo (HDMI) Output
  Digital Surround 5.1 (HDMI) Output

Which was perfect and simple.

I think the solution to this lies in alsa. Unless these other three outputs have any use, then I think alsa should not expose them. (If they do have any other use, I would be interested to know what)

The question is whether it would be technically possible for alsa to know which interface is valid?

Revision history for this message
David Henningsson (diwic) wrote :

> The question is whether it would be technically possible for alsa to know which interface is valid?

I have discussed this with Nvidia, and the answer is "not until something is actually plugged in". To have PulseAudio react on something being plugged in is a bit of work and won't be ready in 11.04, but I hope to be able to have it working better in 11.10.

(To further complicate the issue, many Nvidia DVI and/or Displayport outputs can actually output audio, which means there can be more than one digital output that actually works.)

To post a comment you must log in.
This report contains Public information  
Everyone can see this information.

Duplicates of this bug

Other bug subscribers

Remote bug watches

Bug watches keep track of this bug in other bug trackers.