PulseAudio, as usual, has been annoying me.

This time, it’s because it’s blocking the S/PDIF passthrough via HDMI from XBMC.

I found a great tutorial on how to disable it at http://www.jeffsplace.net/node/12.

However for some reason I had no sound from the TV. That’s because the default device for ALSA is the analog audio output rather than the HDMI port. To fix this, run aplay -l in terminal to determine the card ID for the HDMI out.

$ aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 0: ALC662 rev1 Analog [ALC662 rev1 Analog]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

Then, create a ~/.asoundrc file with the following:

pcm.!default "plughw:0,3"

Where 0 is your card ID and 3 is the device ID found from the aplay -l.

Now all apps should be able to play audio through ALSA/HDMI.

yer -ao alsa -ac hwdts -vo vdpau qgh_dts.dts