[Pkg-alsa-devel] Bug#418594: libasound2: update from sarge to etch causes alsa to generate funky spdif stream with usb-audio

[David Härdeman]

Package: libasound2
Version: 1.0.13-2
Severity: important

I just did an update on my HTPC from sarge to etch, the self-compiled 
kernel remained the same (2.6.20-rc7). Now, any alsa using media player 
(I've tried mplayer, xine, mythtv) seem to generate an spdif stream 
which confuses my external receiver. It will power off at irregular 
intervals, mostly when there are loud noises (e.g. gunshots). The exact 
same movies/DVB-streams/DVD's worked fine under sarge.

I'm using a Terratec Aureon 5.1 MkII USB audio device.

I've checked through the ALSA bug tracker and the only thing that I 
could find that seemed relevant was bug 2622:
https://bugtrack.alsa-project.org/alsa-bug/view.php?id=2622

Which seems to suggest that a hg version of libasound2 might fix this 
(i.e. a post 1.0.14rc3 libasound2 version). There seems to have been 
quite a lot of changes to the usb audio part of the library. However, 
I'm not sure how to compile and test this version as a .deb package.

I'm also not sure this is due to libasound2, but the sarge -> etch 
update did not change the kernel and all media players that I've tried 
seem to have the same problem, so I suspect that the alsa libs are the 
culprit.

-- 
David Härdeman