[MPlayer-users] (Bugreport) AC3 passthrough on SB Live! 5.1, audio skips

[Frederik Klama]

Distribution:		SuSE Linux 7.2
Kernel:			2.4.4-SMP i686
LibC:			6
X:				4.0.3
gcc:				2.95.3 20010315
ld:				2.10.91 (with BFD 2.10.91.0.4)
as:				2.10.91

Hardware:
CPU:				Dual PIII-800 (Coppermine)
Video Card:		ATI Rage 128
Video Driver:		X built-in driver (SVGA) with r128 Kernel module for
				accelleration
Sound Card:		Creative SB Live! 5.1 (with LiveDrive3)
Sound Driver:		ALSA 0.9.0rc1 (from CVS)
AC3 Decoder:		Cambridge Soundworks DeskTop Theatre 5.1 DTT2500 Digital

I can get AC3 passthrough using the options "-ao alsa9:iec958:AES0=0x87 -ac 
hwac3" (got the "iec958:AES0=0x87" bit from ac3dec) and mplayer does not 
cmplain at all.
The sound however just skips (no sound for a few milliseconds) regularly but 
randomly. If I play the same stuff twice I don't necessarily get the same 
skips at the same time, but the skip density at certain parts of the movie 
are always higher than in others.
When I dump the ac3 audio with "mencoder -ovc frameno -oac copy -o 
somefile.ac3" and play this audio with ac3dec (supplied by alsa) I get 
perfect sound ! No skips, no nothing. Just the soundtrack as it should be.

Feel free to ask for any additional information.

Frederik Klama
-- 
If Bill Gates had a penny for every time Windows crashed......Oh wait, he 
does.
-------------- next part --------------
processor	: 0
vendor_id	: GenuineIntel
cpu family	: 6
model		: 8
model name	: Pentium III (Coppermine)
stepping	: 3
cpu MHz		: 797.883
cache size	: 256 KB
fdiv_bug	: no
hlt_bug		: no
f00f_bug	: no
coma_bug	: no
fpu		: yes
fpu_exception	: yes
cpuid level	: 2
wp		: yes
flags		: fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 mmx fxsr sse
bogomips	: 1592.52

processor	: 1
vendor_id	: GenuineIntel
cpu family	: 6
model		: 8
model name	: Pentium III (Coppermine)
stepping	: 3
cpu MHz		: 797.883
cache size	: 256 KB
fdiv_bug	: no
hlt_bug		: no
f00f_bug	: no
coma_bug	: no
fpu		: yes
fpu_exception	: yes
cpuid level	: 2
wp		: yes
flags		: fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 mmx fxsr sse
bogomips	: 1592.52