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hardware mixer doesn't work with volumio

mail10

November 15, 2014 13:06

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Hi, my hifiberry dac has trouble on hardware mixer with volumio 1.5.
it runs well with software volume but once i select hardware volume, volume control doesn't work (always 100%) and volumio goes unstable (loosing response often).
do you have any suggestion to me?

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8 comments

• 0
  
  HiFiBerry team November 15, 2014 17:01

  Hi,
  
  I recommend reporting this to the developers in the Volumio forum. They are looking for feedback and might have a tip what to change. Check out the link in this article:
  http://www.hifiberry.com/2014/11/volumio-1-5-is-out/
  
  Best regards
  Daniel
• 0
  
  mail10 November 16, 2014 04:52

  Hi, Daniel,
  Thanks for a reply. I'll ask there.
• 0
  
  Keith Grider November 24, 2014 16:43

  Also with the same problem. I was running a vanilla raspbian with gmrender-resurrect and did not have to do anything, it just worked. Volume worked out of the box and fine. I loaded volumio and had to enable software volume control to get volume control to work. Is hardware volume control supposed to work with this card? I have the HifiBerry DAC for a model B Version 2.
  
  Keith
• 0
  
  HiFiBerry team November 25, 2014 04:01

  Hi Keith,
  
  the card has a hardware volume control. However, MPD (the software that is responsible for the playback) has to be configured correctly. It looks like this is not the case. Therefore this has to be fixed in Volumio.
  
  You can try to edit mpd.conf by yourself and set the mixer:
  mixer_control “Playback Digital”
  However as I'm not an expert with these, I can't say for sure that this will work.
  
  Best regards
  Daniel
• 0
  
  Keith Grider November 25, 2014 13:06

  Daniel,
  
  Thanks for the quick response.
  
  It does look like an MPD problem. When I select hardware, i get 100% audio and cannot move teh volume control off of 100%. The relevant bits of mpd.conf look like this:
  

  audio_output {
  
  		 type 		"alsa"
  		 name 		"Output"
  		 device 	"hw:0,0"
  		 mixer_control 	"Playback Digital"
  		 mixer_device 	"hw:0"
  		 mixer_index 	"0"
  		 dop 	"no"
  
  }
  

  
  
  when I select software it looks like this:
  

  audio_output {
  
  		 type 		"alsa"
  		 name 		"Output"
  		 device 	"hw:0,0"
  		 dop 	"no"
  
  }
  

  
  
  Alsa looks like this
  

  aplay -l
  **** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
  card 0: sndrpihifiberry [snd_rpi_hifiberry_dac], device 0: HifiBerry DAC HiFi pcm5102a-hifi-0 []
    Subdevices: 1/1
    Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
  

  
  
  
  Can you provide any further instruction as to how the mpd.conf file should look?
  
  Regards,
  
  Keith
• 0
  
  HiFiBerry team November 26, 2014 07:03

  Dear Keith,
  
  you are using the HiFiBerry DAC, not the DAC+. The DAC does not have hardware volume control, therefore you need to use software volume control.
  
  Best regards
  Daniel
• 0
  
  Keith Grider December 01, 2014 16:32

  Daniel,
  
  Thanks for the clarification. From an electrical perspective, can you let me know what is different? From what I have read, it appears that both cards use the same PCM5102A chip. Are there other pins connected on the raspberry B+ which control volume that are not available on the B? Can I modify my B to control hardware volume?
  
  Regards,
  
  Keith
• 0
  
  Keith Grider December 01, 2014 17:15

  Ah, I just pinged around. The DAC+ uses the PCM5122, I get it. The Bs are getting hard to find, so my next one must be a DAC+. Can you tell me which GPIO pins are tied up to run it? I am planning a display project with one and want to know which pins I can use. I know you need 12,35,40 for the i2s, but which pins are you using for hardware volume control?
  
  Regards,
  
  Keith