How to enable surround 5.1 output on laptop

[Bill Davidsen]

Alan Cox wrote:
> On Thu, 10 Dec 2009 01:22:09 +0100
> Major Péter <majorpetya at sch.bme.hu> wrote:
> 
>> My Sound card is Intel ICH8, so I guess this means, that my card isn't
>> supported. :(
> 
> Should be (depends on the actual codec your vendor used) - more likely the
> problem is pulseaudio.
> 
> http://forums.fedoraforum.org/showthread.php?t=225630
> 
> may be helpful
> 
While this gives a method for getting around the limitations of PA, it certainly 
points out how manual these features are. In the days of oss the front and back 
channels showed up as two dsp devices (at least on some cards) and the 
application could be told what to use, including sending one source to the 
"front" dsp and another to the "back" dsp, allowing my remote speakers to please 
my wife while I listened to something else.

When ALSA first came out the channels could be changed in a GUI, now one must be 
root and edit text files to accomplish the same thing. And in a world where 
laptops are more common all the time, and better hardware is a dock or a plug 
away, instead of making the process as automated as plugging in a USB keyboard 
or a network cable.

-- 
Bill Davidsen <davidsen at tmr.com>
   "We have more to fear from the bungling of the incompetent than from
the machinations of the wicked."  - from Slashdot