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I have Dolby Virtual Surround Sound 5.1 speakers with Tuba CineBass Subwoofer on Acer laptop (mine is 5951G but there is also bunch of models with similar configuration of speakers with/without subwoofer). In Windows it works and sounds amazingly after installing both Realtek drivers and Dolby software from Acer support site. In Ubuntu only 2-channel sound is working.

How can I enable virtual 5.1 sound or at least subwoofer?

janot
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MakingHarmony
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4 Answers4

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This really depends on whether or not you have true 5.1 speakers. See the "disclaimer" at the end of the post.

If you have true 5.1 speakers, here's how you can configure pulse to take full advantage of all five of your speakers and your subwoofer:

From etc/pulse/, copy daemon.conf and default.pa to your user's home folder. (If you've altered these configs previously, copy from your backup of the original files):

cp /etc/pulse/daemon.conf ~/.config/pulse/daemon.conf
cp /etc/pulse/default.pa ~/.config/pulse/default.pa

Add the following line to ~/.config/pulse/default.pa:

load-module module-combine channels=6 channel_map=front-left,front-right,rear-left,rear-right,front-center,lfe

Add (or uncomment) the following lines in ~/.config/pulse/daemon.conf:

remixing-produce-lfe = yes
remixing-consume-lfe = yes
lfe-crossover-freq = 80

Without the lfe-crossover-freq defined, it defaults to 0, which is not very helpful.

You can replace 80 with the desired crossover frequency (in Hz). Frequencies below this value will be sent to the LFE channel. Frequencies between 80Hz - 120Hz are generally recommended for the LFE crossover.

To enable the new settings, restart pulse with pulseaudio -k. Some applications could require a restart.

For 7.1 speakers and other configurations, the Arch Wiki has extensive PulseAudio documentation as well as dozens of examples.

Disclaimer: This answer only applies if you actually have 5 true speakers and one true LFE (subwoofer). If your surround sound is "virtualized" using only two speakers, this is a software feature and not a hardware feature that can just be enabled.

In the case of "virtual" surround sound; if you need to download and install software from the manufacturer to get the feature to work on Windows, you will probably need to do the same on Linux/Ubuntu. If they only produce software for Windows, that means the manufacturer does not support the product's software features on Mac or Linux.

Also note that there are many ways to connect audio equipment and they are not created equally. Getting 6 distinct channels from your PC to 6 distinct speakers requires compatible DAC, ports, and cables. For example, the 3.5mm headphone port on your laptop is simply not capable of true 5.1 output, even though it can carry encoded streams like Dolby Digital.

Nmath
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use alsamixer but first, install the extra driver support:

sudo apt-get install alsa-firmware-loaders alsa-tools alsa-tools-gui

At this point, you may need to reboot.

Then, execute the following commands in an open terminal:

alsamixer

Then, press F6 use the arrow key to select your sound card and then press ENTER.

Next, press F5 and scroll to the right using the arrow keys until you get to Auto-Mute. Use the up arrow key to disable automute.

Finally, scroll to the subwoofer using the left or right arrow key and control the volume using the up and down arrow keys. Also, press the M key to mute or unmute each channel.

mchid
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    I've followed your answer, but sound wasn't affected by disabling "Auto-Mute" and there is no "Subwoofer" column. Also `alsa-firmware` package isn't available from repositories and installing package compiled from source returns error: `trying to overwrite '/lib/firmware/yamaha/ds1e_ctrl.fw', which is also in package linux-firmware 1.143.1 dpkg-deb: error: subprocess paste was killed by signal (Broken pipe)` – janot Jul 20 '15 at 20:10
  • @janot I got that from one of the wiki pages which are sometimes out of date. The alsa-firmware package is probably not available because the firmware is most likely included in linux-firmware now so just install the rest of the packages listed. Do you have more than one sound card listed? – mchid Jul 21 '15 at 02:35
  • alsamixer shows only HDA Intel PCH – janot Jul 21 '15 at 06:07
  • Late comment but worth the mention. Install `pavucontrol` and go to Configuration and try to change the profile to something like `Analog Surround 5.1 Output + Analog Stereo Input`. Note that this is only for `pulseaudio` users which Ubuntu nowadays uses it anyway. – dat tutbrus May 30 '16 at 02:35
  • @dattutbrus I'm a bit late too >< There's no such analog profile. only Analog Stereo Duplex and Analog Stereo Output – janot Nov 27 '17 at 03:51
  • @janot well then your motherboard probably didn't support 5.1 audio. When I had my 945GCMX-S2, it had 6 jacks, so the system recognized it and added the 5.1 option. – dat tutbrus Dec 02 '17 at 00:49
  • @dattutbrus idk how many jacks it has, just wanted to get this in ubuntu https://imgur.com/lsOnd89 – janot Dec 02 '17 at 06:01
  • @janot I'm sure that is very misleading, it's impossible to have a 5.1 setup over 1 headphone jack, as that 1 jack only allows 2 speakers maximum. Choosing 5.1 in settings won't magically make your stereo headphones 5.1. – dat tutbrus Dec 03 '17 at 04:51
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According to the link in the other answer, you may have to edit the following file to enable 5.1 audio. Run the following command:

sudo nano /etc/pulse/daemon.conf

Then, press CTRL + W, type:

channels = 2

and then press ENTER to take you to the line you need to edit.

Now, change the 2 to 6 and remove the ; character and the following space at the beginning of the line so that the line should look like this:

default-sample-channels = 6

Finally, press CTRL + o and then press ENTER to save the file. Press CTRL + x to exit and then reboot.

mchid
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  • That also has not effect – janot Jul 21 '15 at 06:09
  • @janot check out the answer from "**Unknown-Master**" on this thread as they seem to have got it working http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2217683 – mchid Jul 22 '15 at 21:00
  • Tried this without any result with all available pins. But then I've partially disassembled subwoofer and found that it's actually kind of working when right speaker is used. It's membrane trembles at least.. Looks like it was working all the time this way. Maybe you have and idea what's going on and how to get it working with both speakers, somehow separate it from right speaker... – janot Jul 24 '15 at 11:30
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It seems it's a bug somewhere in ubuntu, there is a bug for that on a lunchpad. If it affects you please click on "This bug affects me" there - https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/pulseaudio/+bug/1672822

And let's hope that it'll be fixed eventually

Handsome Jack
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