HDMI sound via ATI graphics card

The HDMI sound device might not be detected automatically when booting the computer without the television connected. I hope this instruction will help you to make sure the drivers are always loaded.

The easiest way:

1. Turn TV on
2. Reboot

Open sound settings, you should see an HDMI Audio device here:

First find your HDMI sound device, in this case card 1, device 3:

aplay -l

**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
...
card 1: Generic [HD-Audio Generic], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
  Subdevices: 1/1
  Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

Modify the following file to force-load the driver:

• http://forums.opensuse.org/english/get-technical-help-here/multimedia/472550-problems-sound-hdmi-no-pulse-pavucontrol-2.html

sudo gedit /etc/pulse/default.pa

Insert these lines after module-alsa-sink, use option 1,3 for card 1 and device 3:

...
#load-module module-alsa-sink
#wjv 20130701 force load HDMI sound driver card 1, device 3:
load-module module-alsa-sink device=hw:1,3
#load-module module-combine sink_name=combined
#set-default-sink combined
...

Reboot your system.

Test with aplay or with speaker-test (card 1, device 3):

aplay -D plughw:1,3 ~/Scripts/other/alarm.wav
speaker-test -c 2 -r 48000 -D hw:1,3

Make sure the card is not muted:

• http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1668173&p=10363314#post10363314

sudo apt-get install gnome-alsamixer
alsamixer

• F6 to select the device
• M to mute/unmute