xref: /OK3568_Linux_fs/kernel/Documentation/sound/cards/mixart.rst (revision 4882a59341e53eb6f0b4789bf948001014eff981)
1*4882a593Smuzhiyun==============================================================
2*4882a593SmuzhiyunAlsa driver for Digigram miXart8 and miXart8AES/EBU soundcards
3*4882a593Smuzhiyun==============================================================
4*4882a593Smuzhiyun
5*4882a593SmuzhiyunDigigram <alsa@digigram.com>
6*4882a593Smuzhiyun
7*4882a593Smuzhiyun
8*4882a593SmuzhiyunGENERAL
9*4882a593Smuzhiyun=======
10*4882a593Smuzhiyun
11*4882a593SmuzhiyunThe miXart8 is a multichannel audio processing and mixing soundcard
12*4882a593Smuzhiyunthat has 4 stereo audio inputs and 4 stereo audio outputs.
13*4882a593SmuzhiyunThe miXart8AES/EBU is the same with a add-on card that offers further
14*4882a593Smuzhiyun4 digital stereo audio inputs and outputs.
15*4882a593SmuzhiyunFurthermore the add-on card offers external clock synchronisation
16*4882a593Smuzhiyun(AES/EBU, Word Clock, Time Code and Video Synchro)
17*4882a593Smuzhiyun
18*4882a593SmuzhiyunThe mainboard has a PowerPC that offers onboard mpeg encoding and
19*4882a593Smuzhiyundecoding, samplerate conversions and various effects.
20*4882a593Smuzhiyun
21*4882a593SmuzhiyunThe driver don't work properly at all until the certain firmwares
22*4882a593Smuzhiyunare loaded, i.e. no PCM nor mixer devices will appear.
23*4882a593SmuzhiyunUse the mixartloader that can be found in the alsa-tools package.
24*4882a593Smuzhiyun
25*4882a593Smuzhiyun
26*4882a593SmuzhiyunVERSION 0.1.0
27*4882a593Smuzhiyun=============
28*4882a593Smuzhiyun
29*4882a593SmuzhiyunOne miXart8 board will be represented as 4 alsa cards, each with 1
30*4882a593Smuzhiyunstereo analog capture 'pcm0c' and 1 stereo analog playback 'pcm0p' device.
31*4882a593SmuzhiyunWith a miXart8AES/EBU there is in addition 1 stereo digital input
32*4882a593Smuzhiyun'pcm1c' and 1 stereo digital output 'pcm1p' per card.
33*4882a593Smuzhiyun
34*4882a593SmuzhiyunFormats
35*4882a593Smuzhiyun-------
36*4882a593SmuzhiyunU8, S16_LE, S16_BE, S24_3LE, S24_3BE, FLOAT_LE, FLOAT_BE
37*4882a593SmuzhiyunSample rates : 8000 - 48000 Hz continuously
38*4882a593Smuzhiyun
39*4882a593SmuzhiyunPlayback
40*4882a593Smuzhiyun--------
41*4882a593SmuzhiyunFor instance the playback devices are configured to have max. 4
42*4882a593Smuzhiyunsubstreams performing hardware mixing. This could be changed to a
43*4882a593Smuzhiyunmaximum of 24 substreams if wished.
44*4882a593SmuzhiyunMono files will be played on the left and right channel. Each channel
45*4882a593Smuzhiyuncan be muted for each stream to use 8 analog/digital outputs separately.
46*4882a593Smuzhiyun
47*4882a593SmuzhiyunCapture
48*4882a593Smuzhiyun-------
49*4882a593SmuzhiyunThere is one substream per capture device. For instance only stereo
50*4882a593Smuzhiyunformats are supported.
51*4882a593Smuzhiyun
52*4882a593SmuzhiyunMixer
53*4882a593Smuzhiyun-----
54*4882a593Smuzhiyun<Master> and <Master Capture>
55*4882a593Smuzhiyun	analog volume control of playback and capture PCM.
56*4882a593Smuzhiyun<PCM 0-3> and <PCM Capture>
57*4882a593Smuzhiyun	digital volume control of each analog substream.
58*4882a593Smuzhiyun<AES 0-3> and <AES Capture>
59*4882a593Smuzhiyun	digital volume control of each AES/EBU substream.
60*4882a593Smuzhiyun<Monitoring>
61*4882a593Smuzhiyun	Loopback from 'pcm0c' to 'pcm0p' with digital volume
62*4882a593Smuzhiyun	and mute control.
63*4882a593Smuzhiyun
64*4882a593SmuzhiyunRem : for best audio quality try to keep a 0 attenuation on the PCM
65*4882a593Smuzhiyunand AES volume controls which is set by 219 in the range from 0 to 255
66*4882a593Smuzhiyun(about 86% with alsamixer)
67*4882a593Smuzhiyun
68*4882a593Smuzhiyun
69*4882a593SmuzhiyunNOT YET IMPLEMENTED
70*4882a593Smuzhiyun===================
71*4882a593Smuzhiyun
72*4882a593Smuzhiyun- external clock support (AES/EBU, Word Clock, Time Code, Video Sync)
73*4882a593Smuzhiyun- MPEG audio formats
74*4882a593Smuzhiyun- mono record
75*4882a593Smuzhiyun- on-board effects and samplerate conversions
76*4882a593Smuzhiyun- linked streams
77*4882a593Smuzhiyun
78*4882a593Smuzhiyun
79*4882a593SmuzhiyunFIRMWARE
80*4882a593Smuzhiyun========
81*4882a593Smuzhiyun
82*4882a593Smuzhiyun[As of 2.6.11, the firmware can be loaded automatically with hotplug
83*4882a593Smuzhiyun when CONFIG_FW_LOADER is set.  The mixartloader is necessary only
84*4882a593Smuzhiyun for older versions or when you build the driver into kernel.]
85*4882a593Smuzhiyun
86*4882a593SmuzhiyunFor loading the firmware automatically after the module is loaded, use a
87*4882a593Smuzhiyuninstall command.  For example, add the following entry to
88*4882a593Smuzhiyun/etc/modprobe.d/mixart.conf for miXart driver:
89*4882a593Smuzhiyun::
90*4882a593Smuzhiyun
91*4882a593Smuzhiyun	install snd-mixart /sbin/modprobe --first-time -i snd-mixart && \
92*4882a593Smuzhiyun			   /usr/bin/mixartloader
93*4882a593Smuzhiyun
94*4882a593Smuzhiyun
95*4882a593Smuzhiyun(for 2.2/2.4 kernels, add "post-install snd-mixart /usr/bin/vxloader" to
96*4882a593Smuzhiyun/etc/modules.conf, instead.)
97*4882a593Smuzhiyun
98*4882a593SmuzhiyunThe firmware binaries are installed on /usr/share/alsa/firmware
99*4882a593Smuzhiyun(or /usr/local/share/alsa/firmware, depending to the prefix option of
100*4882a593Smuzhiyunconfigure).  There will be a miXart.conf file, which define the dsp image
101*4882a593Smuzhiyunfiles.
102*4882a593Smuzhiyun
103*4882a593SmuzhiyunThe firmware files are copyright by Digigram SA
104*4882a593Smuzhiyun
105*4882a593Smuzhiyun
106*4882a593SmuzhiyunCOPYRIGHT
107*4882a593Smuzhiyun=========
108*4882a593Smuzhiyun
109*4882a593SmuzhiyunCopyright (c) 2003 Digigram SA <alsa@digigram.com>
110*4882a593SmuzhiyunDistributable under GPL.
111