If you hook the RPi2 directly to the tv’s hdmi port, does tvservice still throw an error.
Yes, it does.
Yes, it does.
What about other HDTV's. I'm trying to narrow down whether it's a problem with the RPi, receiver, or TV. Do you have another HDTV to test with?
Tried it on 2 different makes of TV (LG and Coby) and 2 different HDMI cables. Still the same: "[E] Failed to initialize VCHI (ret=-1)"
I think you’re problem is beyond the expertise of the plex community. You might want to search the raspberry pi or openelec forums for similar problems. Maybe try installing Raspian or Openelec and see if your problem continues. It may be a problem with your Pi but I can’t say for sure.
Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
Well, thanks for your help rcork. Guess I'll dig around a bit and see what I can find. Just for kicks and grins I'm going to try a different microSD card. Never know, I guess. Think it's possible I got a bad Pi2 and the HDMI port is malfunctioning? I can rule out the HDMI cable, receiver and TV now leaving just the card, the image and the hardware.
Well it's always possible you got a bad unit. Try putting OpenElec and Rasbian on and see if you still have issues. You can use BerryBoot to have both those OS's on the same SD card and toggle back and forth at boot to troubleshoot.
Any particular flavor of Rasbian? I would guess NOOBS since that is rather fitting for me, but not totally sure. And once I get these 2 installed, then what? More testing w/ my files? Will it see my Plex server and play them appropriately?
Throwing this out there to see if anyone might have any ideas. rcork has been great to work with but I fear we may be up against a wall here with this issue. I installed OpenELEC on my RPi2 and loaded up a couple of 5.1 movies on a USB drive. The RPi2 played them perfectly. Passed DTS and DD 5.1 down to my receiver and everything sounded great. Re-installed RasPlex and nada. Back to the LCPM 2.0 garbage. Am I missing a setup step here somewhere? I have both boxed ticked to allow DTS and DD (AC3) pass-through in the Preferences page and changed the Audio output channels to 5.1 as well. When I went from OpenELEC back to RasPlex the only thing I changed was the OS. The HDMI cable is the same, the receiver is the same, using the same port on the receiver, same power source, same network port, even the same 4GB class 10 MicroSD card formatted in FAT before putting the image on it via the RasPlex Windows loader. HELP.
loaded it up, booted it, ran the tvservice -a command and got the same error.
Does this command require sudo privilege? I found the command that verifies mpeg2 license does.
try 'sudo tvservice -a'
Not at home. If sudo itself doesn't work, try 'su -' to log in as root user, and then try the tvservice command.
Does this command require sudo privilege? I found the command that verifies mpeg2 license does.
try 'sudo tvservice -a'
Not at home. If sudo itself doesn't work, try 'su -' to log in as root user, and then try the tvservice command.
You don't need sudo or su, neither will work as Rasplex has root access by default.
Throwing this out there to see if anyone might have any ideas. rcork has been great to work with but I fear we may be up against a wall here with this issue. I installed OpenELEC on my RPi2 and loaded up a couple of 5.1 movies on a USB drive. The RPi2 played them perfectly. Passed DTS and DD 5.1 down to my receiver and everything sounded great. Re-installed RasPlex and nada. Back to the LCPM 2.0 garbage. Am I missing a setup step here somewhere? I have both boxed ticked to allow DTS and DD (AC3) pass-through in the Preferences page and changed the Audio output channels to 5.1 as well. When I went from OpenELEC back to RasPlex the only thing I changed was the OS. The HDMI cable is the same, the receiver is the same, using the same port on the receiver, same power source, same network port, even the same 4GB class 10 MicroSD card formatted in FAT before putting the image on it via the RasPlex Windows loader. HELP.
I'm assuming you have tried reflashing a Class 10, minimum 4Gb, Micro SD card, have a 2A power supply (not powering Pi from TV) and a decent micro USB cable. The only change you should make to config.txt is to make sure that gpu_mem_1024=256, leave everything else as default. If not, can you please try that? There are thousands of users out there using DTS passthrough (someone has just posted yet another confirmation of this in the 0.5.1 Release topic).
Ned, I am using a 4Gb class 10 MicroSD bought just for this project, using a brand new GizmoJunkies 5.3V, 2A power supply. As for the gpu_mem_1024=256 command, where do I put that in the config? I have this at the top of the confg:
# default GPU memory split (do not change if you do not know what you are doing)
gpu_mem=128
# SDRAM size based GPU memory split, uncomment and setup to override 'gpu_mem'
gpu_mem_256=54
gpu_mem_512=128
and this at the bottom of it:
hdmi_force_hotplug=1
hdmi_drive=2
gpu_mem_256=64
gpu_mem_512=200
dtoverlay=lirc-rpi
AgentPlex007, tried 'sudo tvservice -a' via SSH and it returns 'sudo not found' error. Running SSH w/ the plexuser account (dont know of any other).
Ned, I am using a 4Gb class 10 MicroSD bought just for this project, using a brand new GizmoJunkies 5.3V, 2A power supply. As for the gpu_mem_1024=256 command, where do I put that in the config? I have this at the top of the confg:
# default GPU memory split (do not change if you do not know what you are doing)
gpu_mem=128
# SDRAM size based GPU memory split, uncomment and setup to override 'gpu_mem'
gpu_mem_256=54
gpu_mem_512=128
and this at the bottom of it:
hdmi_force_hotplug=1
hdmi_drive=2
gpu_mem_256=64
gpu_mem_512=200
dtoverlay=lirc-rpi
AgentPlex007, tried 'sudo tvservice -a' via SSH and it returns 'sudo not found' error. Running SSH w/ the plexuser account (dont know of any other).
Place it at the end of the other gpu_mem_xxx=xxx entries.
Regarding sudo see this post https://forums.plex.tv/topic/139132-rasplex-does-not-pass-through-dts/?p=875226
Regards
Added the 'gpu_mem_1024=256' command. Still no dice. Any clue as to why or what '[E] Failed to initialize VCHI (ret=-1)' means when trying to run the 'tvservice -a' command means? I have ordered another brand new class 10 microSD card to try.
This is what I get back when I run the command:
RasPlex:~ # tvservice -a PCM supported: Max channels: 6, Max samplerate: 192kHz, Max samplesize 24 bits. AC3 supported: Max channels: 8, Max samplerate: 48kHz, Max rate 640 kb/s. DTS supported: Max channels: 8, Max samplerate: 48kHz, Max rate 1536 kb/s. DTS_HD supported: Max channels: 8, Max samplerate: 192kHz, Max rate 8 kb/s.
RPi1 -> Onkyo TX-SR309 receiver -> Sony Bravia 55HX929
Ok, finally an update. Got it working!! All it took was a new Pi2, new memory card and new receiver. Not sure which one fixed the issue, but I can now pass DD5.1 as well as DTS 5.1. I did find I apparently have a movie encoded in DD-ex which was actually outputting 6.1. Went w/ a new receiver because the basement one was getting long in the tooth and has no HDMI inputs/outputs so the upstairs one goes downstairs and new one goes upstairs. Got the Sony STR-DN850 on a sweet deal at Best Buy. Once I get the old on reset downstairs I'm going to take the Pi2 down there just to rule out that receiver as having been my issue. I got to return the Pi2 to the vendor I purchased it from and they got me a new one. All in all, pretty happy now, just gotta start figuring out the overclocking (if necessary), and a remote control. Lot of reading to do now. Thanks for all your help everyone, especially rcork!
i have rasbery pi 2
i have instald rasplex on it
and my combo is
NAS ----> RP2 ---> rx-v677 receiver --(ARC)--> Samsung Smart Tv
my isues are
1. cant output DTS HD or MA
2. when i play videos in Direct mode the sound is a bit late for the Sean duno whats the isue
also if i play plex on my smart tv it dosent support DTS only the fake dts neo 2.5 or pcm and PCM is 2 Chanel !!
what i wold love to do is
play DTS HD on the tv plex app or the rp2 also i use ARC to control the rp2 and resever and tv dont know if it has to do any with the isue
this is my rasplex setings for audio
You don't need sudo or su, neither will work as Rasplex has root access by default.
Just wanted to chime in, I was debugging why DTS passthrough wasn't working on my Pi2 with RasPlex 0.6.1, and found that `tvservice -a` gives the same error as he was getting ([E] Failed to initialize VCHI (ret=-1)) when run as plexuser, but will run fine as root and showed me that all the modes were supported. After setting `hdmi_force_edid_audio=1` the passthrough worked fine - perhaps there's a permissions issue internally where plexuser can't run the script to detect that the stream is supported, so it turns off unless forced?
I've spend a few hours yesterday fiddling with the DTS issue described in this thread. Eventually I ran out of options... I'll share my journey with you as someone might have an idea what to try next.
This is my setup:
RPi (rasplex 0.6.0) > HDMI audio splitter (this one) > 1. receiver (toslink) & 2. TV (arc)
I've indicated in rasplex that I have an AC3 & DTS capable receiver and have set the channels to 5.1.
No when I run tvservice -a in this setup all I get is:
PCM supported: Max channels: 2, Max samplerate: 48kHz, Max samplesize 24 bits.
My wild guess is that this is caused by the fact that the TV (samsung) is known to downmix any external DD/DTS to PCM. Playing a DD or DTS track indeed produces a PCM sound in this setup.
But something interesting happens when I add hdmi_force_edid_audio=1 to config.txt. Of course after this the output of tvservice -a indicates that all codecs are supported. Now when I play a DD track it first shows up as PCM on my receiver but I can enter the sound menu of my tv and change the track to DD. After doing this the receiver recognizes DD and the track plays just fine. This is pretty spectacular as like I said the tv is know for not passing through any external DD/DTS tracks. Coming this far I was pretty confident that playing a DTS track would be a problem but it turned out I was wrong...
At first playing a DTS track seems to work the same as a DD track. The receiver shows a PCM signal and I only hear 2 channels of the DTS track. So I entered the sound menu of the tv and expected that I change PCM to DTS there. But no luck, I can only select PCM here and there is a DD option but that is grayed out. I know that DTS is a valid option in the sound menu as I've played DTS tracks with the build in media player.
So it looks like the DD signal is passed through in a way that the tv accepts it and provides the option to select that channel. Somehow a DTS signal is passed through by rasplex in a different way. A way that is not recognized by the tv at least.
At this point I've tried all the various combinations in rasplex settings with different audio channels and enabling / disabling the AC3/DTS capable receiver. I've also tried different HDMI cables.
A workaround for me would be if I could keep hdmi_force_edid_audio=1 in config.txt and only disable the DTS option so that DTS would be transcoded by plex to DD.
Any clues on what to try next are appreciated!
