Idea: Audio Device Selector in RetroPie-Setup

[darrena092]

Hi there!

Not sure if this is something that people would find useful, but with my use case of RetroPie this is definitely a pain point. I tend to move my Pi between my office and the TV, meaning sometimes I use USB audio, and other times I use HDMI audio. This means that I'm having to change the ALSA config and either restart the Pi or reload ALSA every time I move location.

While this is an awkward, but doable solution for someone who is familiar with Linux, it's probably not great for inexperienced users.

I think it might be a good idea to add an audio configuration menu to RetroPie-Setup, which allows the user to select a default output device and automatically updates the ALSA config based on the user's preferences. This could also be added in EmulationStation to the RetroPie menu for easy access.

I'm happy to work on this myself and submit a PR, but I wanted to get a feel for what the general opinion of this idea is first before I start work on it.

Thanks!

[mitu]

@darrena092 said in Idea: Audio Device Selector in RetroPie-Setup:

I think it might be a good idea to add an audio configuration menu to RetroPie-Setup, which allows the user to select a default output device and automatically updates the ALSA config based on the user's preferences. This could also be added in EmulationStation to the RetroPie menu for easy access.

There is already an Audio settings menu in EmulationStation - in the RetroPie system. Right now it only works for choosing the audio output for the Pi's onboard audio - i.e. no USB/I2S sound card support. It should be possible to extend it to support other audio options.

The only issue would be the EmulationStation own Audio menu, where you can choose the Card and Device (volume control) - the ALSA name of the default mixer varies, depending on the audio card, but the list of Audio Devices is fixed (in source).