Manual: speaker-test

SPEAKER-TEST(1)					   General Commands Manual				     SPEAKER-TEST(1)

NAME
       speaker-test - command-line speaker test tone generator for ALSA

SYNOPSIS
       speaker-test [-options]

DESCRIPTION
       speaker-test generates a tone that can be used to test the speakers of a computer.

       speaker-test by default will test the default device. If you want to test another sound device you will have first to
       get  a  list  of all of the sound cards in your system and the devices associated with those cards. Notice that there
       might be for example, one device for analog sound, one for digital sound and one for HDMI sound.	 To get the list  of
       available cards and devices you can run aplay -L.

       $ aplay -L
       null
	   Discard all samples (playback) or generate zero samples (capture)
       default:CARD=ICH5
	   Intel ICH5, Intel ICH5
	   Default Audio Device
       front:CARD=ICH5,DEV=0
	   Intel ICH5, Intel ICH5
	   Front speakers
       surround40:CARD=ICH5,DEV=0
	   Intel ICH5, Intel ICH5
	   4.0 Surround output to Front and Rear speakers
       (...)

       in the above example, there are four devices listed: null, default, front and surround40. So, if you want to test the
       last  device you can run speaker-test -Dsurround40:ICH5 -c 6. The -c option will indicate that the six audio channels
       in the device have to be tested.

OPTIONS
       -c | --channels NUM
	      NUM channels in stream

       -D | --device NAME
	      PCM device name NAME

       -f | --frequency FREQ
	      sine wave of FREQ Hz

       --help Print usage help

       -b | --buffer TIME
	      Use buffer size of TIME microseconds.  When 0 is given, use the maximal buffer size.  The default value is 0.

       -p | --period TIME
	      Use period size of TIME microseconds.  When 0 is given, the periods given by -P option is used.	The  default
	      value is 0.

       -P | --nperiods PERIODS
	      Use number of periods.  The default value is 4.

       -r | --rate RATE
	      stream of RATE Hz

       -t | --test pink|st2095|sine|wav
	      -t pink means use pink noise (default).

	      Pink  noise is perceptually uniform noise -- that is, it sounds like every frequency at once.  If you can hear
	      any tone it may indicate resonances in your speaker system or room.

	      -t st2095 means use bandlimited pink noise at -18.5dB AES FS, generated according to SMPTE ST-2095:1-2015.  In
	      addition to speaker localization it may be used for system calibration, for example 85dB for  thater  drivers,
	      with  an	extra +10dB for subwoofers.  Per the spec, it is intended "to be used in calibrating the sound pres‐
	      sure level and electroacoustic response of a cinema B-chain system."  Note that sampling rates less than 48KHz
	      are outside the scope of the spec, and an attempt will be made to construct a reduced rate filter.

	      -t sine means to use sine wave.

	      -t wav means to play WAV files, either pre-defined files or given via -w option.

	      You can pass the number from 1 to 3 as a backward compatibility.

       -l | --nloops COUNT

	      Specifies the number of loops.  Zero means to run infinitely.

	      When -s option below with a valid channel is given, speaker-test will perform  always  a	single-shot  without
	      looping.

       -s | --speaker CHANNEL
	      Do  a  single-shot  speaker test for the given channel.  The channel number starts from 1.  The channel number
	      corresponds to left, right, rear-left, rear-right, center, LFE, side-left, side-right, and so on.

	      For example, when 1 is passed, it tests the left channel only once rather than both channels with looping.

       -w | --wavfile FILE
	      Use the given WAV file for the playback instead of pre-defined WAV files.

       -W | --wavdir DIRECTORY
	      Specify the directory containing WAV files for playback.	The default path is /usr/share/sounds/alsa.

       -m | --chmap MAP
	      Pass the channel map to override.	 If the playback in a specific channel order or	 channel  positions  is	 re‐
	      quired, pass the channel position strings to this option.

       -X | --force-frequency
	      Allow supplied FREQ to be outside the default range of 30-8000Hz. A minimum of 1Hz is still enforced.

USAGE EXAMPLES
       Produce stereo sound from one stereo jack:
	 speaker-test -Dplug:front -c2

       Produce 4 speaker sound from two stereo jacks:
	 speaker-test -Dplug:surround40 -c4

       Produce 5.1 speaker sound from three stereo jacks:
	 speaker-test -Dplug:surround51 -c6

       To send a nice low 75Hz tone to the Woofer and then exit without touching any other speakers:
	 speaker-test -Dplug:surround51 -c6 -s1 -f75

       To do a 2-speaker test using the spdif (coax or optical) output:
	 speaker-test -Dplug:spdif -c2

       Play in the order of front-right and front-left from the front PCM
	 speaker-test -Dplug:front -c2 -mFR,FL

SEE ALSO
       aplay(1)

AUTHOR
       The  speaker-test  program was written by James Courtier-Dutton.	 Pink noise support was added by Nathan Hurst.	Fur‐
       ther extensions by Takashi Iwai.	 SMPTE ST-2095:1 band-limited pink noise added by Rick Sayre.

speaker-test					       April 2nd, 2011					     SPEAKER-TEST(1)