[Consortium] Processing Tivo audio

[Alan Bromborsky]

I have a Tivo and  I wish to play the AC3 5.1 output (spdif/toslink) 
through my computer (KXStudio) and sound card (Xonar D2).  The sound 
card has a
spdif/toslink input (I can play digital stereo from a cd that I input 
into the toslink using VLC).  I need to know how to convert the digital 
AC3 from the Tivo to a 6 channel digital wav streams and send those 
streams to the sound card.

If possible I am looking for an example from someone who has done this 
processing or part of this processing before.  Otherwise, I am looking 
for suggestions for the best way to implement this.  Can I only use alsa 
or gstreamer or a combination of the two or ffmpeg or something else.  I 
am not sure where to start.

I am trying to turn my HTPC into a surround sound preamp.  XBMC can 
handle playing video files.  VLC can handle (in addition to files) cd's, 
dvd's, and bluray's.  In think I can handle analog inputs (turntable and 
tapes) since the data streams are not encoded, but I don't know what to 
do about AC3 from the Tivo.