--- libao2/ao_alsa9.c.orig	Wed Jul 30 11:29:25 2003
+++ libao2/ao_alsa9.c	Wed Jul 30 13:33:38 2003
@@ -336,7 +336,24 @@
 	  }
 	}
       }
-    } //end parsing ao_subdevice
+    } else { //end parsing ao_subdevice
+        /* in any case for multichannel playback we should select
+         * appropriate device
+         */
+        char devstr[128];
+
+        switch (channels) {
+          case 4:
+            strcpy(devstr, "surround40");
+            alsa_device = devstr;
+           break;
+          case 6:
+            strcpy(devstr, "surround51");
+            alsa_device = devstr;
+           break;
+          default:
+        }
+    }
 
     /* switch for spdif
      * sets opening sequence for SPDIF