Prodigy I

Answered

Surprised & puzzled - DTS converts to Dolby Digital 5.1 in my Beam setup!

Forum|Forum|6 years ago
May 10, 2020
26 replies
6403 views

It’s well known in these circles that the Beam, Playbar and Playbase won’t play DTS soundtracks, and the best we can hope for in this situation is a down-mixed stereo output. I’ve also read that Blu-ray players that convert DTS to DD on the fly are like hens teeth - the lists I’ve seen a contain a few Samsung and Oppo players only.

So, how come I’m getting DD5.1 out of my Beam (reported by the app, and by my ears) from plain DTS and DTS-HD Master Audio soundtracks?

My setup is:

Sony UBP-M800 Mk2 UHD bluray player
Sony AG9 TV
Beam connected via the TV’s eARC connection
Sub and Play:1 rears bonded to Beam

There’s no fancy trickery or other boxes, switches, etc. It’s simply bluray player to TV to Beam, all via HDMI.

To get sound from the Beam, I had to make one change to the M800’s audio settings: “Digital Audio Output” = PCM. The other option (“Auto” = bitstream in most cases I believe) gives silence. All other audio settings on the player (and there aren’t many) are at the default. None of them appear to relate to transcoding audio formats.

The result, as reported from the player’s display and by the Sonos app:

DVD or BluRay soundtrack: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 48kHz, or DTS 5.1 48kHx
Blu-ray player output via HDMI = “LPCM 5.1Ch 48kHz”
Sonos app reports Beam is receiving “Dolby Digital 5.1”

What’s going on here? I’ve tested this on several discs, 4K and standard bluray, with the same results.

Have I misunderstood the problem everyone else is talking about? Or have I struck lucky with the Sony M800 Mk2?

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Best answer by Airgetlam

It’s a function of HDMI CEC. The Sonos reports two things to the hub, your TV, one is that it is a speaker, and the other that it handles two codecs, stereo and Dolby Digital. The HDMI CEC hub in the TV then sends the acceptable codecs to all source devices. Assuming the source device is HDMI CEC compliant, it then adjusts itself to only send a Dolby Digital or stereo signal along to the hub, which then forwards that to the speaker.

There are some devices that can accept an HDMI CEC command even when the option isn’t available in the options shown to the user in the audio settings for the device.

Unfortunately, there are some hubs (TVs) and sources that either didn’t properly implement HDMI CEC, at least in the first attempt, which is why you frequently see suggestions for people to download new software for the TV, as well as a reboot process in case something has gone awry. Unfortunately, chances of software updates tend to be slimmer on source devices, but these updates should be applied where possible.

Unfortunately, it’s frequently the receiver/speaker that gets the blame, when it is most often something upstream. To my knowledge, to date, Sonos has not needed to update their relatively tangential implementation of HDMI CEC. It has almost always been an implementation issue in the HDMI CEC hub, built in to the TV set. There have been a handful of issues with source devices, but since that’s significantly upstream from the Sonos, it’s really much harder to define from the end point, the Sonos.

Show previous replies

T

topilouf1

Contributor I

Hi, did you try to connect the BD player HDMI audio output directly to the Beam ?

Just to be sure the TV is not doing anything in your setup

Curious that a player configured to send PCM decides actually to use DD

Maybe you can although try to disconnect the Beam and see what signal is sent to the TV,

J

John B

My best guess… BRP is outputting PCM 5.1 and TV is transcoding to DD5.1.

106rallye

This would be very good news!

J

John B

This would be very good news!

Yes, if you have that BRP and TV. And if I am correct, which is far from certain.

Airgetlam

A couple of years ago I stopped buying discs, in favor of my Apple TV. That may change, if this device does what it seems to. It’s at Amazon for $248 here in the US.

But I’m going to hold off until I get the Arc at the earliest, and see how things stand. Changing back from one format to another is a pretty big change, and I’ve gotten used to not having physical media.

Bruce

A

alexfirth91

Contributor I

I had the same issue on my LG C9. Had to enable PCM for DTS. Dolby Digital discs played with no issue under bitstream. I have a Panasonic DP-UB820. Glad I got it working but it’s clearly a codec support issue with Sonos. For the premium, DTS could be supported too.

106rallye

@alexfirth91 Did you get surround sound or just stereo?

A

alexfirth91

Contributor I

I only tried one film, but Jojo Rabbit worked in 5.1 surround DTS as selected. When I first tried I heard nothing, but the fix I did worked.

C

CarlD74

Contributor II

@alexfirth91 did you change the settings on the TV or on the Blu-ray player? I also have a C9 and a Panasonic 820, and when I play a DTS Blu-Ray I get silence. I have been able to work around it by using my Xbox, but that defeats the purpose of why I bought the Panasonic. Seems I have to choose between Dolby vision or DTS until Sonos does a firmware update.

S

Silverthorn

Prodigy II

@alexfirth91 did you change the settings on the TV or on the Blu-ray player? I also have a C9 and a Panasonic 820, and when I play a DTS Blu-Ray I get silence. I have been able to work around it by using my Xbox, but that defeats the purpose of why I bought the Panasonic. Seems I have to choose between Dolby vision or DTS until Sonos does a firmware update.

You should be able to at least get stereo out of the 820 with DTS tracks. I have the 420 and get stereo on my Playbase. If you're lucky maybe you can get multi channel pcm as well. I'm hoping people will find that the case with new TVs and the Arc.

"I saw the Stooges and the MC5"

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