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Can’t get 5.1 to work on PC (Beam & Ones)

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Hello,

I’m having some issues with my audio setup and am wondering if anybody’s able to support me. I’m not an expert but will explain the setup along with the issues I’m experiencing. Please let me know if more information is needed and I’ll answer.

I use a Sonos 5.1 surround sound system (Beam gen 2 soundbar.

My TV only has 1 HMRC ARC port. The Beam is connected to this.
A non-ARC HDMI port on my TV is then connected to this splitter as the input.

The below devices are connected to it as outputs. I can see what type of audio is being received and played on my system via the Sonos app:

Apple TV (Dolby Digital 5.1)
PS5 (Dolby Digital 5.1 )
Nintendo Switch (Stereo PCM)
Windows 11 PC (Stereo PCM)

My main priority is fixing the Windows PC to output 5.1. But it would also be nice to fix this for the Nintendo Switch.

I’ve installed the Dolby Access app for Windows and it said Configuration Failed. Under this it says I can go to Windows’ settings > Sound > Audio Output and change the Spatial Sound of my audio output to Dolby Atmos for Home Theater and close settings. However, there are no options under Spatial Audio other than Windows Sonic for Headphones. This is the same when I use the DTS app.

I’ve been troubleshooting this for a few hours now and haven’t been able to figure out why with my limited understanding. I’ve seen that my PC may not be able to see my audio system properly, but am confused why this is the case when my PS5 and Apple TV play 5.1 correctly. I’d really appreciate any help, thank you so much for reading…

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Ken_GriffithsAnswer

I did find this on YouTube, but it’s not something I’ve tried, personally speaking… posted for info only:

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AmzypopAuthor

Trending Lyricist I

I’m in the FX Configurator part of the tutorial. I’m not sure which endpoint speaker to select out of the available options:

When my sound devices are in the first picture. Sound comes through via Sony TV, I disabled Realrek(R) Audio a few days ago as it didn’t provide sound, my pc doesn’t have built-in speakers.

Sorry if any of these are silly questions. The gentleman in the tutorial said choose your endpoint output and selected his Realtek speaker device. But I wasn’t sure for my case. And I see 2 Realtek speaker devices in the FX Configurator list.

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AmzypopAuthor

Trending Lyricist I

OMG I watched more of the video and he explains to select the TV. I’m so sorry. Will continue on with the tutorial!

sigh

Prodigy II

No worries. Unfortunately hdmi-arc and windows is still a weak point for PCs connected directly to TVs.

VRR adoption by TVs has made vsync/screen tearing mostly a non-issue, eArc allows uncompressed PCM which games and windows use a non-issue, 4K120, HDR is nice for some games.

With hdmi-arc it’s in a bit of choose between the best for audio or video but not both. PC → Audio device → TV is best for audio, but PC → TV → arc Audio device is best for video if the tv has vrr/hdr/4k120 support.

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AmzypopAuthor

Trending Lyricist I

Thank you again for your help.

I unfortunately can’t get the driver to successfully install. I chose Dolby Home Theatre like in the tutorial. I’ve repeated the steps a few times, uninstalling and scanning Registry as in the video before restarting and reinstalling and there’s no Dolby tab in the Sony TV audio device’s properties, or Dolby as an option in the Advanced tab.

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AmzypopAuthor

Trending Lyricist I

The gentleman who uploaded the YouTube video very kindly did tech support over Discord with me. 3 hours later we got surround sound working, following the instructions in the video. With the caveat that I needed to downgrade to Windows 10 as Windows 11 was blocking the driver install.

Very happy. Thank you so much for your help everyone. I’ll mark the comment with the YouTube video as the solution.

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Bg573

Enthusiast I

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Dolby used to provide a Dolby digital live package, which hardware manufacturers such as creative used to license for on-the-fly Dolby digital output. Like the original DTS codecs, the Dolby Digital (AC3) codec patents expired. This allowed software developers and the pc community to create and release unofficial Dolby Digital encoders without any legal risks.

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For whatever it’s worth here, Creative still sells cards with Dolby Digital Live and DTS Connect. I use a Creative Sound Blaster Z SE to send 5.1 DTS audio over toslink to my Beam (gen 1) plus surrounds and subwoofer.

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