Hi everyone,

Hoping one of the experts will see this...not sure where else to go

I have a media center (I know I know, don't hold it against me) with digital audio output. I have everything setup as 5.1, but I'm only hearing 2 channels (left and right). The audio setup works fine (getting 5.1) with other sources such as a DVD player.

I know this could be any number of issues related to software, but I was wondering if there is anything I can test or look for regarding the signal itself. Everything on the software side looks correct. Is there any way to know if the digital output signal is only sending 2 channels (all the testing on the PC side indicates it should be sending out 5) or if the other 3 channels are being sent (rear left, rear right, center) but somehow being corrupted.

I know this a hard one, but I thought someone may have some ideas to help troubleshoot.

Regards,
Raymond

With a typical DVD player, this can be a result of the output being set as "PCM" instead of "raw data" or "bitstream", etc. See if there are any such menus available.

Check the software settings for setup on your media server. There may be a digital audio output setup entry, with a selection for PCM or Dolby 5.1. If it is set for PCM you will only get 2 channels of output. This is a known problem with the factory default setup on Sony DVD players.

It depends on what you are playing on your media center. If you're playing mp3s and cds, you'll only get 2 channels but when playing dvds I would expect 5.1 channels.
Couple things:
Clarify what you mean by media center. I suppose you mean Windows MCE. Did you build this PC yourself? Buy it?

Might help to also clarify your dvd playing software. Some software has settings to pass through AC-3 streams to the sounds card.

Lastly, if this is a WinMCE box you bought, you should really be asking tech support from the manufacturer.

I know of some Digital and HD TV channels that broadcast in DD 2.0.

Consider the source.

are the 2 channel sources DVDs or MP3s or WMAs? with MP3 and WMA you're only going to get 2 channels. It's probably just sending out the signal as stereo. Try it with a DVD with a 5.1 mix.

Another possibility is that there are only two channels in your program. You don't give quite enough info to rule this one out.

Dolby Digital, although capable of 5.1 channels, can still be called Dolby Digital because of the method it uses to get a signal from one point to another, even if that signal is only two channels, or even mono! I first ran into this about five years ago with the big-dish 4DTV satellite receivers. They had Dolby Digital audio that came out of two RCA jacks labeled "left" and right." And they meant analog.

What receiver are you playing it on? Most of the decent receivers have some sort of display of the signal info to tell you what is coming in the digital port.

Hi everyone,

Thanks for all the comments and suggestions. It came down to a software problem in which I needed to configure the DVD decoder to output 5.1

This wasn't as easy a problem to find though so I though I'd post why ... all the sound properties on the machine were set to digitial out, multi channel, but I was only getting 2 channels on DVD playback. The one setting I was missing was on the video decocer; I'm using the nVidia Pure Video decoder and the only time you're able to access the properties and change the audio setting are when a DVD is playing (right-click off the icon in the icon tray in the lower right corner), but when you're running MCE on a second monitor (in another room) I never looked at the task bar on the machine. I never even new there was a separate properties for the decoder!

To a couple of earlier questions:
- This is a home built media center (MCE 2005) so I'm level 3 support!
- In looking a the receiver, it was getting a PCM signal, hence 2 channel only
- The problem occured playing DVDs with 5.1 sound

Thanks again everyone!! This forum never ceases to amaze me in the quality of the discussion!

-Raymond

And it never fails to just totally amaze me that manufacturers create products to, for instance, play DVDs with 5.1 output, and advertise them as such, and call them 5.1 players, and think they have such a cool product...
then ship them with that feature disabled and, as you can see in this case, almost freekin impossible to find!

This is as bad as making a CD player with a 4" diameter slot to put the disks into!

Same goes for girlfirends.

You bragging or complaining???

Well, she makes a great glove, so I must be bragging today!!!