Amazon Fire Cube not playing multichannel audio properly

Plex Players Streaming Devices
21

So finally after ages there seems to be a solution coming as mentioned here: Fire Cube (3rd Gen) DTS and TrueHD Not working

Has rollout of this started also on other devices like AFTV 4K Max?

22

Amazon announced TrueHD and DTS-HD passthrough only for the Cube v3, not for any other FireTV devices.

Plex mentioned on another thread (which I can’t find right now), they also have to update the Plex Android TV app, date TBD.

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23

That’s the key to solving this; updating the app. I don’t think there is anything that Amazon can do that is going to help here. I would love to be wrong, although I’m on ver 2 of the Cube, so I’d be out of luck if it was version dependent.

24

But it wouldn’t make sense releasing this just for the cube and not also for example the Amazon fire TV 4K max.

25

You’ll have to ask Amazon about that. Look at the Amazon Fire TV Device Specifications. The Cube 3rd Gen 2022 is the only device that mentions TrueHD and DTS audio passthrough.

Google “Amazon TrueHD passthrough.” The only device mentioned with the capability is the Cube 3rd gen.

Also, a bit off topic for this thread anyway. OP topic is about multi-channel music, which uses a different API than movie/tv (video + audio) files.

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26

Well easy answer: It costs money (license fees)

On Fire TV Cube supporting the lossless audio codecs is needed, because of the HDMI Input an the passthrough capabilities.
So you can connect your UHD Bluray Player (the only source where lossless audio could LEGALLY occur) and expect the Fire TV Cube to passthrough the lossless audio.

There is no such functionality on any other Fire TV Player, so I wouldn’t hold my breath for Amazon adding this “useless” feature.

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27

As far as I know it’s perfectly legal to make a copy of your Blu-ray and stream it from a NAS (or other source). As long as you don’t share the remux/encode with people who don’t own the disc.

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28

Pinging the thread as I patiently wait for an app update. :slight_smile:

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31

Very interested in this as well. Would like to also see Dolby Atmos music support.

32

Yeah, that would be nice too. :slight_smile:

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33

Just providing more info but: Tidal not only sends Atmos, but prevents you from sending Atmos if it detects that your receiver isn’t compatible (how?? I wanted to hear the core 5.1 track from atmos songs but it doesn’t let me). So they definetely implemented a complex method of sending audio their way.

34

That’s pretty standard practice to not send data if there isn’t support for it. Although I downmix Atmos to 5.1 all the time, it isn’t exactly correct and I think they aren’t going to downmix it for you. They will just use the stereo mix that is available.

35

It wouldn’t be a downmix. Atmos is object data on top of a 5.1 or 7.1 audio stream. Also because it’s just metadata it can be sent even to unsupported devices. And if the devices can’t play atmos then it just gets safely ignored and you hear the base 5.1 or 7.1 stream.

Tidal checks probably for two reasons: to ensure you don’t hear a mix that isn’t completely what’s intended, and to reduce piracy.

36

Since it isn’t the complete mix, I casually used the term Downmix, because not all of the mix is there and there isn’t really a good term to use. Actually, all of the mix may be there, just not exactly where they intended it to go. And I’m sure they check so that you don’t get an incomplete mix. I doubt they use it for piracy. It is really easy to get the Atmos mix downloaded if you have an account.

37

This is my monthly ping, awaiting the hard working programmers at Plex to come up with a way to have multichannel music play on an Amazon Fire Cube (or similar device).

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38

4K Max users definitely desperately looking forward to it too.
Any progress / update ?

39

This is my monthly ping. Just wondering aloud if any work is being done on multichannel audio for the Amazon Fire devices.

40

Still waiting for an update. :frowning:

41

Apparently this is even less important than the Apple TV update. Very few visitors here. Still, it would be nice if Plex could support multi-channel music on the Amazon Fire Cube and other Android devices. I’ll just keep waiting. Anything new to report @DaveBinM ?

42

I haven’t worked for Plex since late June, when they had layoffs, so unfortunately, I don’t have any more information than you