Hi all,
After upgrading my Roku Ultra 4670x to 9.4 OS I have lost all audio support except for AAC stereo.
When playing even standard AC3 2.0 the Plex app transcodes this to AAC stereo and reports “audio stream is not compatible”. Same for all DTS and eAC3 formats.
I have checked the Roku audio settings and nothing has changed or can be changed there, same in Plex. My setup is the same it has been for 2 years.
Also the Roku’s “volume modes” are grayed out in all apps. When I hover over the in-app menu it says “automatic volume modes have not been enabled”. There has never been an option to turn these on or off.
Please let me know if this is a Roku or Plex issue.
Edit: I’ve discovered it’s a bug brought in with the new 9.4OS interacting with the Plex app. I’m able to reproduce the issue very reliably.
**The problem comes with leaving “force direct play” on in the Plex app. The bug triggers when I play a “volume mode” compatible stream (like AAC stereo), switch to night mode, and stop the file. If I then try to play a file with a non-volume mode compatible stream (like Dolby or DTS) with “force direct play” and “night mode” still on, Roku disables all volume mode options in all apps and reports that my AVR equipment can’t play any Dolby or DTS. With previous OS it would only disable “volume modes” for the currently playing Dolby/DTS streams, now it disables these modes permanently. It makes Plex transcode all these formats to AAC until a factory reset or performing the steps outlined below:
1. Go into Settings/Audio/HDMI and set PCM-Stereo and Settings/Audio/Audio mode=Stereo, RESTART your Roku
2. Go back into Settings/Audio/HDMI=Auto detect and Settings/Audio/Audio mode=Auto, RESTART again**
It’s a really infuriating bug but the only solution when leaving “force direct play on” is to either not forget to turn volume modes off before playing a non-AAC audio stream, or simplest is to leave the direct play option as “auto” not “forced” in Plex.
