I have an Android TV and a Sonos Arc. When using Plex on the Android TV I would get DD5.1.
I have since started using a Chromecast with Google TV instead of just the Android TV. With this I only get Stereo output with Plex. With Netflix and Prime Video I get DD+ 5.1 so my TV can definitely handle passthrough.
Is this a known issue with Plex or do I need to change settings on the Plex server?
Did you enable the pasthrough setting in Plex?
Yep, passthrough set to hdmi.
Ok. Please reproduce and provide both PMS and Android logs.
Great, will do, I have just gone on PMS and downloaded the logs which are attached.
I’m not sure where I find the Android logs though?
(File removed)
Your PMS logs show that the stream is being trancoded from 5.1 AC3 to 5.1 AAC. If you don’t get 5.1 audio on your TV, there is some setting wrong, either in the Chromecast settings or your TV. The app appears to be working properly.
Thanks for your help with this.
I have looked on settings for my Chromecast with Google TV and it says AAC is unsupported. Very strange as the Arc and the TV (Philips Android TV) are supposed to support it. Plus if I cast it works, similar to this person: Chromecast Google TV Stereo Audio in AAC 5.1/7.1
Is there anything I can change so PMS transcodes to something other than AAC?
That’s wrong. The CC does support AAC. Not sure about 7.1. but definitely 5.1 should work. Please provide me your Android log when you can.
Here you go, sorry only on a Chromebook so can only put it in Docs: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1VIe17jxmvYzmgxLqDyYp4iRUE2w6jtklAQAQNLSnxL8/edit?usp=sharing
Yous logs show that everything is working as 5.1 AAC. Whatever is stopping 5.1 from working is on your TV/Sonos end.
Can you explain how things are physically connected?
Chromecast connected to HDMI1 and Sonos Arc connected to HDMI3.
TV set to output audio via HDMI and I have tried both the DD+ setting and the Multichannel (bypass) setting but they seem to give the same result.
All ports support ARC. HDMI 1 is 2.0 whilst HDMI3 is 1.4. Although other apps play DD+ properly. Do you think trying another port could make a difference? (Would mean taking the TV off the wall so not something I can try very easily!).
EDIT: Just tried it by using the PS4 cable which is plugged into HDMI2 - Same issue though.
Can you post screenshots of your Chromecast’s Audio settings. There should be a section for surround sound. What is that set to?
You’d sure think that. But the CC only supports decoding stereo AAC. It originally supported 5.1 but Google removed it.
We discarded support for 5.1 AAC & Multi-channel AAC streams for Gen 2 and Ultra devices from 1.28 onwards.
...
This is working as intended. We would recommend you to use either regular stereo (2-channel) AAC or AC3/EAC3 audio or 5.1 Opus audio stream or etc.
(I’m curious if it’s the CC or the TV that’s smashing it to stereo.)
I know that’s true for the casting protocol. I don’t know if that applies when actually running the Plex app. I’ll need to have the devs check. The app log shows it reporting that it supports multi-channel AAC.
I’m dumb anyway - I missed the “… with Google TV” part of the topic. I agree that might change things.
There are a ton of reasons to expect AAC 5.1 to fail.
/subscribing. I’m curious why AAC 5.1 is being advertised to Plex at all, and what the CCwGTV is doing with it from there.
@Soong, what TV make/model do you have? I’m curious if it supports eARC. Some TVs can decode AAC 5.1 but only emit stereo. Some TVs can’t pass LPCM directly through and convert it to stereo.
Does your TV let you specify a fixed “DD5.1” (only) audio mode?
It’s a Philips 65PUS7303. Think it’s from 2018 - It doesn’t support eARC, just ARC.
In the sound setting it lets you pick multichannel (bypass) or Dolby Digital 5.1. I have picked DD5.1 and that’s what makes the other apps output in DD5.1.
Sound settings on the Chromecast wGTV (such a stupid name) are set to automatic and all options are showing as supported except for AAC! If I choose Manual instead of Automatic it will let me select AAC but then gives a warning that it might not working and if I play something it stutters and plays at about 2fps and not in DD5.1.
Try this. In the Plex app, enabled passthrough. Change it from HDMI to Optical, you will then be able to select codecs. Enable AC3 and turn everything else off. Try playing your video now.
Is the point of changing from HDMI to Optical to disable capability detection, so that you get to choose things manually?
Yes. Although this is a bug. The settings for optical shouldn’t affect hdmi passthrough, but it does, at least for now. So you can disable codecs that are reported incorrectly.
