In general, what does surround sound transcode into?

Plex Players
1

Hi,

When I am playing media with a surround sound format that is not supported on my TV, what does it transcode into? How does plex decide what to do? Dumbed down to 2ch stereo? A format that the TV does support? Multiple discrete channels?

Thanks,
Tony

2

AFAIK, that depends on the available bandwidth. If you have a rather low bandwidth available, it is mixed down to stereo.
If you have a high bandwidth, you might get multichannel AC3 or OPUS (again depending on the abilities of the device.)

With a remote connection ot the server, you tend to get more stereo downmixes.

3

Thanks Otto, that makes sense.