Solving playback issues

[tortuga2315]

I recently upgraded my home theater from 5.1 to 7.1. I have 11 movies that I ripped from BluRay that have either a Dolby True HD or DTS-HD audio track. I have an Onkyo TX-NR5100 receiver.

At first I had the Roku Streaming Stick 4k+ and it would require that Dolby True HD 7.1 and DTS-HD audio tracks to be transcoded into EAC 7.1. My receiver showed a DD 7.1 input in both cases.

Yesterday I bought a Roku Ultra to see if it provided better support. At first I was thrilled because in the Audio settings I had the option for Audio Passthrough of Dolby Atmos and DTS-HD. This option was missing on the Streaming Stick 4k+. I played a movie with TrueHD 7.1 and my receiver displayed an Atmos input and a Dolby Atmos 7.1 output! And Plex showed that the audio was NOT being trancoded. Woot!

I then tried DTS-HD but rather than passing it through, the input was DTS 5.1 and the output was DTS 7.1. Plex was transcoding the audio even though the Allow DTS-HD option was enabled and the source was DTS-HD.

But what is odd is that EVERY input that is NOT DTS shows as Atmos on my receiver. I was watching a TV show in 2 channel stereo and Plex showed the audio as 2 channel stereo but the receiver showed it as an Atmos input and a Dolby Atmos 7.1 output.

I don't know why the Roku Ultra outputs everything as Atmos even the stuff that isn't.

[atc98092]

No, it's not transcoding the DTS-HD. While The Ultra 4800 has an audio passthrough setting, that does NOT mean it will bitstream lossless audio codecs. Your Ultra is converting TrueHD/Atmos to DD+/Atmos. DTS-HD is bitstreaming the lossy DTS core audio, which Roku devices have always supported. Since you're using Plex as the player, I can't say for certain what Plex might be doing behind the scenes to the audio, but it does know that your Roku will not bitstream the lossless audio, so it might be doing the transcoding behind the curtain. 🙂

As to everything showing up as Atmos, I believe your passthrough setting has been changed. If it's set to Auto, then it will convert the audio to the highest detected level the AVR reports as supported. I've heard others report the same thing with Atmos being sent out. My 4800 is connected to an Atmos-capable AVR, but the only Atmos sound I get is if that's what is actually being sent with the video. I never see Atmos on the display otherwise. 

If you want your lossless audio fully bitstreamed, you need an Nvidia Shield. There's nothing else available for under $300 that will do it, and have a Gigabit Ethernet jack. There are some inexpensive Android based players that will bitstream the audio (using Plex or Kodi as the player app), but none of them have a Gigabit Ethernet jack, so if you have any UHD rips you need really good WiFi.

[tortuga2315]

For DTS that makes sense as my Plex server reports that it's transcoding the DTS Core 5.1 audio stream. Why is there a DTS-HD option if it essentially doesn't work?

My Audio Passthrough is set to Auto. If I understand you, you're saying that Roku is receiving a stereo signal but is converting it to Atmos 7.1? This is unfortunate because with a stereo signal my receiver can apply some special settings to make it sound better whereas if the receiver sees the input as Atmos I am very limited in what I can do.

Both the Ultra and Streaming Stick 4k+ are on WIFI and a speed test shows a speed of 125 mbps. I would think that'd be fast enough. 

[atc98092]

I don't know why they list DTS-HD, although it might be because it has the core DTS audio that will passthrough. TrueHD has no comparable lossy core, so it has to be transcoded if the player won't pass the bitstream. 

Yes, the audio setting must on Passthrough, not Auto. The 4800 is the first Roku since the 4640 that includes a DD encoder, so it's capable of doing the conversion internally. Why it defaults to converting everything to Atmos, I have no idea. Kind of like Roku shipping them with full-time HDR enabled, instead of only switching to HDR with the correct content. Onn does the same thing with their $20 4K streaming player, with HDR always being enabled. Even when they added a setting that is supposed to allow only switching on HDR content, they broke it on a subsequent update. And the Onn won't bitstream the lossless audio either, even through it's an Android box that supports Plex and Kodi.

[t1]

I discovered this also. The new roku if not put in bypass will generate a dolby atmos signal on everything. They have joined the atmos scam.  Out of the box with default setting I was watching "The Rifleman" on a ota channel in b/w thru my ota/tablo/roku/onyko path with my atmos capable AVR reporting dolby atmos. They want to sell atmos sound bars and hope no one notices.TThey will put anything even mono in a atmos shell.

If your are tring to setup atmos system, make sure you have the quality dolby atmos demo files and buy at least one real dolby true hd atmos file of music to play. I bought the new roku hoping to help decide if I was getting real atmos... 

Observations on the way to find quality atmos music for my new 5.1.4/7.1.2 system.

Both apple spaitial and Amazon atmos are 2 channel only. The headphone 3d music scam. Not commenting on playback hifi quality

I am on fence about tidal.

Amazon neuters atmos capable movies and only outputs 5.1.  The new Avatar film can be bought on Amazon and Vudu for same price  19.99. Vudu is in atmos, Amazon in 5.1

As for playing tidal atmos thru a real atmos surround system, stay tuned.

To use any android tv including nvidia shield, you need google account just to do factory reset. Sent mine back on the spot. Generally reported work around, just get fake account...

Fire tv, friend says bug shuts playing down after 25 min. Have not evaluated formats yet.

Roku has decided to fake it..

Apple next maybe..