I have tried various combinations of software and settings in an effort to get XBMC/Kodi to use audio passthru on my Fire TV - all have met with failure in that the audio channel just outputs white noise when audio passthru (AC3) is enabled in XBMC/Kodi.
I have confirmed that the Fire TV is configured to pass Dolby Digital via HDMI - the only setting that seems to be relevant on the device. In fact I've tried two settings "Dolby Digital Plus over HDMI" and "Dolby Digital Plus Automatic" - they both appear to have the same effect. The Fire TV is connected to the AV Amp via HDMI.
I have tried versions 13.2 (XBMC), 14.0 and 14.1 of Kodi all with the same result. In all cases if I leave the audio defaults as they are then the audio is reported by the Amp (an Anthem MRX-310) as 2.0 PCM and I get stereo sound - configuring Kodi to use audio passthru and enabling AC3 support always results in white noise [doing the config while the video is playing or before I select the video file] and the Amp still reports 2.0 PCM.
XBMC/Kodi is using NFS to access the m4v file (created via makemkv and handbrake). In the "in play" audio screen XBMC/Kodi reports that the audio stream is AC3 (5.1).
I have also tried using XBMC/Kodi as the external player from the Plex application with the same result.
If I use the player embedded in Plex to play the same file then the Amp reports Dolby D 3/2 and I get surround sound.
Has anyone else experienced this issue ? Is there some other configuration item that I've missed ?
Could this be a bug ? it seems to me that there is something wrong in the audio signal in that the Amp is not interpreting it as Dolby Digital. I expect some will say that its a problem with the Amp - however given that the Amp switches properly when I use the plex player I would suggest that its something to do with the software …
I'd be grateful if someone could help here.
Ian
I have the same problem. I bought a Fire TV Stick specifically so I could install Kodi and view Netflix, giving me a complete home theater solution on a USB stick. I have three HDMI inputs on my TV that all go to one optical output on my TV to my Yamaha stereo, and my TV supports AC3 passthrough. The Fire TV Stick Netflix app outputs Dolby Digital perfectly, as do the HDMI inputs from my Windows 7 computer, and my Motorola cable box.
The only thing that doesn't output Dolby Digital is Kodi 14.0, 14.1, and the latest nightly build. I'm a digital hardware/firmware/software engineer, specializing in embedded systems, and I've tried everything I can think of, and every permutation of Kodi and Fire TV Stick settings, and Kodi simply will not output Dolby Digital. At the point where my stereo should switch to Dolby Digital I just hear a sharp "chirp" from Kodi and my stereo remains in PCM mode.
I've been working on the problem for a few weeks, and Googling for answers, and while there are many comments about Kodi Dolby Digital not working on the Fire TV Stick, I've found no answers. If there are any guru's or developers reading these posts I hope they will let us know what the problem is, if there is a solution, or if they are working on it, or if we should just give up and stick with Windows 7.
I love Kodi, and have converted my few hundred DVD's to MP4 so I could use them on Kodi, and it works perfectly on Windows 7. And by the way my Windows 7 computer is connected to the same TV via an HDMI cable and the Kodi passthrough settings work perfectly. I've even tried the Fire TV stick on the same HDMI port, on the same TV, going to the same stereo and the Fire TV Stick Kodi simply will not output Dolby Digital.
As I said I hope someone in the know will reply to our questions.
Works for me.
Who's doing the DD decoding in you setup? Are you getting stereo or nothing?
Is there an HDMI input in your yamaha ?
Thanks - its good to know that I'm not the only one having this issue and that it does actually work in some configurations - which suggests that we have a configuration issue rather than hitting a bug in the software which is obviously good news.
I have just reloaded Kodi 14.1 and generated a Debug log - which is located at
http://xbmclogs.com/show.php?id=422937
The actions I took were;
1) Install Kodi
2) Launch the application on Fire TV
3) Added files from NFS share
4) Configure the audio settings (Audio Passthru and AC3 support)
5) Switch on debug, with the Audio module also selected
6) Start the playback of a file (*)
Again I got white noise and the amp reporting a 2.0 PCM stream - used the "in play" menu to switch off Audio passthru and got the stereo sound back (Amp still reports 2.0 PCM). The playback finished and I started it again (still with audio passthru disabled) as expected still stereo.
Finally I force stopped the application before pulling the log back.
Hopefully it will be easy (for those with the skills !) to identify the configuration issue and we can quickly resolve our issue.
Thanks again
Ian
Does "resetting" your AVR while a video playing does something? Resetting being, e.g. switching on/off or changing source.
Looks like some AVR's have a hard time detecting our passthrough stream for unknown reasons, at least on Android.
I have created two debug logs with identically configured (as closely as possible) Kodi 14.1 systems, one where Dolby Digital (AC3) works, and one where it does not. They are from two of my Kodi systems, the working one a Windows 7 system, the non-working one an Amazon Fire TV Stick. Both systems are connected to the same TV (an LG 47LG4600) via HDMI, with an optical output that goes to the same stereo (a Yamaha HTR-5760).
The two logs were created while running from the same NFS server, with the same MP4 movie (Dawn of the Planet of the Apes), after a clean reboot of both systems. As I said, the Kodi 14.1 systems were both identically configured, with audio passthrough and AC3 capable stereo enabled in the System->Audio output settings. However the Fire TV Stick system does not play the movie in Dolby Digital, instead when the movie starts I here a short "chirp" and the audio remains in PCM mode. The Windows 7 system plays the movie in Dolby Digital 5.1 with no problems.
Although I'm not a Kodi software expert, I am and embedded systems developer and went through the logs looking for significant differences but couldn't find any. I'm hoping that by posting these two logs a Kodi software expert can figure out what is wrong. If anyone needs more detailed logs I will be happy to provide them. Simply tell me which debug options you would like and I will generate the logs from the two systems.
The non-working Fire TV Stick log is at
http://xbmclogs.com/show.php?id=423150, the working Windows 7 log is at
http://xbmclogs.com/show.php?id=423154.
As a final note I would like to let all the developers at Kodi know how much I appreciate them creating such a fantastic system. I was really shocked when I discovered it a few weeks ago, and converted all my DVDs to MP4 and can finally enjoy them, instead of letting them gather dust on the shelf. I am willing to help with this problem in any way I can. If needed I can set up a cross compilation system (if someone will point me to the appropriate instructions) on Windows 7, or a compilation system via an Ubuntu virtual machine. I have extensive experience in hardware/firmare/software development from embedded systems to fault tolerant mainframes, and really want to see the Fire TV Stick problem solved. From what I've read many people are having audio problems with it, although for others it seems to work.
I will try resetting it tomorrow. I would observe though that the plex player switches the type of audio stream on the same fire tv ok without having to reset the amp
Ian
Just a quick question: Why are you using Plex with Kodi instead of an SMB/NFS/uPNP connection?
I'm streaming from my Windows machine to Kodi via SMB, passing audio through to my Denon receiver without any issues. I've been successful with the AFTV box as well as the Stick version.
I think I may have started my conversation on the wrong thread. User Iscb2015 seems to have problems with the Fire TV box, while I'm having problems with the Fire TV Stick. As I stated in my last post I am using the Fire TV Stick plugged in to an HDMI port on my LG TV, and the TV has an optical output port to my Yamaha stereo. The TV has an AC3 passthrough mode that works with everything except the sideloaded Kodi app, even the Netflix app on the Fire TV Stick works so I know it's not a hardware problem. Something in the Kodi app is preventing it from outputting Dolby Digital.
I've also been working on the problem for a few weeks now because at first I assumed it was a configuration issue. I've tried all of the suggestions I could find such as resetting the Yamaha, trying different HDMI ports, all the combinations of Kodi and Fire TV Stick audio settings possible, and even changing MP4 file audio configurations, but nothing ever changes. I always get a "chirp" and then my stereo simply stays in PCM mode. And as I said Kodi on Windows 7 works perfectly on the same hardware. I've even attached both the Fire TV Stick and Windows 7 HDMI cable to the same HDMI port, going through the same TV, to the same stereo and it works perfectly. So there must be some type of problem with the Kodi app particular to the Fire TV Stick.
In any case if I should start a different thread please let me know, I don't want to cause any confusion.
Also I'm setting up a Precise Pangolin virtual machine right now so I can compile Kodi for ARM myself, but since I'm not familiar with the software or hardware any help from experienced developers would be welcome. Once I've compiled the existing 14.1 app I'm going to have to dig into the system in detail cold turkey, so I'd appreciate any pointers on where to start with audio passthrough issues.
If you check my second posting you will see that I have tested this with kodi using NFS without plex and the audio passthrough is broken.
Ultimately I want to use plex as the interface to select the item to be played and kodi as the player because plex is a standard app that we can use and have appear in the standard fire TV app list without it being another app that starts kodi. In my opinion the plex app is better than kodi in terms of the user interface to select the item you want to watch however the kodi app seems to be much better in terms of actual playback (if I can get the audio to work properly).
To be honest though all of that is irrelevant - my issue is that audio passthrough simply does not work when using kodi on my fire TV - people saying "it works for me" (to be frank) doesn't really help and is very frustrating -especially as there does not seem to be a complete / correct configuration defined [for example one config I've seen on the web talks about selecting 5.1 for channels along with audio passthrough which conflicts with the help information on the config screens].
I accept that kodi is developed by people in their spare time and I'm very impressed by the product as it stands however the fact remains it does not work as described in my setup. I just want to understand why and ideally get it fixed ASAP.
Ian
PS. My suspicion is that Muncrief has the same issue even though his actual config is subtly different - the common factor being kodi on a fire TV type device. I don't actually know but I'd be surprised if the fire TV and the fire TV stick have radically different software. And consider that we have both run other apps on the fire TV device which successfully output Dolby digital only kodi seems to have an issue. Is it possible that kodi is connecting to the audio device in a way that doesn't quite configure the device correctly ?
I have the same suspicion Iscb2015. I've just installed the Precise Pangolin virtual machine necessary to compile Kodi and am installing the development system used for it. I'm a pretty tenacious developer and really want to get this working so I'll do my best to figure out the problem. I have no experience with Kodi or Android though, so hopefully I'll get some tips along the way to speed things up.
(2015-02-12, 02:18)Iscb2015 Wrote: [ -> ]I accept that kodi is developed by people in their spare time and I'm very impressed by the product as it stands however the fact remains it does not work as described in my setup. I just want to understand why and ideally get it fixed ASAP.
Ian
The reason "why" you get static/white noise is because even though Kodi is sending the correct audio out but it is not sending the bit to switch your AVR's decode mode.
This is the same issue that I have on my Denon AVR-391, Kodi is passing the AC3 (DD) or DTS audio to the AVR, but the AVR thinks it's getting PCM. This is why you get the static.
The only way for me to fix it (and may be the same for you) is to manually change the decode mode on the AVR from Auto to DTS (even if it's DD) during playback, then I can change it back to Auto. Once it's done once everything is fine and it will automatically switch between all audio formats. It will stay like that until I switch sources or power off the AVR, then I have to do the same thing again.
This only happens with Kodi on Android, and I don't have the same issue with my OE/Chromebox. So for some reason it appears to be a combination of Kodi and Android and it may be impossible to be fixed without one of the developers having one of the particular AVR's that has this problem.
But if your AVR has a way of manually changing the decode mode, try changing it while playing a video and see if that helps.
I'm not sure that's the case Tinwarble. I'd heard this works for others as well but when I switch back and forth between my Windows Kodi and Fire TV Stick Kodi, or manually switch my stereo to DTS and back to auto, or turn my stereo on and off it never goes into Dolby Digital mode with the Android Kodi. The stereo does switch to Dolby Digital when switching back and forth between Windows Kodi and other sources though. So it doesn't look like the continuous Android Kodi signal is correct.
In any case I set up the development system and successfully compiled the Kodi 15 Alpha 1 nightly code, and installed it on my Fire TV Stick tonight (and unfortunately the problem hasn't been solved yet), so I'll compile 14.1 tomorrow and see if I can figure out what's wrong. Once again if any experienced developers want to point me in the right direction I would really appreciate it, otherwise I'll just head out on my own
My Amp doesn't have a setting to allow me to change the decode mode.
I tried power cycling the Amp while Kodi was playing the movie file and it made no difference still white noise.
As I've said before the switch occurs if the plex player is used - so it must be possible for the software to do this on a Fire TV.
Ian