Kodi Community Forum

I just upgraded to the Kodi Beta and my movies no longer default to the 5.1 audio track instead they play through in stereo. So all of my movies are either Dolby Digital, DTS HD, or Dolby True HD, and when I play these movies they come through my receiver as only 2 channel. The correct audio track still exists, if I go to the video menu while the movie is playing and go to the audio tab I can select the correct soundtrack and everything plays fine. The issue is that it is not selecting this audio track by default. I have double checked my audio settings and everything remained the same from my 13.2 version of XBMC, Passthrough is enabled and all the appropriate items are checked. I had a similiar issue when I used OPENELEC for a short time and could never find a resolution, but since then I have switched my install back to XBMCBUNTU and the issue went away with the new install, but now it has resurfaced since the upgrade to KODI. Any advice on how I can force my movies to default to the 5.1 soundtrack would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

I think a debug log would probably be needed. I take it these movies have 2 (or more) soundtracks?

Yes they have a stereo track and a 5.1 track, which I didnt do on purpose, it just kind of ended up that way. I use makemkv and handbrake and when i process them in handbrake I only choose the 5.1 track so I am not sure why every file has 2 tracks but it does show up that way in XBMC. So do I just start the debug log and then play a movie and then switch it to the right track? Would that give you the info that you need? This will be my first debug log. Thanks for the help.

Yeah I would:

Turn on debugging
restart Kodi
Start one of the videos that has the problem
switch audio streams
Stop playback

SSH in and run

If pastebinit isn't installed run


first.

I just tried to do a debug log and after I typed in my email address and hit ok I got a script error from the kodi log uploader and I have not received an email. Is it possible I may need to reinstall the log uploader?

Looks like our posts crossed in the ether. The log uploader is ... flaky. Just use pastebinit.

http://paste.ubuntu.com/8997919/

Ok this was the output of that command, let me know if that helps at all. Sorry about my last post I did not see your repsonse before I posted it. I first tried to follow the instructions in the wiki. Thsnks again for the help.

Line 741 shows that when analysing the file, Kodi thinks that the aac 2 channel track is the default.

Why it works to choose the multichannel in one version and the aac in another version is above my pay grade.

Two last thoughts:

In audio settings, have you set that your amplifier is capable of decoding aac? If you did, turn it off.

Line 765 shows opening of passthrough failing. Not sure if this is a red herring?

Fritsch, where are you?

These are my audio settings from the audio output tab

Audi output Device: HDA NVidia, DON DENON-AVAMP on HDMI #1
Number of Channels: 7.1
Output Configuration: Best Match
Stereo Upmix: Disabled
Maintain Original volume on downmix: enabled
Resample Quality: Medium
Keep audio device alive: 1 minute
Play GUI sounds: Only when Playback is stopped
Passthrough Output Device:HDA NVidia, DON DENON-AVAMP on HDMI #1
Dolby Digital (AC3): Enabled
Dolby Digital Plus(E-AC3): Enabled
Dts: Enabled
TrueHD: Enabled
DTSHD: Enabled

Does all this seem to be correct? I am technically only using 5.1 channels in my surround sound setup but if I remember correctly I copied these settings from the wiki page for this type of audio setup, and even if I change that to 5.1 the problem still exists. It does seem that once I open a movie and select the correct audio track it does remember the correct track the next time I open it, so I guess eventually the problem will work itself out (except for new movies I add) but it would be nice to force it to the correct default. Thanks again for all the help.

A few tips:

handbrake for me seems to automatically default to an aac stereo track. You can disable it and add ONLY the track you want, but you would have to either do that every time or create a new preset? Never spent enough time on it recently to be fore definitive.

You can use mkvmerge to remux it without the aac track or to set the multichannel to default.

Yes preferences for each movie like "which audio track?" are stored for later use. This can get confusing if you can't suddenly work out why behaviour seems to change.

Thanks for the info. When I use Handbrake I always select the 5.1 track but the file will still show up with 2 tracks in XBMC. I am familiar with MKVmerge I use it for my Dolby true HD movies and leave those movies in mkv format, but the majority of my library are m4v files so I dont think I would be able to run them back through mkvmerge since they arent mkv files, but I could be wrong about that. I will keep trying to figure it out but if nothing works I can always do a clean install of XBMC Gotham since that has worked to fix the issue in the past. Thanks again for taking the time to give me a hand.

No problem. You can probably use your m4v files as an input file on makemkv and end up with an mkv. There isn't much downside to that except your library will need to be updated because the file names have changed.

And I guess software other than xbmc which may rely on a particular format, like iDevices probably, and maybe 'smart' tvs or other uPnP players.

Disable VAAPI. You have a wrapper driver installed.

Thanks. I disabled VAAPI under acceleration but it did not seem to change the issue I am having with the audio. What is a wrapper driver exactly? Is there maybe a setting I could change in the advancedsetings.xml file to change the default track of a movie? Should I submit another debug log with VAAPI disabled?

Any other ideas on How to force a movie to default to the 5.1 audio track instead of the stereo version? Or is there any reason why upgrading to Kodi seemed to change the behavior of my movie library?