I personally own an ONKYO TX-NR509 receiver which was a great bargain at the time of purchase, I currently have a 5.1 speaker setup but there is an option to add two more speakers if they are externally amplified.. am thinking about adding some Ceiling speakers for DOLBY ATMOS. My question is, if not using passthrough mode theoretically any 7.1 capable receiver could support DOLBY ATMOS if this is added to KODI?
Kodi do the object-based audio decoding? Can't see it happening for a very long time. Think of the system data (speaker positions, distances, delays etc.) that would be needed.
Atmos is TrueHD + Extension for positional information.
From Helix v14:
We can passthrough the full Atmos audio stream to a AVR for decoding.
We can decode the TrueHD portion to normal LPCM 7.1
We can not decode the Atmos extension information.
Thanks for all replies, I was trying to avoid replacing my Receiver but that's probably going to be the best option i think, just noticed the TX-NR 635 is compatible with firmware upgrade, might be able to pick one on these up cheap used on ebay.
I would recommend against getting a new reciever just yet, since DTS is about to launch their Atmos competitor DTS:X. They are going to hold some sort of press announcement early next month. As you might have noticed, there are less than 10 Atmos blu-rays on the market so far, and it might very well be that the movie studios have a preference for DTS:X since DTS-HD MA is so dominant on blu-ray.
read that myself, agreed i'll put it off for now, cheers.