(2014-08-21, 11:40)jjd-uk Wrote: Guess you didn't read the wiki Audio_settings (wiki) then?
You seem to have a common misunderstanding on how audio works, this is why Speaker Configuration was renamed Number of Channels as this setting has nothing to do with the number of physical speakers you have. What this setting does is tell XBMC the number of PCM channels a connection supports, this is why it's been removed for SPDIF as this only supports 2.0 PCM channels, where PCM channels is an expression of the raw bandwidth.
Dolby Digital for example is an compressed format which fits within a link that only supports 2 PCM channels, a bit more detail at Audio_troubleshooting (wiki) hence DD5.1 can pass over a PCM 2.0 link.
Since this post is in the Windows area I'm guessing you're actually have Windows as your OS, if you look at the audio properties you should find Max Number of Channels for your HDMI device, since you're connected to a TV this will almost certainly be 2 hence XBMC must also be set to 2 for Number of Channels, this is another reason for the change of language from Speaker Configuration to nudge the user that Max Number of Channels in Windows and Number of Channels in XBMC are related.
With the new settings in Gotham we try to only expose valid options depending on selected options to keep wrong settings to a minimum, so with HDMI if Number of Channels 5.1 is selected then Transcode option is hidden as it's only relevant when 2.0 is selected, hence selecting 5.1 in your case would have been totally wrong.
Actually, I'm using Openelec as the base for that XBMC install. I found this post with a search trying to troubleshoot the issue.
Reading your post, the way you explain it, yes it makes sense. I would still insist however that it is counter-intuitive. No other appliance requests you to specify the number of channels, vs the number of speakers. It may be how it technically works, but it's unfortunately not the common way people are used to setting up the audio in their devices.
If you have 5.1 speakers, desire surround sound, and still end up with only 2.0 output, that is as wrong a setting as any other combination that doesn't work.
Intuitive setup is one that does not require you to read pages of user manuals (i.e. wiki) to use something (particularly a product like XBMC that I've been using since ~2005). You say that I'm making a common mistake, I say that I am simply expecting 'Kodi' to behave like every other product I use. I read what you are saying, and I hear Steve Jobs telling his users they are holding their phones wrong. Get what I'm saying? Instead of trying to make the setup more technically correct, make it easier to find right combinations of settings user wants -- user focused. I can't imagine that the typical user knows how many PCM channels they have available, or understand it's relationship to getting correct output; that is unclear. How many speakers you have, however, is pretty obvious to every user and should be the base setting a user has access to.
If you're dead set on doing it this way, an Audio Config wizard to help find the right settings may be worth the trouble. Otherwise, as a loyal user, I would simply suggest that it would be less confusing to users to have a setting that specifically defines the number of speakers in use, and expose PCM channel settings only if the speaker count goes over 2.0. It makes infinitely more sense to me, to start with telling Kodi definitely how many speakers I have, then Kodi shows me what settings I need to look at to make this work. More accessible, not more complicated.
Although I suspect what I'm saying is falling on deaf ears, I'm saying it anyway.