2009-10-02, 15:27
This is a newb question so I apologize in advance. I'm finally getting round to purchasing a receiver and I'm trying to understand what the output options are for my hardware and software. Right now I have xbmc outputting digital downmixed stereo over hdmi which is fine, but obviously not what I want for a surround sound system.
Setup
Acer Aspire X1300 HTPC (5.1 Analog or Nvidia HDMI Audio Out)
Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic)
XBMC Full Install (Latest SVN)
HDMI Video+Audio out to TV
So my assumption right now are that when I play 5.1 (AC3) or DTS audio I can bitstream that over HDMI to a receiver and have it do the heavy lifting and processing. This is just default XBMC Pass-through behavior as long as the options for the receiver are set in the Audio properties.
Where I am confused though is what happens when I have to resample audio in XBMC, i.e. with Video Sync or such. My assumption is that it is sent as analog (PCM?) data over HDMI to the receiver. However Ubuntu only sees the HDMI output as stereo so does that mean I will only get stereo output from XBMC or are there methods of sending resampled data that maintains the surround sound information?
Setup
Acer Aspire X1300 HTPC (5.1 Analog or Nvidia HDMI Audio Out)
Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic)
XBMC Full Install (Latest SVN)
HDMI Video+Audio out to TV
So my assumption right now are that when I play 5.1 (AC3) or DTS audio I can bitstream that over HDMI to a receiver and have it do the heavy lifting and processing. This is just default XBMC Pass-through behavior as long as the options for the receiver are set in the Audio properties.
Where I am confused though is what happens when I have to resample audio in XBMC, i.e. with Video Sync or such. My assumption is that it is sent as analog (PCM?) data over HDMI to the receiver. However Ubuntu only sees the HDMI output as stereo so does that mean I will only get stereo output from XBMC or are there methods of sending resampled data that maintains the surround sound information?
