Roku Ultra Does Not play DTS-HD MA 7.1

[One2Go 122]

My setup is a Roku Ultra version SG 4.1.63 and is connected to Dennon AVR-4311C1.Today for the first time I noticed that a MKV Movie with a DTS-HD MA 7.1 audio track did not produce any audio and the Dennon AVR just showed the default stereo lights but no sound came out.

The very same Roku passes ALL other audio formats. DD, DTS, DTS-HD MA 5.1 TrueHD 7.1 to the AVR. After searching this forum I couldn't find an answer, is there a setting in the Emby app to play from the DTS-HD MA 7.1 audio the DTS-HD MA 5.1 as that works flawless. Playing the same file to a Roku TCL TV which just has stereo speakers Emby does trancode it to two channels.

The Roku volume mode is OFF.

My Google Chromecast (AndroidTv 2.1.23g) played the very same file flawless but it was connected to a different HDMI input on the AVR. I plugged the Roku into that input but nothing changed still no audio. 

So I think that the problem must be in the Roku as the Denon AVR-4311 should automatically fold down 7.1 content to a 5.1 layout by default. Here is the weird part a few years ago a different movie but also with a DTS-HD MA 7.1 audio track played just fine. I am not sure if it was the same device or if it was a software update to this device that crewed things up.

Thanks for any help and it may be a reason to convince the wife to let me buy an NVIDIA Shield 

PS:

I think I just found the answer: "Roku devices do not support lossless DTS-HD MA 7.1 (Master Audio) passthrough. When playing files with this format, the Roku will either produce no sound, crash, or reboot. So are there any settings that can force a transcode just on the DTS-HD MA 7.1?

Edited yesterday at 03:18 AM by One2Go

[Luke 42519]

Hi, does it play dts-hd 5.1?

[ebr 16430]

8 hours ago, Luke said:

Hi, does it play dts-hd 5.1?

Yes, he said that in the post.

One - Have you changed any of the transcoding options for this user?

[One2Go 122]

I have not touched anything regarding any settings including transcoding. Where do you find the transcoding options per user? I only have entries in the server and there for H.264 it is set to "Enabled Hardware acceleration" nothing else has been touched as transcoding worked when the device could not play either the video or the audio.

When I tried to change the audio settings in the Roku Emby App it said go to the Web App. I only see in the server settings an Audio entry. Where can I find the Web App for the Roku Emby App or is the server the place where to look?

When using a TCL Roku TV with just the inbuilt speakers having the same version SG 4.1.63 the DTS-HD MA 7.1 is transcoded to (AC3 384 kbps)

 

[One2Go 122]

I found the per user settings in FireFox and I presume (Local IP Address/:8096) Below are the screenshots for the User preference and the server transcoding settings.

User preference

 

Server Transcoding

Edited yesterday at 02:46 PM by One2Go

[speechles 2084]

@One2GoOh no. That isn't supposed to happen. If  you don't change something we don't arbitrarily force setting changes upon you when the app updates. But our friends at Roku might when the Roku firmware updates. They could change your audio settings and reset everything. That might be what is happening.

On your Roku do you have Custom checked or Auto? You might want to select Custom and then Choose Dolby Digital and turn DTS to ON. The Roku audio settings are passed through to the Emby Roku app. The Emby Roku app uses these to build a capabilities profile. If you set those to Auto and depending on the order of the HDMI devices and which is turned on first the Roku may not understand correctly. With Auto it can incorrectly determine you have no support for pass-through at all. Or it might be simply that DTS isn't turned on.

But it might also be the recent Roku firmware update which changed how AAC was passed. Before the Roku would assume it could decode AAC 5.1 even if it was converting it to stereo. Now the Roku reports it only has support for AAC 2.0 when it can support AAC 5.1 but convert to stereo. We will probably have an option in the Emby Roku app to handle this so you can still get AAC 5.1 to direct play in stereo.

That same firmware change affects the audio. DTS-HD MA was never going to work with Roku using 7.1 channels. It had to passthrough the DTS core with 5.1. But it reported it could decode the full 8 channel DTS-HD MA even though it couldn't. But this might have changed if you turn on DTS and it still doesn't work for you. Once you change audio settings on your Roku you must RESTART the Roku for it to have any affect. Remember this.

If Roku did change the DTS to now report a maximum of 6 channel support we could likely make a setting to fix it. Otherwise there will be needless transcoding when the device is fully capable of passing through the DTS core. I am hoping you are simply using Auto and need to change that to Custom and then enable DTS. Hopefully that is all this is.

Please tell us what happens when you try. I haven't fully tested this myself. I was on other things and such. If you can try and after enabling DTS and restart the Roku it still doesn't work we will need to dig deeper. Let us know what you find. Thanks.

If an ffmpeg log is created seeing that would confirm the suspicion.

Edited yesterday at 07:47 PM by speechles

[ebr 16430]

6 hours ago, One2Go said:

Where do you find the transcoding options per user

[One2Go 122]

Thank you for your lengthy and excellent comment. I did what you suggested and changed from auto to custom in the streaming output and turned DTS to ON. I did not play back the DTS-HAD MA 7.1 but still showed the 2 stereo lights on the Denon AVR-4311. 

I did some further testing and the DTS-HD MA 5.1 audio was actually transcoded to DD 5.1 on the Roku. However a plain DTS 5.1 was passed through as DTS. On the Chromcast the DTS-HD MA 7.1 was also transcoded.

I try to fix this but understand that the Roku is somewhat not very flexible and accommodating. The OLD Nvidia Shield looks more and more like an option.

[One2Go 122]

@ebr That is exactly what the settings of this user look like all enabled.

[One2Go 122]

I just realized that none of my streamers are passing through DTS-HD MA, so I decided screw it I get an Nvidea Shield Pro which does upscaling passing through of DTS-HD MA plus I can hook up a keyboard and don't have to futz around with some no name browsers for the device. In addition the apps only screen is desirable in view of the shitification of Google and Roku's home screens.

I will help with solving this problem it needed to.

Edited 23 hours ago by One2Go

[speechles 2084]

1 hour ago, One2Go said:

I did some further testing and the DTS-HD MA 5.1 audio was actually transcoded to DD 5.1 on the Roku. However a plain DTS 5.1 was passed through as DTS. On the Chromcast the DTS-HD MA 7.1 was also transcoded.

That is to be expected. DTS cannot be repackaged into HLS. So once you cannot direct play it has to use HLS. It notices this was a surround sound codec using pass-through and has the only choice left using DD 5.1. If you had no pass-through support it would've immediately chosen to transcode to stereo AAC.

14 minutes ago, One2Go said:

I just realized that none of my streamers are passing through DTS-HD MA, so I decided screw it I get an Nvidea Shield Pro which does upscaling passing through of DTS-HD MA plus I can hook up a keyboard and don't have to futz around with some no name browsers for the device. In addition the apps only screen is desirable in view of the shitification of Google and Roku's home screens.

I will help with solving this problem it needed to.

If you notice it is transcoding audio you can just post your ffmpeg log. It will show what is happening. One with DTS-HD MA not working correctly. That would be enough. Thanks.

Edited 23 hours ago by speechles

[One2Go 122]

Here are 3 logs two of them DTS-HD MA 5.1 the same movie and 1 DTS-HD MA 7.1. Thanks for the help.

ffmpeg-remux-e12d3954-eb32-4f96-aa1d- 319e741558a2_1 (DTS-HD MA 7.1).txt

ffmpeg-transcode-03b7a423-ceb1-4cce-bb7c-dd008409145f_1 (DTS-HD MA 5.1.txt

ffmpeg-transcode-8f25e5c7-7587-4f3b-8cbe-aa57cfca2208_1 (DTS-HD MA 5.1).txt

ffmpeg-transcode-03b7a423-ceb1-4cce-bb7c-dd008409145f_1 (DTS-HD MA 5.1.txt

[speechles 2084]

All of these on the Roku show the same cause. The container is MKV which the Roku can direct play. But the video stream is VC1 which the Roku cannot. This causes the below condition to happen. The video is transcoded into h264 and since DTS cannot be muxed into HLS it becomes AC3 to keep the surround sound since AC3 is found to be supported.

Bourne Identity, The (2002) -> Video:VC1, Audio:DTS ->  TranscodeReasons=VideoCodecNotSupported -> Video:H264, Audio:AC3

The very top log you post shows from Android TV. That one detects support for DTS. The Roku logs you posted do not show support for DTS on your Roku. Are you sure you enabled DTS in the audio settings and then rebooted/restarted the Roku after making the change?

Roku shows this: (missing DTS support?!)
AudioCodec=ac3,aac,mp2,mp3,eac3,flac,vorbis,lpcm

While Android TV shows this: (has DTS support)
AudioCodec=aac_latm,mp4a_latm,ac3,eac3,dts,dca,dtshd,aac,mp3

Edited 7 hours ago by speechles

[One2Go 122]

I did first setting the digital output to auto and I believe that are the logs I posted.

I will now set the digital output to custom and the DD is already set and will change DTS from OFF to ON.

Will run the same too files Bourne Identity eith DTS-HD MA 5.1 and Zootopia 2 with DTS-HD MA 7.1 and will post those 2 ffmped logs.

[One2Go 122]

Here we go: I changed the digiral options to DD Plus and the DTS set to ON. Restarted the Roku device and these are the results.

1.. Bourne Identity (DTS-HD MA 5.1) Played flawless because of transcoding and attached is the log.

2. Zootopia 2 (DTS-HD MA 7.1) NO ffmpeg log because it was a direct play look and the screenshot was from the Emby server. Video played but no audio at all. Didn't think the Roku had the DTS-HD MA codecs.

 

3. Constant Gardener (DTS 5.1) again NO ffmpeg log and it played flawless the video and audio.

ffmpeg-transcode-51117f7b-4d06-4a8b-9524-7dc1ee312ba6_1 (DTS-HD MA 5.1).txt

Edited 2 hours ago by One2Go

[ebr 16430]

2 hours ago, One2Go said:

Zootopia 2 (DTS-HD MA 7.1) NO ffmpeg log because it was a direct play look and the screenshot was from the Emby server. Video played but no audio at all. Didn't think the Roku had the DTS-HD MA codecs.

 

Please repeat this test and  follow the instructions to send a log from the app right after.

Thanks.