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Author Topic: Custom 5.1 Mix with 2 Channel output? Doesn't seem to work  (Read 1754 times)

blgentry

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Custom 5.1 Mix with 2 Channel output? Doesn't seem to work
« on: September 15, 2016, 03:05:28 pm »

What I was originally trying to do was to figure out what kind of Audio streams a movie had.  It's the movie Se7en, which has a stereo mix, and DD-ES 5.1 mix, and a DTS-EX 5.1 (6.1) mix.  The problem is that the stereo mix appears to be in a 5.1 stream and I can't figure out which one is which.

So, I was trying to use MC to move the surround left and surround right channels to Left and Right.  That way I'd hear surround stuff when I had a 5.1 mix and NOTHING when I had the stereo mix.

When I do this, I don't get the results I'm expecting.  I get just the left and right.  The problem seems to be that I am listening on a 2 channel setup with a 2 channel DAC.  So it's converting from 6 channels to 2 before doing anything else, which eliminates the surround, center, and sub channels.

I've tried setting Output Format > Channels to 5.1 .  It never sticks.  As soon as I stop and restart playback, it changes back to 2 channel, so I'm stuck with not being able to mix channels in the PEQ as I am trying to do.

I guess there's probably no good reason to do what I'm trying to do.  It's mostly an information gathering tool.  I thought MC was sophisticated enough to do it.  Am I missing something, or is this "normal behavior"?

Thanks,

Brian.
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mwillems

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Re: Custom 5.1 Mix with 2 Channel output? Doesn't seem to work
« Reply #1 on: September 15, 2016, 04:34:07 pm »

What I was originally trying to do was to figure out what kind of Audio streams a movie had.  It's the movie Se7en, which has a stereo mix, and DD-ES 5.1 mix, and a DTS-EX 5.1 (6.1) mix.  The problem is that the stereo mix appears to be in a 5.1 stream and I can't figure out which one is which.

So, I was trying to use MC to move the surround left and surround right channels to Left and Right.  That way I'd hear surround stuff when I had a 5.1 mix and NOTHING when I had the stereo mix.

When I do this, I don't get the results I'm expecting.  I get just the left and right.  The problem seems to be that I am listening on a 2 channel setup with a 2 channel DAC.  So it's converting from 6 channels to 2 before doing anything else, which eliminates the surround, center, and sub channels.

I've tried setting Output Format > Channels to 5.1 .  It never sticks.  As soon as I stop and restart playback, it changes back to 2 channel, so I'm stuck with not being able to mix channels in the PEQ as I am trying to do.

I guess there's probably no good reason to do what I'm trying to do.  It's mostly an information gathering tool.  I thought MC was sophisticated enough to do it.  Am I missing something, or is this "normal behavior"?

Thanks,

Brian.

Because output format is 'first' a stereo output format means other channels are not actually addressable in PEQ unfortunately.  The reason you can't set it to 5.1 is likely that your hardware doesn't support 5.1 output.  It's a limitation of the current system and one reason I've advocated for separating the mixing target from the output channel setting entirely; you can't ever address more channels than your hardware supports even just to use them as a temporary storage space while mixing.
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blgentry

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Re: Custom 5.1 Mix with 2 Channel output? Doesn't seem to work
« Reply #2 on: September 15, 2016, 04:58:00 pm »

Thanks for the clarification.

If I was really into this, I could hook up an extra sound card or two and use OS X audio aggregating to create a device with 6 channels.  Then use that for output and redirect at will. 

But for this particular purpose this seems like too much work.  So in the mean time I've created a couple of MKA (MKVs with audio only) and imported them into Audacity to visually see the channel layout and which channels have audio.  Guess what?  That stereo mix that's supposed to be there?  Looks like it has two individual 5.1 channel DD mixes instead.  Incidentally, I think this disc wins the award for most audio tracks in a single movie (in my system):

DD 5.1 (supposed to be stereo but isn't)
DD-EX 5.1
DTS-ES 5.1 (6.1)
(4) independent commentary tracks!  (stereo for each one)

So, 7 audio streams for the movie Se7en.

Brian.
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