More > JRiver Media Center 23 for Windows
JRiver outputting 2.0 channel stereo as if it were 5.1 multichannel
richard-ec2:
--- Quote from: Fitzcaraldo215 on September 04, 2017, 10:54:11 am ---Relax. Zones are quite simple. Set up your stereo and Mch zones. Elapsed time, including your reading and research time = under 5 minutes. Switch between those 2 zones manually for awhile. After you tire of that, you will realize in under 5 additional minutes how simple Zoneswitch is. Problem solved forever.
The major problem with Source Number of Channels is the metadata on the recordings. It is an integer field. So, it represents 5.0 channels as 5, but 5.1 channel recordings have the integer value 6, not 5.1. That is not JRiver's doing. And, while rare, I am guessing there may possibly be some 6 channel files out there, which should be treated as 6.0, not 5.1.
The real problem is that Source Number of Channels sure as heck SEEMS to be the right thing to do, but it isn't. And, it is not going to work the way you want it to.
--- End quote ---
I think the point that's been made in previous threads is that the problem seems to be unique to JRiver - machines like Oppos and Sonys are able to play these discs without any problems and software players like Foobar can play the rips easily enough so it's a bit of a mystery why JRiver can't also handle them by default.
Having said that, I agree that the zones workaround is a lot easier than I'd feared and the automatic switching makes it trouble-free to use once it's all set up. I found another adjustment that has to be made in JRemote to make it work - there's a setting that tells JRemote to follow the zone decisions made by the app and that setting has to be turned on. But other than that it all seems to be working very nicely now so I'll just say problem solved and thanks very much indeed for your help.
RD James:
--- Quote from: blgentry on September 03, 2017, 08:54:29 am ---There's a rather elegant and sort of easy solution to your problem: Zones and Zone Switch Rules.
--- End quote ---
It may work, but it's not an elegant solution at all.
Using Zone Switching means that every audio format is isolated in its own playlist and trying to play a file in a different format from something that is currently playing causes playback conflicts, since both try to play at once.
You're playing to a single audio device but now you have several zones doing different things.
An elegant solution to this problem would be an option in JRiver's output settings that let you select which formats to pass through (2.0 output as a stereo signal), which need to go in a container format (5.0 in a 5.1 container), and which need downmixed. (7.1 -> 5.1)
Thinking more broadly than that, some kind of support for Rule-Based DSP Switching instead of using Zones would also be much more elegant.
Zone switching should be used to handle audio devices, not DSP switching.
--- Quote from: richard-ec2 on September 04, 2017, 03:25:59 pm ---I think the point that's been made in previous threads is that the problem seems to be unique to JRiver - machines like Oppos and Sonys are able to play these discs without any problems and software players like Foobar can play the rips easily enough so it's a bit of a mystery why JRiver can't also handle them by default.
--- End quote ---
Hardware players communicate directly with the AVR and can query which channel formats are supported.
I could be wrong, but I don't believe that software players have that option, and Windows only reports a "maximum number of channels".
So if the device supports 8 channels (7.1) that does not say whether it will also support 4 or 5 channel outputs. (4.0/5.0)
Have you tried enabling the "auto configure output settings on playback error" option?
I'm not sure what the failure state for that is, since my 7.1 device seems to accept any number of channels.
I would hope that it "fails upwards" so that 5.0 would try 5.1 if it fails, instead of falling back to 2.0
It might be useful if you detailed how Foobar is configured (WASAPI, DirectSound etc) and what the failure state is with it, compared to JRiver.
tbng:
I agree that zone method is an answer. You can switch between 5.1 and 2.0 by presetting zones. The zone method, however is not a GOOD answer. As noted above, there are conflicts. Neither can you establish a play list with tracks using different zones and get the desired output on each track. I also am having issues with the bit rate on 5.1 output in that everything is limited to 48kHz sampling max, which is, perhaps not conincidentally, what the internal sampling rate is. This does not happen in two-channel playback.
Hey, JRiver! PLEASE establish a setting that permits simple outputting of the source file as is so it is no longer necessary to switch manually between two and multi channel. That's why the Good Lord invented computer software and is allowing fingers to rot away. (Not thumbs. Have to text, you know.)
JimH:
--- Quote from: tbng on September 12, 2017, 06:18:27 pm ---Hey, JRiver! PLEASE establish a setting that permits simple outputting of the source file as is so it is no longer necessary to switch manually between two and multi channel.
--- End quote ---
Wouldn't that be bitstreaming?
https://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=105213.0
RD James:
--- Quote from: JimH on September 12, 2017, 06:38:21 pm ---Wouldn't that be bitstreaming?
--- End quote ---
No, that's not the issue here.
The issue is that most playback devices do not support all channel formats, while JRiver only has the option to set the output format to either "source number of channels" or a fixed channel format.
So if your device supports 2.0 and 5.1 but nothing else, "source number of channels" will fail for 4.0, 5.0, 7.1 format tracks etc.
And setting it to 5.1 means that 2.0 tracks will either be upmixed to 5.1 or played in a 5.1 container depending on your JRSS settings.
The JRSS setting affects both up and downmixing, so if you don't want 2.0 tracks being upmixed to a 5.1 container, it also means that a 7.1 track will not receive any downmixing and two of the channels will be discarded.
If JRSS had an option that only did downmixing and no upmixing, that might work combined with "source channels" and the "auto configure output settings on playback error" option enabled - assuming that automatic configuration works correctly.
At least that seems like a solution which would require the least amount of effort, rather than completely reworking how output format selection works.
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