Justin,
I am not sure I understand your request.
Basically we both want the same - disabling JRSS upmixing with Media Center just routing any possible source channel layout "correctly" to our physical speaker layout. This should be a straight forward thing to do.
Sorry, I'm not sure what's confusing. Hopefully this helps.
I almost never want any up-mixing done, and I think this is what you want also, but your posts are somewhat confusing to me, so I can't say for sure; but I'll assume you want the same thing.
I select "Source Number of Channels" for Channels and "Source bitdepth" for Bitdepth. My understanding is that by doing this, the audio will not be modified (up or down mixed) in any way, and that the Channels sent to MC will be routed to the appropriate Speakers in my system, whether they exist or not.
JRSS (arguably quite well) mixes any input signal to output in the number of channels you specify in the Channels selection. However, personally, I don't want 4.1 mixed to 5.1, nor do I want Stereo mixed to 5.1, etc.
MC currently has some options to specially deal with Stereo and Center channel, they are..
"For stereo sources, only mix to 2.1" and "Move center to front L/R"
These are both important and valuable options, but they are only available if you use JRSS, which you can only use if you specify a specific number of Channels in your system. Meaning, I can only take advantage of this if I select a number of channels, which I don't want to do for the reasons given above.
Now, your trouble comes in with Mono signals.
MC is hardcoded to split Mono into Stereo, because of the thread long ago discussing Audio only considerations.
Now, Matt has recently added the (excellent) change which sends mono
in a Video signal to the center channel.
This is also hardcoded, and not optional. It probably doesn't need to be optional, but what about the person that doesn't have a center channel? What do they get? I have no idea.
My suggestions are to allow the current special handling of Stereo and Center channel
with "Source number of channels" selected.
This way, I can benefit from having a Stereo music track being mixed to include my subwoofer, which I currently cannot use, but would like to. It would also allow someone without a center channel to split to their L/R fronts, but not do any other mixing.
In addition, to handle your request for Mono, I suggested these options also be
added and allowed to be selected with "Source number of channels"
"Send mono to center" and "Expand mono to stereo"
This could/would remove the hard-coded, and unchangeable choices JRiver has made in how to handle these situations. The defaults should be the current hard-coded options.
Some people might want their
mono audio tracks to play from their center speaker, and not be split into stereo. This is not an option for us currently.
Some people might want their
mono video tracks to be split into stereo, and not just sent to the center channel. This is not an option for us currently.
By adding these 2 options, and allowing all 4 options to be selected
in conjunction with "Source number of channels", I think we can overcome all of the current shortcomings, and we can all get what I think we all want.
I don't see any circumstance where these options will take away anything from the current abilities, they will only enhance the current situation. Also, since they all exist in one form or another already, I don't suspect it would be a big change to do as I'm suggesting.
I believe these options will give you exactly what you are looking to do. If I'm mistaken, please explain to me the error, so I can understand, and perhaps come up with a further enhancement.