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[CraigNZ]

I am using my PC and JRiver to listen to Amazon Music Unlimited over HDMI to an Anthem AVM70.  I am currently using the DSP function to encode the datastream (using WDM driver) from Amazon Music to Dolby Digital (AC3) and send that to my AVM70.  This works perfectly, except it is limited to 48Khz sampling rate.  The Audio Path shows JRiver is downsampling the incoming 192khz rate to 48khz.  Dolby D+ supports much higher data rates.  Is it possible to encode the incoming stream to Dolby D+?  The AVM70 does support DD+ and 192khz sampling.

[CraigNZ]

I should add that the PC is running Windows 11 23 H2.

[Awesome Donkey]

The app you're using to listen to Amazon Music has to support exclusive mode for the audio output, otherwise it goes through the system mixer and resampled. If you're using a web browser, there's no way to enable exclusive mode for that - most people use the Tidal or Qobuz apps that do have exclusive mode to accomplish this, not sure about Amazon Music.

Be warned, the WDM driver has an issue when trying to playback 192 kHz content when exclusive mode is enabled, it hiccups and doesn't work correctly. Even if you find a way to get Amazon Music to output 192 kHz without resampling you'll likely run into this issue and there's no workaround for it either, unfortunately.

[CraigNZ]

I am using the Amazon Music native app, downloaded from Microsoft Store.  Because the AVM70 will support 24 bit 192kHz 8 channel.  So I configured the Windows 11 sound settings to output 24/192.  Amazon Music has several Ultra HD tracks in 24/192 format.  When I play those tracks, Amazon Music checks the sound settings and sees the system will support it so the app forwards the stream unaltered to the JRiver DSP function as 24/192/6ch.  Because I have the JRiver DSP configured to take that stream and convert it to Dolby Digital, which has a limitation of 48kHz sampling rate, the DSP function begins by down sampling the 192kHz input stream to 48kHz.  I see this in the Audio path function in JRiver.  The DSP function then encodes the stream to Dolby Digital and sends it on to the AVM70.  The AVM70 now shows Digital Surround coming in from the PC.

I can remove the DSP function down sampling step by going into the Windows sound settings and change the output to 24/48.  When I do this and then play a 24/192 song in Amazon Music, the app down samples 192 to 48 and passes this to the JRiver DSP.  Looking at the audio path in JRiver the down sampling step is now gone and only the Dolby Digital encoding remains.  The Audio Path in JRiver shows 48kHz input and 48kHz output.  This is because of the sampling rate limitation in Dolby Digital AC3.

So what I would like to have is to add Dolby Digital Plus to the JRiver DSP encoding options so I could run 192kHz sampling all the way from the Amazon Music app to the AVM70.

[CraigNZ]

I know there are many who would argue you cannot tell the difference between 48khz 96khz and 192khz sampling rates.  And for most audio systems I would agree.  But for those of us with high end systems that are very sensitive to sampling rates and trained musician hearing, you can tell the difference.  It is mostly in the clarity and tonal quality of the upper frequencies, especially noticeable on string instruments.  But also in the dynamics, e.g., a rim shot on a snare drum.  That is why we configure PC's with upper end hardware and software like JRiver which takes advantage of those sources and hardware.

There are probably only a few people interested in this but I would be willing to purchase an 'extension' to the JRiver encoders to support my system to its fullest potential.  That is one of the greatest features of JRiver software is its configuration options.  Even if there is an additional cost.

[Hendrik]

Is there a reason you don't pass uncompressed PCM to your receiver? You wouldn't be limited by encoding capabilities then.
Its unlikely that we'll get a DDP/EAC3 encoder.

[CraigNZ]

I can send the data stream as multi-PCM to a 7.1 sound system but it is still two channel audio, since the source is two channel.  To take full advantage of a multi-channel speaker configuration I need to encode it first.  I was hoping to do this with JRiver but what I might try is to tell the AVM70 to take the multi-pcm input and encode it to Dolby Digital.  I will need to check the AVM70 forum to see if it is converted down to 48khz or passed as something like Dolby Atmos.