HD-300; getting no audio from MKV files--need to downmix to stereo

[DarkWolf77]

I just got my HD-300 and I'm using it as a media extender. I love it, however, I found that I got no audio when I tried to watch an HD MKV file.

It turns out that it was outputting the audio in 5.1 surround, which my hardware doesn't understand (and I only have two--very high quality--speakers). I have it connected via optical to a DEQ which feeds my amp, and in turn goes out to my pair of speakers. I've been looking around the forum but can't find an answer. I saw that the features of the HD-300 say that it can down-mix things like DTS and dolby, etc (http://www.sage.tv/hd_theater.html). but I can't find out how to do it.

I found a post in the forum mentioning using a setting called 'miniclient/disabled_audio_codecs' to force the server to transcode these, but it doesn't work--it doesn't get transcoded.

Any ideas?

and NO I am not going to go buy 3 more speakers and a dts decoder, I'm very happy with my audio setup.

[madpoet]

You need to clarify what the audio codec is in your MKV.

[Pirin]

In order for your HD-300 to downmix the audio to stereo, you need to configure it to do so. The trick is, you have to do it in stand-alone mode. Disconnect your network cable and reboot the HD-300. Once in the stand-alone mode, go into configuration and set up the audio. For stereo, you want to choose analog out (I think). You can check the HD-300 manual (page 4) for more information. However, I don't know if the optical out is live if you chose analog output??

[madpoet]

You don't have to use analog. It can downmix over any of the audio connections including HDMI. I use HDMI only to my TV and it downmixes to 2 channel as long as my audio codecs are correct.

[DarkWolf77]

Originally Posted by madpoet

You need to clarify what the audio codec is in your MKV.

Ah sorry, it seems I forgot the most important detail. The file in particular I'm testing with says it's "AC3 48hz 5.1".


I tried setting the sound output to analog stereo (the optical is still active) and I had no luck.

Originally Posted by madpoet

You don't have to use analog. It can downmix over any of the audio connections including HDMI. I use HDMI only to my TV and it downmixes to 2 channel as long as my audio codecs are correct.

ok, but HOW?

[paulbeers]

I may be wrong, but what it sounds like is that is that the HD300 is only going to downmix to stereo when hooked via HDMI. You are hooked via optical which Sage is probably just passing "as is" to your decoder.

[ericscottf]

When this happens to me, i just pass the video through sagetv's transcoder and watch it later.

Can i change settings on an hd200, like described for the hd300 instead?

thanks

[DarkWolf77]

...and now I tried to watch a ripped dvd through the extender (and the standalone player) and had the exact same results--even with the dvd audio track set to stereo. Why does the feature list say it will downmix to stereo, yet it does not?

[paulbeers]

As stated, I think it is because you are using optical. Optical should just pass the audio stream AS IS. If you use HDMI or analog stereo it does it just fine.