Mac Mini 2018 and Dolby 5.1 dont Work

[Avbeitia]

Recently I had bought a Mac Mini 2018 to use it as mediacenter.

I have one problem with the audio Dolby 5.1 that on my soundbar always appears as PCM always and never as Dolby Digital. The soundbar is connected to the TV with ARC and the MAC mini is connected directly to the soundbar. If I set up MIDI I appear 8 audio channels and there I can set as 5.1 but it still comes out as PCM.

I also have surround headphones that support Dolby and DI do not understand how all this can be so complicated when on a PC everything does it perfectly without problems.TS that I connect to the Tv via ARC and the MAC MINI to the TV. There I don't recognize Dolby or DTS audios there, but if I go to the MIDI configuration only 2 channels appear to me.

This is a bit despairing because if I connect a laptop with windows 10 via HDMI as I connect the MAC MINI with the configuration of ARC to the headphones and the computer to the HDMI of the TV, there the computer recognize the Dolby sound that the Mac Mini is not able to recognize.

I also have an Apple TV connected directly to the TV and the headphones connected via ARC seamlessly detect Dolby audio.

Another thing I don't understand is because if I have connected by HDMI the MAC MINI to a Lg Oled TV, it puts me that it is connected by DisplayPort.

Thank You.

 

[handheldgames]

Recently I had bought a Mac Mini 2018 to use it as mediacenter.

I have one problem with the audio Dolby 5.1 that on my soundbar always appears as PCM always and never as Dolby Digital. The soundbar is connected to the TV with ARC and the MAC mini is connected directly to the soundbar. If I set up MIDI I appear 8 audio channels and there I can set as 5.1 but it still comes out as PCM.

I also have surround headphones that support Dolby and DI do not understand how all this can be so complicated when on a PC everything does it perfectly without problems.TS that I connect to the Tv via ARC and the MAC MINI to the TV. There I don't recognize Dolby or DTS audios there, but if I go to the MIDI configuration only 2 channels appear to me.

This is a bit despairing because if I connect a laptop with windows 10 via HDMI as I connect the MAC MINI with the configuration of ARC to the headphones and the computer to the HDMI of the TV, there the computer recognize the Dolby sound that the Mac Mini is not able to recognize.

I also have an Apple TV connected directly to the TV and the headphones connected via ARC seamlessly detect Dolby audio.

Another thing I don't understand is because if I have connected by HDMI the MAC MINI to a Lg Oled TV, it puts me that it is connected by DisplayPort.

Thank You.

It sounds like your mac os application is not outputting a bitstream dolby digital signal and that it's converting the signal into a PCM signal. Are you still getting all the channels of audio? If so, somewhere the DD signal is transcoded and sent along as a PCM stream.

Apple does the same thing with Airplay and DD. Dropping the signal to PCM before streaming it across the network.

 

[magicMac]

Recently I had bought a Mac Mini 2018 to use it as mediacenter.

I have one problem with the audio Dolby 5.1 that on my soundbar always appears as PCM always and never as Dolby Digital. The soundbar is connected to the TV with ARC and the MAC mini is connected directly to the soundbar. If I set up MIDI I appear 8 audio channels and there I can set as 5.1 but it still comes out as PCM.

I also have surround headphones that support Dolby and DI do not understand how all this can be so complicated when on a PC everything does it perfectly without problems.TS that I connect to the Tv via ARC and the MAC MINI to the TV. There I don't recognize Dolby or DTS audios there, but if I go to the MIDI configuration only 2 channels appear to me.

This is a bit despairing because if I connect a laptop with windows 10 via HDMI as I connect the MAC MINI with the configuration of ARC to the headphones and the computer to the HDMI of the TV, there the computer recognize the Dolby sound that the Mac Mini is not able to recognize.

I also have an Apple TV connected directly to the TV and the headphones connected via ARC seamlessly detect Dolby audio.

Another thing I don't understand is because if I have connected by HDMI the MAC MINI to a Lg Oled TV, it puts me that it is connected by DisplayPort.

Thank You.

if you want to send Dolby 5.1 bitstream over HDMI then the content actually has to be Dolby Digital 5.1 AC3 format (AC3 steam inside an MP4 file or .TS file for example). iTunes does this passthrough just fine. When you're on the desktop and just using YouTube etc you will not get dolby sound. In fact you want it to be PCM so there is no additional compression.

8-Channel MIDI is nothing to do with sound output, it's to do with instruments.