Voicemeeter Atmos / Bitstream Handling

[Rizbang]

Hi all,
I have been looking high and low for details about passing Dolby Atmos and other surround encoded streams through Voicemeeter without alteration (e.g. passthrough / bitstream).

My Setup:

Windows 10, i7-7700k, 16GB
Voicemeeter Potato is my system default sound device (have also tried Banana)
A1 is set to my PC audio speakers (Realtek Audio, which is onboard my Gigabyte Z270X-UD3 MB - it's 7.1 enabled FYI)
A2 is set to Denon-AVR (which is a Denon X3400H connected via HDMI to my GTX-970)

Windows speaker config on the Realtek speakers is 5.1 (reflecting my actual setup).
Speaker setup for the Denon-AVR is "Dolby Atmos for Home Theatre".
Both have "exclusive mode" enabled.

I am playing an Atmos demo video using MPC-HC with bitstream settings enabled (also tried VLC).

With the above, my Denon AVR displays "Multi In" and the "PCM" indicator is lit. However, if I change the windows default output from Voicemeeter to the Devnon-AVR device my AVR displays "Atmos" indicating the source from the PC is an Atmos source (which is my desired outcome!).

I have tried to set the A1 output in Voicemeeter to my Denon-Avr but that had no effect.

Any information on how to get Atmos audio sources to pass through Voicemeeter would be great.

Thank you in advance.

[Vincent Burel]

Could you please simply describe the audio path from the source to the output ?

1- VLC - > Voicemeeter virtual input (is it configured in 7.1) ? do you see the incoming signal in Voicemeeter virtual input meters?
2- Voicemeeter BUS A1 -> Output Device (configured in 7.1) ? confirm in voicemeeter system settings dialog box (ch:8)

[Rizbang]

Hi,

So 1 is correct. Playing atmos content in vlc. Windows defaut sound device set to voicemeeter virtual input. Voicemeeter virtual input is configured with 7.1 in windows speaker config with all speakers enabled and all set to full range. Sound plays and all channel meter bars are active amp n voicemeeter.

For my testing I do have the AVR on BUS A1 and have confirmed voicemeeter shows 8 channels.l in the settings.

I will have to attach screenshots later so if there are soecifc settings you want to see let me know, otherwise I will attach all shots of above setup.

I just had a thought, i do have my discord setup to output to voicemeeter aux input and this is mixed to the A1 BUS. Could this be causing the issue? I wasnt connected to discord at the time of testing but maybe voicemeeter always mixes and passthrough cannot happen in this setup?

[Rizbang]

One more question, can the exclusive mode setting for the output device have any effect here?

[Rizbang]

attached are the speaker configs...more screens to come.

NOTE: although the screenshot of the denon shows that the rear channels are disabled I did re-enable them and executed the tests with no Joy. AVR still shows "Multi In" / PCM.

[Rizbang]

windows sound device and voicemeeter configs

[Vincent Burel]

One more question, can the exclusive mode setting for the output device have any effect here?

possibly... experience shows too that many multichannel device works only with MME interface... you may ask to your manufacturer in what conditions the Dolby Atmos mode is expected to work.

[Rizbang]

Interesting. So switching all outputs to MME will yield “Dolby Surround”. This is still not Atmos as my AVR will display “atmos” when it is getting that stream.

Test setup / Result:
Voicemeeter as windows default device...
1. WDM AVR on A1 output. All other outputs cleared. / result “pcm”
2. MME AVR on A1 output. All other outputs cleared. / result “Dolby Surround”

AVR as windows default device...
1. Result is “atmos”


I also tried changing speaker config for the various sound devices.
Voicemeeter as default device:
1. I set all devices to stereo except the AVR but only stereo sound was output. And only L/R vu meters were bouncing in vm.
Interestingly though the AVR still displayed Dolby Surround.
2. Adjusted the previous setup so that the main voicemeeter input was 7.1 speaker setup and sound from all speakers through the AVR was back but still no “atmos” on the AVR.

Maybe it has something to do with the windows dolby for atmos app.

Any thoughts on other tests I can run?

[Rizbang]

Perhaps there are configuration settings I could try so as to pass atmos through voicemeeter?

[Vincent Burel]

apparently it passes through Voicemeeter (meter bars show the 7.1 signal on input and BUS).
The problem is in the windows audio interface...
you confirm that it works when using MME audio interface on output Ax ? but not with WDM ? right ?