PS4 output on Blu Ray.

egg1000

Got a niggling problem that at the moment I'm just living with, because I'm 90% certain it's a PS4 bug.

I have PS4 slim, HDMI connected to LG 50" TV and optical connection to 5.1 LG DVD/amp.

Everything comes through in lovely 5.1 surround, Games play in surround sound, no problem, Blu ray intro's and trailers play in surround, but feature films only come through in 2.1.
If I select any other soundtrack on the disc (spanish, dutch etc, it comes through in 5.1). The only film I've found that will play in 5.1 in english is close encounters. Tried to many to mention, The force awakens, Dark knight, Batman begins, gravity etc.

Amp is pretty dumb and just does what it can with the optical signal. No options to select type of input via optical. But when I select bitstream or dolby on the PS4 audio settings, the Digital light comes on, and things play in surround.
Very few settings that could be adjusted on the TV. Options are 'Auto' out or 'PCM' out. It's set to auto, but when set to PCM, audio is only stereo.
Doesn't seem to matter what I set the output to in the BR settings, it's always 2.1, unless it's the intro, or a foreign language.

My thought process is that the PS4 is forcing PCM 5.1 (this is what is displayed in the pause menu) and my amp doesn't understand, and perhaps I'm lucky to even get 2.1 from it under the circumstances?

If anybody can enlighten me further, I'd be most grateful, as currently, I'm assuming I need a new amp.... but I'd like to be certain that the amp is the culprit.

Thanks

shoestring25

yes its the amp, optical is old now and not ip to it for uncompressed sound you get on games and blu rays now days it cannot cope with all the data via uncompressed PCM so you only get stereo pcm via optical.

your best bet on an old amp with no hdmi is optical connection straight from the ps4 into the amp not via the tv, then select bitstream on the ps4. that should give you compressed 5.1 surround sound. it wont be the best sound you can get but will be ok till you get an amp that has HDMI

next010

Optical only supports PCM 2.0 (stereo), Dolby 5.1 & DTS 5.1

TV settings
PCM = stereo
Auto = bitstream DD/DTS (I guess)

With PS4 set to bitstream Dolby and if you're getting DD 5.1 on games at least it should on paper be working for movies too, so if Blu-ray's are not coming through as DD 5.1 that is odd.

If bitstreaming PCM on the PS4 that is PCM 5.1/7.1 which your system cannot handle.

Some old LG displays did not support passing/bitstreaming DTS 5.1 as well.