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MartinAsh1978
Scholar

NOW TV Boost, no 5.1

Hi, 

 

I've just started the trial of NOW TV Boost on the NOW TV stick. HD is being recognised but the Boost settings are not recognising 5.1 even though I have that set in the audio settings. 

 

I have tried signing out and switching off the stick but nothing works. 

 

Anyone got any ideas? 

 

20191124_185531.jpg

20191124_185502.jpg

 

Any help would be much appreciated, cheers. 

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION
Anonymous User
Not applicable

Hi all. For 5.1 to work the NowTV boost settings must be set to either DolbyD+ or DolbyD+/DTS all other settings result in Stereo only. Sonos Beam does not work with DolbyD+ so will not output 5.1 with a NowTV box or stick. Hopefully a future firmware update will let the DolbyD setting work which would then work with Sonos Beam. 

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40 REPLIES 40
schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @MartinAsh1978 

 

Are you using a sound bar, AV Receiver or the inbuilt speakers on your television ?

 

If so are the sound devices in your chain able to encode / decode  Dolby Digital Plus ?

 

Have you tried settings both Audio Mode & HDMI on your screen shot shown to Auto ?

 

MartinAsh1978
Scholar

Hey,

 

Thanks for the speedy response @schnapps 

 

OK, so I do not have a standard setup, it's a pain in the ass quite frankly so I will try to describe what I have.

 

I have a Sonos Beam but my Samsung TV does not output 5.1 from the ARC because it's one of those TVs that simply did not have the ability to do so. So, in order to get around some of the problems I use a switch (https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0734SYLJL/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1).

 

I have a BT Box, NOW TV Stick, Chromecast and PS4 going into the switch and then coming out of the switch via HDMI into my TV. I also have a cable coming out via Toslink into the Sonos. This gets me 5.1 with the BT Box, PS4 and the Chromecast in some circumstances.

I'm assuming this funky setup is the reason I am having issues but I assumed the Settings option on my screenshot was not doing any tests and was just simply reading the settings on the device. Does the Now TV app do a test when reporting the settings? I didn't think it would be doing it at that point.

I have tried setting everything to auto but no joy on that one. 

 

Thanks for the help so far.

 

EDIT - I have Audio Mode and HDMI explicitly set to Dolby D but still no joy.

schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @MartinAsh1978 

 

To be honest i am not sure how under the NowTV App in the My Account section the Boost Pass settings knows if you have a compatible 5.1 surround sound system or stereo sound system.

 

Does your Sonos indicates what sound signal it is receiving and if so is it detecting stereo or 5.1 ?

 

The Boost Pass is still new to me and i am still playing around with it on my different AV combination i have dotted around my house.

 

I have only tested the Audio side of the Boost Pass so far on my AV Receiver and Roku Stick Plus and when i set the Roku Audio settings to either Auto or DD Plus.

 

The AV Receiver displays on the information panel DD Plus and going into the My Account section of NowTV App on my Roku Player under the Boost Pass settings it confirms 5.1 surround sound (which is what i was expecting).

 

Listening to my system it is definitely sending sound to the five speakers and subwoofer (sounds pretty good on the one movie i have tested it out on so far).

 

I have an older Dolby soundbase in the Living Room which i haven't tested yet with my NowTV 4K box, but i couldn't never get sound from it using the inbuilt Netflix App on my television where all other Apps from the TV played fine with regards to sound output. 

 

So i am not fully confident the Soundbase will report back  5.1 surround sound on my Boost Pass on my NowTV box based on never been able to get sound via the Netflix App from my Smart television.

 

I know @RoyB is coming across a similar issue on his soundbar where the Boost Pass on his stick is detecting Stereo and not 5.1.

Hooba
Scholar 3

I'm using a NowTv stick, with boost. 1080p is always ok - 5.1 has been hit and miss. Today working fine with movies - live and on demand. Sports not so great - switching it to Stereo and then back to 5.1 sometimes sorts it out, mostly it doesn't. I gave up and am now using PS4 which consistently works. Dunno what to say - its pretty flaky on a Stick. When it works, it works very well .... My set up not too exotic - have the stick plugged directly into an HDMI on  my AV Amp, so no real room for things to go awry with the 5.1

RoyB
Legend

@MartinAsh1978 

 

AAMOI, what model of Samsung TV do you have, and is it documented that it can’t do 5.1 over ARC?

 

I know my Samsung UE55JS9000 can do it, as the NowTV app on the set itself is working perfectly, sending 5.1 over the ARC to my soundbar. 

 

I‘m just having trouble with getting it all to work with a Roku Streaming Stick+ on an HDMI input to the TV, where the settings that work for @schnapps don’t work for me. But I have no problem with getting the Stick to say it’s doing 5.1, just with getting the soundbar to agree that it is.

 

I think your HDMI switch is a red herring here; it would not matter if some or all of those devices had an HDMI port to themselves. And as you can get 5.1 out over the Toslink to the Sonos Beam from other devices on that switch, there is no clear reason you can’t get it from the Stick also.

 

My further researches will involve looking at other sources of 5.1 on my Stick, e.g. Netflix, to see if these work when NowTV doesn’t, or if the presence or absence of 5.1 is consistent across all apps on the Stick.

 

Tomorrow, perhaps......

Set a Payment PIN on your account so that no-one but you can buy memberships on it. Check your bank accounts monthly for any other unexpected payments to Now. That way you can at least nip them in the bud, while you and Now figure out whose fault they are.
RoyB
Legend

@MartinAsh1978 

 

A couple more thoughts:-

 

Working over Toslink, there is no negotiation, so you have to set it on the Samsung, or the Stick, to send what the Beam can handle, and is expecting.

 

I read that the Beam can’t do DD+.

 

Though as per your Edit above, DD ought to work.

 

What, in the Samsung menus, is the Samsung set to send over Toslink?

 

 

Set a Payment PIN on your account so that no-one but you can buy memberships on it. Check your bank accounts monthly for any other unexpected payments to Now. That way you can at least nip them in the bud, while you and Now figure out whose fault they are.
gavs82008
Legend 5
Legend 5

@RoyB 

Interestingly my Samsung can do DD+ via amazon video, but with Now TV through the TV app I didn’t get any sound. Only putting it to DD for Now TV works. 

The Tv bought in January and got a Samsung sound bar with wireless rear speakers a few years ago with ARC capability.

 

Any ideas to get DD+ working for Now TV or am I missing something? 

FYI that I do not work for NOW, just a NOW customer trying to help
MartinAsh1978
Scholar

@schnapps - You can see from the Sonos mobile app whether or not the signal is broadcasting 5.1 and it is reporting stereo for NOW TV 😞 I think I might try what @Hooba suggested and try it on the PS4, it sounds like the stick may be flaky.

 

@RoyB - Not sure on the TV model but I did a ton of investigating when I first got the Sonos as I just assumed it would work as the TV is not that old and cost a bloody fortune at the time. After reading up it was apparent that some Samsung TVs just did not support 5.1 from anything that was inputted into HDMI and then attempted to output via the ARC. This does relate to something @gavs82008 has mentioned as you can get 5.1 from the inbuilt apps via the ARC as I managed to do this with Amazon Prime although this would suggest the NOW TV TV app should also work and it does not sound like it is. It's frustrating but just one of those things. Apparently if I had any Toshiba TV from the last 10 years I would have had no problem. I think you are right though, I think the switch is not the issue. 

 

Thanks for all the replies, it is really appreciated 🙂 I'll let you know if the PS4 works when I have tried it.

schnapps
Legend 5
Legend 5

Hi @MartinAsh1978 

 

I will be interested in your findings using a PS4.