[DDDamian]

(can you guess what my daytime job is? )

Typing?

Seriously:
1) I'm well-aware of upsampling/artifacting
2) I'm well-aware of DRC, volume scaling, bit depths
3) We do not use ffmpeg for all you describe, we use internal code too
4) I'm well-aware of the various codecs and their advantages/disadvantages
5) The GUI design and indeed AE design is a team effort and a team decision

Some of the points you raise are very good, although not new or original. They're already on my plan (along with many other's wishes, and my own and that of other devs).

I don't mean to diss your post at all - but you coulda just said "hey, can we get straight LPCM?". Which you can

I'll reiterate: there's a couple more features to be added before feature freeze, and multiple issues to fix for Frodo final. Once that rolls we'll be looking at some other things including AE/GUI/settings/setup changes and some other points you brought up. Already ahead of you mate.

All good, keep up the good work then I was being verbose purely to avoid a drawn-out to-and-fro.

(and aww.. my point of in-receiver processing causing noise was nicely esotheric, are you saying you've actually heard that one before?)

Nicely esoteric indeed - good circuit design mandates maximum shielding or separation of digital vs analog signals including grounding,RFI,etc. But the depth and placement of your curtains and carpets have a much greater effect lol. Don't forget PCM requires D/A processing too

And no worries - once we have the basics working for the vast majority that will hit this with Frodo there are many more audiophile (or even enthusiast) issues we'll address, including some of the points you raise. Rest assured I'm no less an enthusiast nor any less anal

[puntloos]

Nicely esoteric indeed - good circuit design mandates maximum shielding or separation of digital vs analog signals including grounding,RFI,etc. But the depth and placement of your curtains and carpets have a much greater effect lol.

And no worries - once we have the basics working for the vast majority that will hit this with Frodo there are many more audiophile (or even enthusiast) issues we'll address, including some of the points you raise. Rest assured I'm no less an enthusiast nor any less anal

Cool, I hereby appoint you as .. Guardian of the True Audio and Destructor of Bogus Bitstreaming Claims

Hope you can make this a better world for all of us soon

[DDDamian]

Heh - we're on the same page mate. Just letting you know what the current priorities are (bug-fixes and stability, AE is still in its infancy) and a little bit about where we're heading.

Stay tuned

[BlackRaven]

I currently have my PC to my stereo only tv with a HDMI cable. But on movies I am really struggling to hear stuff (TV always seems fine). It is obviously the higher qualities that I am therefore having the difficulty with - as though I'm not getting much of the centre speaker in the mix. Is there anything I can do to mix it properly to just stereo? I am using Frodo, and volume and amplification are both as far to the right as they will go.

[Ned Scott]

Volume Amplification was broken, but should be working in Frodo beta2.

[BlackRaven]

Volume Amplification was broken, but should be working in Frodo beta2.

New version has fixed it - thanks

[puntloos]

Can someone enlighten me what the difference is between "Volume Amplification" and "DRC"? I understand that DRC is the more advanced system but .. how does it work?

[StinDaWg]

For real DRC you'll either have to wait for Frodo or check your receiver.

Is real DRC still going to make it into Frodo or not because it's at feature freeze? Also, any idea when regular old volume amplification will be working again in the nightlies? I have RC1 and you can adjust the volume up or down but the audio compression feature isn't working. Went back to Eden because of this. I have a stereo soundbar with a "true volume" feature but it sucks and is not customizable at all. It's either on or off with no way to adjust how much the sound gets compressed.

For those that do use the volume amplification of xbmc here are the settings I use.

-12, +12 This makes dialog and explosions more similar while still allowing explosions to sound "loud" without blowing your ears out.

-18, +18 I use this at night or if I'm really trying not to disturb anyone. I feel like this is the limit you can go before it starts to sound weird. Explosions should never sound quieter than dialog. I feel that this balance is just about perfect if you are looking to get sound levels very flat.

I'm not sure if this is the way it was intended to be used, but I have to set the volume slider at the opposite of amplification, otherwise audio sounds distorted if you are only boosting the audio without setting the master volume to a lower value so things even out. If that makes sense. I also have audio set to 2.0 and boost volume on downmix.

[bobo1on1]

Volume amplification is working in RC1, except if you use pulseaudio.

[StinDaWg]

Volume amplification is working in RC1, except if you use pulseaudio.

I just tried the newest build, and it does appear to work. However, the reason why I thought it wasn't working is because if you hit "O" to see the OSD, the att: never changes. On Eden this value would fluctuate real-time so u could see how many dB its changing, however on Frodo it does nothing, always shows the same value. Not sure if this is expected behavior or you guys just haven't got around to re-implementing it yet?

[puntloos]

For those that do use the volume amplification of xbmc here are the settings I use.

-12, +12 This makes dialog and explosions more similar while still allowing explosions to sound "loud" without blowing your ears out.

-18, +18 I use this at night or if I'm really trying not to disturb anyone. I feel like this is the limit you can go before it starts to sound weird. Explosions should never sound quieter than dialog. I feel that this balance is just about perfect if you are looking to get sound levels very flat.

I'm not sure if this is the way it was intended to be used, but I have to set the volume slider at the opposite of amplification, otherwise audio sounds distorted if you are only boosting the audio without setting the master volume to a lower value so things even out. If that makes sense. I also have audio set to 2.0 and boost volume on downmix.

Hi StinDaWg, can you enlighten me what you mean by "-12, +12"? Do you mean XBMC volume and volume amplification respectively?

[NavalDaval]

I just installed Frodo 12.0 RC1 on my Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 7 Inch and I am having the same low sound problem. I have tried with and without 2.0 and boost volume on downmix selected. I don't see any other place to increase volume. Thank you.

Dave W

[un1versal]

Dont you guys need to increase the volume on the machine itself? IIRC XBMC is only a application and does not control the OS volume at all in any machine.

uNi

[NavalDaval]

Thank you for the reply.
The Volume is set around 20% and with the speakers that I have plugged in the music is loud enough. When XBMC plays, with out changing the volume, it is very soft. When I push the volume up XBMC shows a full volume bar. When I push down the music gets softer. If XBMC dose not change the volume in the sound card then it should not intercept the volume key. And I should not have to crank up the system volume because one app is very soft. Because to do that you get very loud sound when you exit XBMC.

Dave W

[StinDaWg]

For those that do use the volume amplification of xbmc here are the settings I use.

-12, +12 This makes dialog and explosions more similar while still allowing explosions to sound "loud" without blowing your ears out.

-18, +18 I use this at night or if I'm really trying not to disturb anyone. I feel like this is the limit you can go before it starts to sound weird. Explosions should never sound quieter than dialog. I feel that this balance is just about perfect if you are looking to get sound levels very flat.

I'm not sure if this is the way it was intended to be used, but I have to set the volume slider at the opposite of amplification, otherwise audio sounds distorted if you are only boosting the audio without setting the master volume to a lower value so things even out. If that makes sense. I also have audio set to 2.0 and boost volume on downmix.

Hi StinDaWg, can you enlighten me what you mean by "-12, +12"? Do you mean XBMC volume and volume amplification respectively?

Yes. If I only increase volume amplification then it makes the sound distorted. If I decrease XBMC master volume to offset the amplification then it sets the baseline back to even while still allowing for the loud sounds to be compressed without having the voices or soft sounds muffled.