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I have FINALLY discovered how to get correct, non buggy 5.1/7.1 Surround Sound!! :)

C
Userlevel 2
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This issue has been driving me nuts for weeks. I love Shadow as a service, but it has been next to impossible to get correct channel surround sound to work till now.

The problem is that the native streaming that Shadow uses ONLY sends Stereo metadata to your Device/PC and there is no way of changing that. Even if you select 5.1 sound on your local PC, the surround speakers just replicate the front left and right speakers, even though it shows as a 5.1 input signal on your Receiver.

One solution given was to use a 5.1 or 7.1USB DAC and USB Forward the device to the Shadow VM. This seemed to work if the DAC had analog outputs, however, it was very buggy/glitchy and repeatedly cut out when I tried it. As for Dolby Digital Live/DTS Connect DACS, I couldn't get them to work at all.

The solution I have discovered is to set up Steam Remote Play just ONCE from your Shadow to your PC or Device (don't worry, you won't actually be using the Steam streaming service in its full form) and this should give you a new Sound Output option in the Sound Control Panel of your Shadow VM called 'Steam Streaming Speakers'. Select this as your Default Audio Output Device and configure your speakers as either 5.1 or 7.1. Another thing you can also do is change the Audio Sampling level in Properties to 32bit 48,000khz from 16bit 48,000khz (anything above 48k khz does not seem to work)

Now, as long as you have your local PC setup to have a 5.1 or 7.1 configuration, you should have full, non glitching surround sound with all the correct channels in place without any need to change any settings when you start up your Shadow.

I have yet to tell if the 'Use High Quality Audio' option in the Shadow Control Panel makes any difference to the Audio when using this method, but the change seems negligible if it does.

Hope this helps some of you, be good to know your feedback/opinions.

71 replies

Jim29er
Userlevel 5
Badge +4

<snip>

Now I am unsure of some factors;

I selected the Shield audio setting to upscale stereo to 5.1 (pcm).

My receiver is set to ‘direct’, meaning to bypass stuff. When I changed the setting to the next configuration it said ‘multichannel’ but no more sound when clicking test. No errors, test seemed to function, just no sound. Maybe after a reboot on that setting..?

<snip>

 

Setting the Shield to upmix stereo to 5.1 shouldn’t matter (and should work) when it’s receiving a stereo signal. As far as the “multichannel” displaying on the receiver but no sound functioning, indeed that does happen sometimes, and a reboot of the Shadow VM should fix it. Have you got it to work that way after a reboot?

zombie

<snip>

Now I am unsure of some factors;

I selected the Shield audio setting to upscale stereo to 5.1 (pcm).

My receiver is set to ‘direct’, meaning to bypass stuff. When I changed the setting to the next configuration it said ‘multichannel’ but no more sound when clicking test. No errors, test seemed to function, just no sound. Maybe after a reboot on that setting..?

<snip>

 

Setting the Shield to upmix stereo to 5.1 shouldn’t matter (and should work) when it’s receiving a stereo signal. As far as the “multichannel” displaying on the receiver but no sound functioning, indeed that does happen sometimes, and a reboot of the Shadow VM should fix it. Have you got it to work that way after a reboot?

 

I did some testing and learned the AVR setting, like ‘direct’ or set to some processing seems to work (without a need to to reboot. My guess is I changed something else at first when changing the AVR setting? (as it now allows changing settings on the avr)

I have not yet disabled the upmix stereo function in the Shield settings as all seems to function.

As to the no sound situations; it seems not all ‘steam level configuration’ settings are providing sound, selecting a bitrate over 48k will not work, as in no sound. Rebooted in between changes.
Using 41k 32 bit atm and no idea if setting the speaker setup to full range has any effect.


A thing I noticed today, after booting into the Shadow vm, the audio device was set back to shadow-display. This may have been caused by having installed Steam, Epicgames, Origin or another update.
This is worth mentioning as it took some work to get it all back to work. 

Changing back to the steam device and/or disabling the shadow device resulted in a clicking sound and after a reboot it was set to the shadow again.
Solution was to disable all (both) audio devices, reboot, enable steam device (shadow device now also disabled after reboot).

 

So, it seems to work :)

I read that it may not on the older Shield devices, hence the feedback!

 

Thanks again for sharing.

S

Awesome work - very comprehensive.  Yes, I’ll give it a shot - I only have two windows PCs however, so I’ll need to see if I can get the Steam speakers to install on one of them in order to grab the drivers

I can ZIP them up and make them available for download as well; just lemme know if you need that.

Edit/update: Here are the drivers if you can’t find them elsewhere: https://www.dropbox.com/s/w1x1cel34ltw8bf/SteamStreamingDevices.zip?dl=0

i down loaded the file but its just files. theres no option to install? been trying to follow so i can do 7.1 threw my pc to my denom av receiver 7.1 surround sound. i tested my surround sound is working on my pc the channels are accurate.  thanks for any help

 

Jim29er
Userlevel 5
Badge +4

@Someone01 After you’ve downloaded the ZIP file and extracted it to a folder (on your Shadow VM), you need to right-click on the .INF file and click Install. There are two subfolders...one with the streaming speakers, and one with the microphone. I don’t think the microphone is needed, but both are what Steam is supposed to install when using its streaming.

S

@Someone01After you’ve downloaded the ZIP file and extracted it to a folder (on your Shadow VM), you need to right-click on the .INF file and click Install. There are two subfolders...one with the streaming speakers, and one with the microphone. I don’t think the microphone is needed, but both are what Steam is supposed to install when using its streaming.

yah heir is no option to install when right clicking. it just open file or open with. i do see the two seperate file. oh and gives me option to extract but it just gives me the files. i been tinkering with this and following the steps and using my iphone as my second device. i set it up for 7.1 on my phone stream options i play left for dead 2 and stay in the safe area and go back to the sound tab where you right lick sound icon then hover over speaker set up and click advanced options but i do not see any Steam Streaming Speakers to set as default. i tried disabling the blade shadow as well but no effect. i been at this for hours lol I also tried in the device manager as well.

S

ok so i figured out how to install the files and it work! i just did sound test and can hear from all the speakers now!!!! im pumped! its my son first time playing a scary game and now he will have the FULL surround sound experience to go along with it! yay! thanks a million!

D

Hello, first of thanks for finding this second… i cant get it too work… i see shadow on my main pc and on my main pc i see shadow both are connected.. and i read this forum and i needed too do this 

  • In order for the “Steam Streaming Speakers” playback device to be available, you need to stream a Steam game installed on your Shadow VM to another computer at least once.

But still i doesnt show up? is there somebody that can help me out?

i do not know how too install drivers in that zip file

Thanks alot =)

Jim29er
Userlevel 5
Badge +4

@Dytch 

  1. Download the SteamStreamingDevices.zip to your Shadow VM
  2. Right-click the zip file, and click Extract All…
  3. Click the Extract button
  4. An Explorer window with the extracted folders should open
  5. Go into (double-click) the SteamStreamingSpeakers folder
  6. Right-click the steamstreamingspeakers.inf file, and click Install
  7. Do the same for the SteamStreamingMicrophone folder with steamstreamingmicrophone.inf
  8. You can then delete the zip file and the extracted folders
D

Thankyouuu zo much its working!!! 

S

I just subscribed to the forum to say thank you ! It’s very nice to play with 5.1

Thortok2000
Userlevel 4
Badge +4

There was an AMA today and I asked about HDR and 5.1 sound and the response was that it is on their roadmap for 2021. Woot!

"I don't know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve." - Bilbo Baggins, from his speech on his eleventy-first birthday.
zombie

There was an AMA today and I asked about HDR and 5.1 sound and the response was that it is on their roadmap for 2021. Woot!

Thank you for the update. I assume it was on reddit?

It is not that well known for many (international) users so maybe such events can be announced on this main site also. Excuse me if I overlooked :)

If you do not know about Reddit, it is a well known site that hosts fora for many topics and projects etc.
Shadow can be found on Reddit on the following link; The Official Shadow Community (reddit.com)

Jim29er
Userlevel 5
Badge +4

Please be advised that the Android 3.3.0-BETA client appears to break surround-sound on Shield TV when using this Steam Streaming Speakers method...I commented on the update thread:

 

zombie

Please be advised that the Android 3.3.0-BETA client appears to break surround-sound on Shield TV when using this Steam Streaming Speakers method...I commented on the update thread:

 

Just to let you know I appreciate the sharing and answered to one of your issues in that topic but easy to get overlooked of course :) I had issues with static sound and resolved it by disabling all audio devices, reboot and enable only the steam, reboot and all worked fine. Maybe such works for you also.

I unfortunately got to reset my OS installation (scaling issue) and went back to the non-beta client as part of troubleshooting and fixing but I would still give it a go.

B

@Someone01After you’ve downloaded the ZIP file and extracted it to a folder (on your Shadow VM), you need to right-click on the .INF file and click Install. There are two subfolders...one with the streaming speakers, and one with the microphone. I don’t think the microphone is needed, but both are what Steam is supposed to install when using its streaming.


I can confirm this works on the 2017 Shield TV. Thanks for the drivers. :-) Where did you find these drivers by the way? I ask in case they need to be updated periodically.

There was another way I mentioned on a different thread. In my sound devices panel (Shadow VM), sometimes another sound option becomes available. Blade_Monitor. It’s always there in the control pannel, but not always “pluged in”. That has 5.1 and 7.1 options out of the box. Don’t know why it doesn’t always show up. Perhaps somthing they are working on.

Jim29er
Userlevel 5
Badge +4

I can confirm this works on the 2017 Shield TV. Thanks for the drivers. :-) Where did you find these drivers by the way? I ask in case they need to be updated periodically.

I just grabbed them from a local system that already had them, under

C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository\steamstreamingspeakers.inf_amd64_78513697685d0fe1

It looks like those files haven’t changed since I grabbed them, and it is concerning that these don’t seem to get installed by Steam any more. Hopefully that Blade_Monitor thing you mentioned is some newer method, as this Steam Streaming speakers thing is definitely a workaround.

M

Bonjour. Peut-on avoir du true hd atmos sur les films avec shadow? J'ai mon nvidia shoeld tv branché en hdmi sur mon home cinéma atmos? Merci de votre réponse

Jim29er
Userlevel 5
Badge +4

Bonjour. Peut-on avoir du true hd atmos sur les films avec shadow? J'ai mon nvidia shoeld tv branché en hdmi sur mon home cinéma atmos? Merci de votre réponse

No, that’s not going to work...I believe the audio stream is limited to LPCM.

M

Bonjour. Peut-on avoir du true hd atmos sur les films avec shadow? J'ai mon nvidia shoeld tv branché en hdmi sur mon home cinéma atmos? Merci de votre réponse

No, that’s not going to work...I believe the audio stream is limited to LPCM.

Alors c'est quoi pour vous le full 5.1? Est-ce que je perds de la qualité audio si je joue un film en dolby atmos avec l'audio stream pcm 5.1?

Jim29er
Userlevel 5
Badge +4

Bonjour. Peut-on avoir du true hd atmos sur les films avec shadow? J'ai mon nvidia shoeld tv branché en hdmi sur mon home cinéma atmos? Merci de votre réponse

No, that’s not going to work...I believe the audio stream is limited to LPCM.

Alors c'est quoi pour vous le full 5.1? Est-ce que je perds de la qualité audio si je joue un film en dolby atmos avec l'audio stream pcm 5.1?

Well, TrueHD Atmos is technically more than 7.1 LPCM audio. FWIW I haven’t tried playing movies from Shadow (I am no longer a subscriber BTW), but I’d think you’d have to use something like VLC to transcode the audio playback. I only used Shadow for games.

M

Hello everybody,

i do not know if i am the only one to face again this issuse, but the sound 7.1 is no more working. I have correctly set up all, but when erforming the windows test, the sounds is not correctly positionned. It was working great for months.

Did you notice this issue also?

Thank you for your help.

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