Streaming literally anything else on my Chromecast I can get 5.1. With stadia I'm out of luck... They don't want to address it either.
Ok, good point, the tech related point of view.
@GraceFromGooglemaybe you could forward this thought.
I am QA for myself, and I run into some "conditions" I would have figured out before.
Of course, developing a product makes you blind on some places, but at least I would have checked 5.1 passthrough on the most common 20 TVs, and at least from every major company.
It does not make sense, to know, that Netflix runs with 5.1 and Dolby Vision on ChromeCast Ultra, but Stadia lacks color in HDR (Destiny2) and has only 2.0 passthrough.
To expect people to be able to have 5.1 PCM over eARC is also not a good point.
For me, I have a TV with HDMI 2.1 already, manufactured in August.
My Receiver (Yamaha RX-V685) has also eARC enabled already.
I list these points, as in your FAQ is mentioned, that it will work with 5.1 Sound when your TV supports eARC.
But it does not. Besides, only few TVs out there are supporting eARC.
This was a wrong approach from start. Go and broadcast Dolby Sound, and everyone will be fine.
Yes, also google because more paying customers will balance the more costs for Dolby Licences.
If Netflix can do DD+ in a 4K stream, I guess Google can, too.
BTW... I now recognize that ChromeCast Ultra was not able to broadcast Dolby Atmos, but my TV is? Interesting.... Tested with 2nd season of Punisher. My TV played with Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos, but Chromecast only showed DD+ in my receiver and no DD+/ATMOS. Might be a hardware issue.
Anyway: @Amphoterism is right: If casual users will struggle here, thers a huge #**bleep**storm incoming!
Same thing here. Stadia only seems to support Linear PCM 5.1, which works on my receiver when directly plugged into one of its HDMI ports (and a factory reset of the chromecast), but not when plugged into the TV using ARC.
My receiver doesn't support 4K/60 passthrough nor HDR, so I'm stuck having to choose between 4K+HDR or 5.1 surround until Stadia supports sending our DD+ 5.1 which is supported through ARC.
Given that the audio also has a serious sync issue, I'll stick with 4K+HDR and headphones for now. ![]()
Been on with customer support twice now. First time they said they said it was connection, and maybe just plug into amp, and basically all the stuff some says when they have no idea. They said they would "escalate to higher ups" and I'd get a call back that evening. Got nothing.
Second call, the guy said it was game specific and you have to switch it on from within the game. He was then stuck because there was no option in any in game menus.
Now waiting again for a call back which probably won't come.
I did tell them about the many people here with the issue who are getting no assistance and ultimately I would like to make a formal complaint. He told me there was no way to do that unless I wrote a postal letter to Mountain View.
So, great service all round.
Same problem, I've got the first edition I plug directly on my amp Pioneer lx 701 the sound is on 2.0. Like someone else said, I cast a Netflix movie 5.1, get back on Stadia the sound appear on MultiPCM 5.1
But if I reboot Stadia and my amp, the sound come back on stereo every time..
This is strange because at the first time with Stadia the sound was directly on 5.1
Google support told me it will only work if plugged directly into TV. They also told me they had not heard of any one else having the issue!
Same issue here. Stadia support say it's my TV at fault, my 2019, 4K TV Dolby with Atmos and every other feature you could imagine. However, every other 5.1 surround source such as xbox one and firetv works fine (passes 5.1 surround to av receiver)plugged onto same hdmi that the chromecast used.
Same problem here.
CCU connected to the ONKYO amplifier.
PCM 2.0 with Stadia.
DD 5.1 with Amazon Prime ...
In the Stadia connections menu i see the 5.1 logo, but it's just a logo!
This is the answer received from the Stadia Team:
"After some checks we realized that you are not the only one having this kind of problem and our developers are already working on it. As soon as we have news, we will update you. Thanks for your patience"
It's been 3 weeks I've got the sound in game on PCM 2.0.
My Chromecast Ultra is plugging on my amplifier Pioneer.
I posted a message on this forum 3 weeks ago (page number 3)
"Same problem, I've got the first edition I plug directly on my amp Pioneer lx 701 the sound is on 2.0. Like someone else said, I cast a Netflix movie 5.1, get back on Stadia the sound appear on MultiPCM 5.1"
Today, I call the Stadia support in France,
-he doesn't know this problem. He told me to plug the Chromecast on my TV directly and be sure the TV can manage the 5.1
-I can't and I don't want to plug on the TV, I explained if I cast a Netflix movie 5.1, get back on Stadia and that work.
-He asked me to maybe send him a video of that with my AV and TV model to send it for the US.
I launching Stadia, do other thing at the same time. At one moment I was disconnected and needed to re-add my Stadia account to the Chromecast.
And now I really don't know why all works well.. the Stadia menu is on 2.0 and if I lauching a game the AV switch automaticaly to the multi PCM 5.1.
I reboot a lot of times, unplug, plug, that works perfectly.
My setup:
- TV Panasonic 50CX680E (HDMI 2.0 without HDR)
-AV Pioneer SC-LX701
Interesting that it just started to work for you after simply pluging and unplugging multiple times and then readding your account. I will see if there is a way to unlink my stadia account and then add it again.
Side note, I did get £50 compensation but as credit for play store. I will take it, get a couple more games.
I just wish there was some clear indication from Google that they know about this issue centrally and are doing something about it.
Disconnecting, reconnecting, and relinking stadia to Chromecast didn't work.
Have tried approaching Stadia team on Twitter https://twitter.com/GoogleStadia/status/1208715648110485509?s=19
@SamG try to delete the CCU from Google home and add it again.
I still do not understand why that work for me now.
What is your setup audio video devices?
I have found and tested a solution:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07K5RKQB7/
Plug the CCU into this device, send the picture to TV on one HDMI cable, and to receiver on the other.
This splitter can handle splitting into two stream of different resolution so TV will still be 4k even if receiver is 1080. Upon starting stadia you might have to tinker a little if it doesn't give you sound. I cast Netflix and make sure I have the right audio output selected on the receiver, then quit Netflix and start stadia.
Other than this annoyance, the only other downside is that it doesn't seem to do HDR now. Even when casting a Netflix HDR title through the splitter I don't get HDR.
Clearly, until Stadia supports compressed multi channel audio for backwards compatibility with non-eARC devices there will be issues.
I really don't understand why they chose not to. Licencing cost probably, but since eARC is only really a thing this year I very much doubt there are many people at all who have both eARC TV and eARC receiver.
Glad you found a solution. Unfortunately I'm in the US and it doesnt look like there is anything comparable... most of the ones sold here are 4k 30fps max. It would just be so much easier if google didnt go the cheap route and implemented 5.1 surround that most people are going to be able to use.
Over two months since I opened this... Still have not had any official response from @GraceFromGoogle @ChrisFromGoogle. It's going to be a real PR disaster when Stadia is launched and you get people paying $10/month for premium and not getting what they are paying for because google can't support Dolby.
If it helps, Ive been onto Stadia chat today. I had the same issues when my Stadia arrived today, having used it on a 100mb connection but solved it by plugging into my receiver rather than the TV. I think the issue is that while you might have ARC/passthrough/ 4K TV and receiver, Stadia relies on having eARC which is a new higher bandwidth ARC port which a lot of TV and receivers dont have. So my TV which was new last year (Samsung) was outputting in PCM not dolby digital (the PS4 works fine as is DD) but the receiver can cope as it doesn't rely on pass though via the TV.
So it's a pain, but if you otherwise have a modern set up it should work.
I am also a new samsung TV user of the year 2019 and I have the exact same problem, but neither the 2020 samsung televisions are compatible with eARC, samsung does not use this standard of audio or video transmission, there are many complaints, why Samsung 8k TV was purchased and does not have eARC. I really do not know which brand of Televisions uses or allows this transmission standard.
The trouble is, you then also need a receiver that handles 4k or at least does 4k pass through. Mine is a high end 9.2 receiver that I had no intention of upgrading at the cost of several thousand just because Google won't use something other than PCM or provide a backward compatibility.
At present I have a TV that I paid money for to handle 4k and HDR, and a sound system that can handle the best sound there is. But because you must plug stadia in to one or the other then you are stuck if you haven't got eARC on both! Bloody stupid.
Fact is, PCM is licence free and Stadia would have had to pay for Dolby digital (I think). And when you look at the history of Google and Android, they have always tried to use licence free stuff even at the expense of user experience.
The best solution I have found is to plug Chromecast Ultra into a device that splits the 4k and PCM stream into two separate. One then goes to TV and other to receiver and for a much more modest cost then new TV and receiver. Trade off is HDR not available. See my previous post here with Amazon link:
Hi Makaveli, my amp is a Yamaha HTR 3069 which is their entry level one. Perhaps I'm just lucky that it appears to work and HDR does work. Destiny 2 was quite impressive and the wireless connection says excellent so it seems to say the right things on screen. I also have a high speed HDMI cable which can deal with 4K, sounds like we are all as up on this as each other so we understand how these things should be plugged in. I have to say though that it failed once on 5.1 after working properly and I wondered if getting the right broadband connection when switching on isn't entirely stable, despite speed which was still shown as excellent. I do think Google need to change the setup instructions though as clearly plugging into TV isn't always the solution.
Yep. That's exactly the problem. Most people don't have state of the art TV's and receivers. Most people already have a completely good system that works with everything else in their system. The whole point of stadia is that you don't need to buy anything. But in order to play in 4k on your chromecast you have to have a TV that supports 4kHDR and eARC and also have a receiver that supports 4K HDR and eARC. I can guarantee you the majority of the people that are on stadia do not have these or come anywhere close. What get's me is that I started this thread almost 6 months ago. Still no official comment in here from google. Lot's of other threads have had google responses but they just seem to ignore this one.