Anyone have a 9+ channel AV receiver connected via HDMI to a PC GPU?

I'm running HDMI from my GTX 1080 to an HDMI switch (to emulate a second display) and into a Denon AVR-3806, in the Windows playback device configuration, I can see all of the speaker modes supported by the AVR-3806; I'm curious as to if Windows acknowledges speaker configurations above 7.1.

Don't quote me but I don't think there is support in windows for Dolby Atmos or DTS:X which would probably give it ability to do anything higher then 7.1. As far I've seen there isn't any source material with 9.2 so the receiver would most likely be processing the audio to add for those extra channels.

I think once there are GPUs and CPUs with integrated graphics that support those audio formats you may see support for it windows.

This only applies when Windows is doing the mixing and passing PCM to the device.

If you bitstream then the Windows mixer and its speaker configuration are ignored. TrueHD, DTS-HD MA and other formats are passed to the device without modification.

Bitstream, ignore that screen.

Even though HDMI and DP supports 32 channels of audio now, as far as I know everyone is still doing a maximum of 8. This doesn't apply to compressed audio of course.

Bitstreaming is the correct answer here. However Dolby Atmos encoding is coming to Windows 10, so playing back content with more than 7.1 channels that isn't Dolby/DTS encoded should be possible.


In fact, checking now, the add-on is already partially propagated in the Windows 10 store:

I'm not interested in bitstreaming, I ask because games may be able to support more than 8 channels PCM, but I haven't confirmed that yet. Game audio is processed in real-time, the music and effects are played back as needed and positioned in speakers based on the player's position in the environment using one of many software 'drivers' to render audio output and position it in discrete speaker channels (not upmixing); OpenAL is supposedly scalable to any number of speakers depending on what information it receives from the operating system and I've seen some information regarding XAudio2 that leads me to believe it supports more than 8 speakers, but FMOD and especially Wwise might be strictly limited to 7.1 unless otherwise programmed to support more speakers. The reason I ask in the HTPC forum is because you all would be more likely to have connected something like a 9.2 receiver to a PC via HDMI than the Computer Audio forum that typically goes for stereo DACs and headphones.

Also, NVIDIA apparently blows when it comes to HDMI audio support, they support a limited number of audio formats over HDMI, so I got the integrated Intel graphics working from my motherboard while using the GTX 1080 for video; the Intel HDMI output appears to support most of the features of the audio device attached to it. I'd love to buy a fancy new receiver and tests this for myself, but I'm not that well off.



32 kHz, now I can playback Super Nintendo music at its original sample rate.

Edit:
Judging by this: http://www.avsforum.com/forum/26-home-theater-computers/1655833-9-2-surround-htpc.html

Looks like the 9.2 thing might just be upmixing on the receiver and not something the receiver can actually receive as input and then output to the attached speakers. That was a couple years ago, wonder if that has changed.

As far as I know, even the ATMOS tracks are only 5.1 or 7.1, then they just use objects embedded into the stream (using metadata) for the receiver to decode and send to the proper speaker channel in an ATMOS setup. So your receiver is really doing the grunt work for mixing and multiplexing channels for anything above a native 7.1 track. (or a 5.1 track converted to 7.1+)