HW-Q80R + MU7000 Atmos issues

[Janitorus]

EDIT: bought an Nvidia Shield to be done with this issue and play Atmos content through Shield apps and Plex. This is no solution to the actual problem of Samsung not updating their apps on 2017, 2018 and perhaps even 2019 models. Meanwhile both Netflix and Samsung keep pointing fingers at each other, promising change, blaming each other 🤡👍

UE55MU7000 + HW-Q80R soundbar 

Newest updates for both. Updated manually. 

• One connect box is connected to ARC port on the TV. Soundbar is connected to the one connect box ARC port.
• Netflix and Amazon prime both will not show "Atmos" icon next to movies or series, only 5.1. Is this normal behaviour?
• With Amazon Prime (watching Tom Clancy Jack Ryan for example) I am able to get the soundbar to recognize Dolby Atmos when setting the output mode in the TV to Dolby Digital+. The soundbar will then show "Dolby Atmos" on its display. The top speakers on the soundbar however seem to have no sound at all when Atmos is recognized. Edit: no sound from side speakers either. Not even at +6 volume. They work fine in normal surround mode and are very active, but I suppose they are copied of some other channel then. Although sometimes when listening closely, I wonder if they aren't actually a unique channel instead? Placebo probably.
• Downloaded atmos demos (https://www.dolby.com/us/en/guide/dolby-atmos-trailers.html) to USB stick, connected to one connect box. Same story: Dolby Digital Plus will show "Dolby Atmos" on soundbar display, but no sound from top or side speakers on the soundbar. 
• Additionaly, it's also really inconvenient how the output can revert back to "PCM" when Dolby Digital Plus was previously selected and the current source does not support DD+ (for example when going from Netflix to Youtube). I would think the TV would be smarter about this and just drop back to DD instead of PCM stereo. Or remember it on a per-app basis. Perhaps an oversight a future firmware update can fix? 

I have reset the TV app hub and the TV itself, started clean, no luck. Although before resetting the TV, I don't think I ever saw the soundbar display "Atmos".

[samoatey]

Okay hopefully then it should work! Obviously I've got a Sonos arc not the same Soundbar as you. Would you mind testing to see if it puts through Atmos with the method you just described with your Soundbar if poss? Would be great to know if it would work! 

If it doesn't I'll need to live with 5.1 until I get a he TV

[Janitorus]

No need for hoping, just tested and it worked 😊

Shield connected to HDMI-IN on OneConnect Box, Soundbar connected to HDMI-ARC port on OneConnect Box. Netflix Atmos and HDR supported. I used the standard Samsung HDMI cable that came with the soundbar to connect the Shield. One small thing you do need to keep in mind is to turn on "Dolby Audio Processing" on the Shield and set it to Manual, then restart the device. This is different compared to hooking it up directly to a soundbar, because the soundbar itself will/should then do all processing. Easy to overlook and it doesn't go in effect unless the Shield is restarted like I said!

So everything except DTS-HD, and Dolby TrueHD (lossless) Atmos will be supported with your setup (because those are too high bitrates for HDMI-ARC I'm quite sure). Normal 5.1 DTS will be supported and Atmos over DD+ (lossy) will be supported however like I said. 

Enjoy the Shield, let us know how you like it. And remember you can still stream MKV's with the device and have DD+ Atmos with those as well. Just not the TrueHD version.

[samoatey]

You are actually a legend! Thankyou so much - so this should work with my Sonos Soundbar too all going to plan!?

I'll follow your steps!

[samoatey]

Do you have your TV set to bitstream or PCM? What do I select?

[Janitorus]

Glad I could help 👍

I just tested to make sure. On your MU7000 with this specific setup you will have to select Bitstream as HDMI input, not PCM. This is because the Shield does all the audio processing (see previous post) so anything that comes after the Shield in this chain will need to take the data as it's being presented without further processing as there is no need for that. You will notice that HDMI output will be greyed out and set to "PCM". This will switch automatically to Dolby Digital+ once you play Netflix Atmos etc.

On the MU7000, also do not forget to set HDMI UHD Color under General, External. For UHD 50P/60P 4:4:4 and 4:2:2 support.

On the Shield, you probably want to turn on "Match Content Colorspace" for more accurate results. On your MU7000 you can also set the colorspace (General, External Devices). By default it is set to Auto and this probably sets the profile to DCI-P3 on the MU7000 as it did for me.
Play some Netflix HDR, pause on a good scene and fiddle around with this as well to see what it does to the colors. Mine is set to Auto and it switches to BT.2020 on Netflix and while streaming UHD HDR MKV's since they have that same color profile.
Having the Shield connected to the OneConnect box I think I did notice some difference in this behavior compared to directly connecting to the soundbar and passing through the video. So the OneConnect box might have some limitations. Either way, just set it to what you like best as this is all taste dependent in the end if you're not a purist. And remember that for both SDR and HDR the Colorspace setting on the TV is a unique setting, it doesn't force the same setting on both when you configure it in either one of them.

To prevent stutter on Netflix and (99% of youtube) I've set my Shield to 60Hz as anything else caused a stutter at set intervals. To be clear, this is while the Shield is connected to my soundbar. Your results might be different since the OneConnect box is involved.

Long winded answer, I know. But I suspect this might be of use since I had the same questions and it all started with "bitstream or PCM" 🤡👍

[samoatey]

Spot on answer thankyou!

Got it all going sounding lovely! Finding I'm getting some stutter on prime - haven't checked much on Netflix - I turned off auto colour space thing - which I think has reduced it.

But still see it sometimes...

Any ideas? It's so annoying!

[samoatey]

I'm also unsure if there is a audio sync issue with the MU7000 trying to process the audio...

[Janitorus]

Prime acts a little different to other apps, I've noticed. Also, I made a small error. By default the Shields refresh rate is set at 59.940Hz, this should play any 23.976 content without stutter. In practice, I'm not sure it does. 

So I've set my Shield to 60Hz which causes no stutter on Netflix and no stutter on 99% of youtube (50fps videos are weird I think). In Plex I've forced match refresh rate which solves everything for anything you throw at it.

For Prime, you can either try setting the Shield to 23.976Hz (makes menu's sluggish though), I've noticed no interpolation stutter then. Or try the match framerate (beta) feature on the Shield, or one of the related apps to force match framerate. Yes, depending on what type of content you mostly watch, this can be a mess. This is still being improved I think, hopefully it doesn't ruin the experience.

Audio sync and ARC is not perfect to begin with. eARC has auto matching feature I think. Between Netflix, Youtube and Plex (I think even DD+ and TrueHD are different there) it can be anywhere between 100-200ms delay which I need to set on my soundbar, with the Setting on the Shield (audio sync) set to 0ms.  Hopefully your audio comes in before video (not the other way around), so you can fix it by delaying it. I suppose you could also set the delay on your TV, since the OneConnect box is involved but I'm not sure. I've probably set it to 150ms which seems like a good average across all apps with my setup.

All of the above is with Shield connected to soundbar this time around. Let me know how that works out.

[samoatey]

Okay cool,

I'll test the prime and refresh rate situation and see what I can do from there in regards to the stuttering...

The sound issue is that the audio is too late so I can't get it back in sync with the TV.

So I've ordered a HD FURY Arcana. More money! 🤦🏻‍♀️

This takes the shields signal and splits it! It's got super high reviews and is the only thing on the market that will do it so let's hope this solves the audio problem. It will also allow me to send Dolby True HD to the arc too which is a bonus I guess.

[Janitorus]

Looks like a great device. I'm interested in hearing whether it solves all sync issues across the board with any app and codec. It would be great if it made the sync absolutely perfect for all sources and codecs. Let me know 👍