No stereo upmix for streamed music ASUS fix your drivers!

[john1272]

ROG Strix Z790-F (A step down in audio quality from my $300  2015  Crosshair V Formula-Z it seems.)

When you have 7.1 speakers and pay $500 for a motherboard you expect it to do something as simple as have the Speaker Fill audio enhancement enabled so you can listen to your streamed music and 2 channel video on all your horns.  How do you unhide the option to enable speaker fill in the enhancement tab of the driver settings.  This is a standard and basic feature that any 7.1 sound capable board is supposed to have, hiding it from me is unacceptable.  Even with local mp3 content turning on SS3 upmix sounds horrible its not a simple stereo speaker fill.  This is Windows driver 101 knowledge ASUS come on get with the program.

Speaker Fill - Windows drivers | Microsoft Learn

[Saltgrass]

I will assume you are the same person I spoke to earlier.  So just one easy question.  Do you have a link to any type of streaming audio I could check with my system?

It still could be, because the ability is enabled by default, you do not need a setting for it.  Why your side and rear speakers are not working, I do not know, unless the system thinks your speakers are only stereo.  But I need to test to verify my system's operation using the same source you are using.

I thought the comment in your link regarding music produced with a channel mask, was interesting.

[john1272]

I use both Spotify and Amazon Music to stream music, if you don't have an account you can stream some of the free content to verify https://www.amazon.com/music/free/?_encoding=UTF8&ref_=sv_dmusic_3

With Amazon Music I have tried both using the web player, on multiple browsers, and my preferred method the Amazon Music PC App and Spotify PC App, in neither case can i get sound to play out of the side or rear horns.  I have verified and reverified that the speakers are set to 7.1.  Everything else works its just streamed content that is not providing sound through the side and rear horns.

I did manage to get an mp3 to upmix but the effect was horrid it did not actually provide the widened stereo effect of  speaker fil it was more like someone running around a room with a microphone with horns fading in and out as the mic was moved around.

[Saltgrass]

OK, I am streaming from Amazon and all speakers are producing sound on my 5.1 system.  I thought this was more about Stereo music not playing in all speakers.  I would not think any current streaming music would be limited to 2.0 audio.

You don't have any problems with your internet bandwidth?  I remember seeing a Windows warning about using very high bit rates may cause problems.

[john1272]

I have a 1Gb Fiber so bandwidth couldn't be the issue.  So, your streaming music and getting sound out of all of your speakers, I am not, I am only getting sound out of the front horns?  Based on your screenshot I would also say you have different hardware, different drivers, and possibly a different version of SS3 than I do as you have the SS3 logo in the top left corner were as mine has the ROG logo and a separate SS3 GUI for effects which I can confirm actually none of the effects work when streaming music?

1. What are your settings in SS3?

2. What browser are you using?

3. Are your speakers hooked up via analog or are you connected using the spdif? 

[Saltgrass]

Have you tried turning off room correction or putting the Side and Rear speakers back to 0 dB?

Your driver is the same as mine.  Your outputs are the same except I don't have the side speakers output.

If something only happens when streaming and works normally if you have downloaded media, the something must be wrong with the stream.  Have you tried downloading the same media and play it directly?  Perhaps you have some type of Quality of Service restriction.

You don't appear to have the Main Volume and Impedance Sensing as I have.  This is on the Realtek UI.  I don't really use SS3 except for its mixing capabilities.

[Saltgrass]

I just moved my 5.1 system to the Z790 motherboard.  I have been doing some testing using the online 5.1 testing videos.  It seems, no matter how close or what amplification, I technically do not hear the rear speakers.  They are playing, just at such a low volume they do not balance out the front speakers.

I will be playing probably for some time but I do have an older system, so maybe that is involved.  

[john1272]

It's definitely a driver issue, of that I have no doubt.  I don't care how they fix it or what interface the use they just need to fix it.

[Saltgrass]

My new speakers are coming Monday evening, so I should be back on Tuesday to let you know what happened.

If you think it is a driver issue, why would the system not produce 5.1 or 7.1 sound correctly using something like a audio test video?  I have a 5.1 system on my TV, and it sounds great going through a Receiver.

I might even take this system into the other room and use the Optical output from the computer to the AV Receiver.

[john1272]

Everything works perfectly except for stereo playback on the external 7.1 speakers.  So if you play test sounds or play a 5.1/7.1 media file or game it will playback perfectly, it will even upmix properly.  The sole problem is with stereo audio and playback of 2 channel streamed stereo audio.  None of the SS3 enhancements apply when the audio is streamed such as listening to music using either Edge, Chrome, Firefox or even the Amazon PC App or Spotify.  Moreover, even if you playback a local mp3 audio file in Media Player the Sonic Studio enhancements will work but the UPMIX distorts the music to such a degree it is unlistenable.  Speaker Fill is not upmix, Speaker Fill applies specific algorithms to 2 channel stereo to copy the left and right stereo channels across all the horns with delays in such a way that the stereo audio playback on all 7.1 external speakers is still stereo but it plays back through all the horns in stereo, more akin to a receiver's Wide Stereo Mode its not actually an UPMIX more of a Stereo widening algorithm.

An actual solution would be to have a Speaker Fill toggle (or whatever they want to call it) in the SS3 enhancements right under UPMIX that when selected deselects UPMIX if it is selected, and vice versa, that way a user can never enable both UPMIX and Speaker FIll at the same time, it's that simple.