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Logic, ProTools, Dolby Atmos renderer all play 7.1.4 well in my room. But Apple Music only seems to play 5.1 if “Dolby Atmos: Automatic” is selected and 2.0 if “Always On” is selected.
I’ve gone into Audio-MIDI setup and configured 7.1.4 there with all the right output, but Apple Music is maximum 5.1.
And solutions?
It's unnerving when we get these type of responses from Apple. I've tried support at Dolby and they are clueless that this is happening and say Apple Music should not be folding down 7.1.4 to 5.1. Then these responses from Apple acting as if we all are listening on airpods is annoying. If Apple is going to push Immersive / Atmos audio, then get it straight when answering questions about it. Those of us who mix Atmos in professional environments and have spent 10s of thousands in Atmos rigs to produce and mix for Apple Music Immersive are getting real tired of this constant 5.1 fold downs. We are trying to showcase to clients songs they are familiar with and what that same track can be in Atmos / Immersive, then we get this semi lame 5.1 surround mix on our 7.1.4 and it's underwhelming and ridiculous that we keep getting answers assuming we are all wearing dumb earbuds.
I'm running a Lynx Aurora N 32 thunderbolt and it won't matter even when the NControl update is released for Atmos and SPQ. I've spoken to techs at Dolby and if Apple won't fix the decoding that happens from Apple Music to whatever audio interface or output is assigned to it, then our Lynx interface will still behave wrong. So far in testing Loopback works and Ginger Audio Sphere works to pass 7.1.4 through to Lynx or whatever audio interface is attached to stream Apple Music playback in Atmos or Apple TV.
Oh great to know we've got the same interface, I'll report back if I find anything out but I guess it'll have to be Loopback for now. I've got a ticket open with Lynx also to work through it with them. I was thinking basically the same thing you are in terms of it being solely an Apple problem, except that I've noticed on various tutorials online that some people have more Dolby Atmos options in the AudioMIDI app than I do. I only see 5.1.2 or 7.1.4 under the Atmos section (not 5.1.4, 7.1.2, 9.1.4 etc) whereas I've seen ppl with difference sound interfaces have many more options. This made me wonder if there is actually something more going on with the drivers, where the interface driver is reporting capabilities to CoreAudio. If that's the case, it is also possible that they are not reporting properly to enable Atmos I suppose.
BTW I also have an Eventide H9000 that I normally only use via AES/EB, but is actually also a USB sound interface. I remembered it reports as 16/16 to the Mac so I decided to give it a try as the sound interface to see if the Mac would output Atmos properly and sure enough it seems to. I say seems to because all I did was check that when it is in 5.1.2 mode it outputs sound to all 8 channels when playing an Atmos movie in the TV app or Atmos music in the Music app. With the Lynx I only ever get the 6 channels (5.1) output no matter what the Atmos setting is.
True to the threads all over the internet, it seems like if your sound interface has more than 16 channels the Mac has a serious bug. Apple you need to fix this! It makes referencing commercial Atmos material on the same system we're mixing on (showing clients etc) super difficult.
I've noticed that since I've updated to MacOS 13.5, I've lost the ability to configure a 9.1.6 Atmos speaker set up in AMS. This was working fine in previous versions of Ventura.
Can anyone else confirm this?
Oh that's interesting, so on MacOS 13.5 I only see two options under the Atmos section, "5.1.2" and "7.1.4", is that the same for you Kenny? Unfortunately I don't remember what it was previously as I had previously run everything through my AV receiver but I'm changing my setup and want to reference on the same Genelec setup as I mix on.
So now I'm interested in what is in the unreleased version (14), I might have to install it on my wife's Macbook Air to check out whether the > 16 channels bug is fixed and also if the extra Atmos configs are back. Or does anyone else already have a Mac with that installed to check? I definitely don't want to go backwards in MacOS versions if possible.
I'm running Ventura 13.3.1 and I indeed have the option for 9.1.6 ... the setup works great. White noise test from AudioMIDISetup confirms that I'm all setup properly ...so half the battle is won, BUT some songs that I know use these extra channels (7.1.4 vs 9.1.6) in their mixes do NOT playback with a full 9.1.6 render of the songs through the Apple Music app. (I know this because I also have an Emotiva RMC-1 setup for 9.1.6 playback from Apple Music on via AppleTV4k... and this works GREAT!!!) It's as though the Atmos Playback Renderer in the current Apple Music app tops out at a 7.1.4 output. C'mon Apple, fix this!!!!
@rizman5150 what IO interface are you using, how many input and output channels does it have? I'd love to have a working 7.1.4 output setup for now, but it's broken because of the >16 channel bug that appears to be in MacOS 13.5 at least for now
I tested my apollo 16x with OSX sonoma 14.0 but situation is the same, which is no 9.1.6 option provided. Does anyone test with any other audio device ? Or does anyone have information about the OSX sonoma version update supposed to appear in the next apple event in regarding to this topic ?
Found this article because I'm still having issues playing Dolby Atmos music with Apple Music on my interface. I'm on Monterey 12.7.2 and previously I could get it to play 5.1 but now when I enable Dolby Atmos in the preferences it just skips every song I try to play until I turn Dolby Atmos off. I have a 7.1.4 room and have tried the Ground Control workaround and the loopback workaround but I still only get all of the songs skipping until there's nothing left in the playlist and no audio playback until I turn off Dolby Atmos in the settings. This is super frustrating that I can no longer sample spatial audio tracks in my studio. I'm experiencing a similar result when I try to use the Apple TV app on my computer, if the show or film says Dolby Atmos in the info the app just hangs up until it eventually crashes making yet another Apple service useless on my computer.
Thank you! Brilliant!
Absolutely!!🤦🏻♂️
Yeah I only see 5.1.2 and 7.1.4 now in 13.5. AFAIK Ventura introduced 9.1.6 support but it seems to be broken in MacOS 13.5
Apple Music plays 5.1 instead of Atmos
