iTunes only plays through front speakers in 7.1 surround setup

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Level 1

8 points

iTunes only plays through front speakers in 7.1 surround setup

Hi,

I am using a PC with an ASUS STRIX RAID PRO 7.1 sound card.

When I listen to music that I have on my PC all of the speakers are utilised, but when I listen to a song on iTunes it only plays through the front 2 speakers (The songs on my pc are also mp3s). I have gone to preferences and ensured that my kHz and bitrate are the same as on my soundcard software as well as on quicktime, but still only plays through the front speakers.

Are there other settings that i need to change that enables all 7 speakers? The soundcard software is called ASUS Sonic Studio.

Thanks in advance!

null-OTHER, Windows 10

Posted on Jan 19, 2017 9:13 PM

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Answer 1

Andrewdiv699 Author

Level 1

8 points

Jan 20, 2017 9:33 PM in response to cjahn50

Hey cjahn50,

I changed it, restarted iTunes but sound still only plays through the front speakers.

I have attached a pic of the sound card software interface and preferences tab of iTunes. Hopefully this can help?

And in the next pic you can see in the tp left corner of the interface that only the front 2 speakers were utilized.

Hope this can help.

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Answer 2

Andrewdiv699 Author

Level 1

8 points

Jan 22, 2017 2:08 AM in response to cjahn50

Yes, the setting on the soundcard software is called Upmix (in the pic you can see it is selected). Before I turned it on the music on my pc also only played through the front speakers. That's why I found it weird that iTunes continues to play only through the front speakers even after Upmix was activated.

The Virtual surround only applies for the headphone jack which is a single output. But still tried it and also didn't do anything.

I went into control panel to check if Speaker fill was activated but under the speaker properties window I don't have a Enhancements tab. I've added a pic (also under the levels and advanced tab there is nothing with regards to speaker fill).

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Answer 3

cjahn50

Level 4

2,083 points

Jan 20, 2017 8:09 AM in response to Andrewdiv699

Go to Edit > Preferences > Playback and set Play Audio Using to Direct Sound. See if this fixes it for you.

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Answer 4

cjahn50

Level 4

2,083 points

Jan 21, 2017 9:09 AM in response to Andrewdiv699

In the past, there was an option for your speaker configuration in Windows called Speaker Fill. If you have it it will be under Control Panel > Sound > click your speakers > Properties > Enhancements. The idea was that since music is typically 2 channel stereo, Speaker Fill would 'simulate' 5.1/7.1 surround. You might want to check and see if you have that option and select it. Or, if your sound card app has a similar option try it. Digging through a web search, it appears your app has a setting for virtual surround. If you can find it, try that.

In the old Realtek control panel, they had a similar option because their drivers trumped the native Windows sound drivers/options.

And lastly, in older versions of iTunes, speaker settings were ulitmately controlled by Quicktime. Since later versions of iTunes no longer require or rely on Quicktime, changing settings there shouldn't impact iTunes.

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Answer 5

cjahn50

Level 4

2,083 points

Jan 22, 2017 8:59 AM in response to Andrewdiv699

Not having an Enhancements tab is because your sound card drivers doesn't provide for one. I'm using on-board IDT audio and I don't have one either.

In older, Quicktime dependent versions of iTunes, in order to get sound from all your speakers, you had to set Quicktime up to provide the sound. So you if you have Quicktime installed, you might want to make sure that Quicktime is set for 5.1, Direct sound.

Beyond this, I'm pretty much out of ideas. I just installed a new Dell for my wife and she's playing through all 5 of her speakers using only iTunes.

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