Question EDID override: send 6 audio channels to "stereo" device (Windows 10)

eddielinton

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This all started with me innocently trying to make use of an old AVR (Sony STR-DA1200ES), hooking it up to a projector (InFocus SP8600) and hoping to enjoy surround sound, primarily using a laptop (Lenovo V330-15IKB running Windows 10) as the source.

How naive I was! This is now my third thread on the same project (I have honestly looked for existing threads first!). The first two, if anyone wants some background, are called "HDMI surround-sound system with STR-DA1200ES and projector: is it possible?" and "Will all devices output surround-sound through HDMI? Will an audio extractor preserve all channels?"

Those questions show I'm obviously a beginner here, but some of the responses were enormously helpful. I've solved so many problems thanks to the AVForums community and am already eternally grateful, but I'm not out of the woods yet and I'm more determined than ever not to let this project beat me, even though I'm far out of my depth!

It seems as though the next problem is the title of this thread: convincing my laptop to output 5.1 channels to a device it "believes" to be stereo.

The laptop HDMI-out is connected to the input of an HDMI audio extractor (AV Access 4KCVH2H). From the extractor output I have another HDMI going to the projector and a TOSLINK optical cable going to the AVR.

The extractor EDID is set to 5.1, but since the HDMI endpoint is the stereo projector, Windows is just ignoring the extractor and outputting what the projector tells it it can handle (stereo only).

I have tried various configurations (e.g. running the HDMI through the AVR pass-through as well as the audio extractor) with no success.

I've read up a little bit about EDID override and (although I'm very happy to be corrected) am convinced it's my last hope. I understand that the EDID data comes from the projector's EEPROM and I need to update the .inf file that this creates in Windows, which will override the EEPROM data with the permanent .inf file, once registered correctly in Registry Editor.

My problem is that the .inf file created by the projector when it's connected (audioendpoint.inf) shows no information about audio channels at all. I was hoping for a setting like "AUDIOCHAN: 2", which I would then change to "AUDIOCHAN: 6" and enter that in the registry... but no such luck, of course.

I know it's a bit much to ask someone to hold my hand all the way here, but perhaps some good tutorial pages relevant to me, or some nuggets of wisdom as a starting point? How do I get the .inf file to tell Windows to output the full spectrum of channels when the original .inf doesn't seem to contain any commands one way or the other?

This is getting more and more specialist and I realise that as a total beginner I'm unlikely ever to get there - but I've come so far and would be enormously thankful to anyone helping!
 

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  • Projector driver details for EDID override.pdf
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Ah, my hero! I was secretly hoping you'd weigh in, Joe :)

I'll give that a shot when I get the chance early next week. Once again, thanks a million. I'm going to beat this!

Another possibly interesting nugget directed at anyone reading this for their own benefit, is that I connected an old Xbox 360 exactly the same way (HDMI to audio extractor, then TOSLINK going to AVR/another HDMI going to the projector) and I got genuine 5.1 surround, no problems. It definitely seems that Windows doesn't want to work with older home cinema gear (at least via HDMI). Both sources are Microsoft-driven, but only the far older device (the Xbox) recognises the splitter properly. What would the word be? Not inbuilt obsolescence... retrospective obsoletion by proxy?!
 
Last update on this thread, I think!

I left a detailed solution to most aspects under my separate thread called "Will all devices output surround-sound through HDMI? Will an audio extractor preserve all channels?" but if you don't have time for all that, basically the projector EDID was never the problem... I am an idiot and just hadn't configured my media player software properly!

Some updates specific to my Xbox 360 comments:

Xbox 360 will output Dolby Surround for games and DVDs, but not stuff that you're trying to play from a USB stick (e.g. MP4 films). Even with the latest firmware updates, it can only output stereo audio, no matter the compression format used.

It also will only recognise FAT32-formatted USB drives up to (I think) 32GB. I formatted a 128GB drive using FAT32 (requires third-party software) and it wasn't even recognised as a drive. exFAT and NTFS will also not be recognised at all.

If you try to play a video file with multi-channel audio, the console won't downmix the audio to stereo, it will simply display an error message: "file not compatible" or similar.

In each of my posts I've tried to summarise what I've learned in context of the original question, in the hope I can help someone in future, despite my total incompetence! So here we go:

EDID override: send 6 audio channels to "stereo" device (Windows 10)

I never actually got this far, because it turned out my issue was far simpler (see above, and other thread mentioned at the top of this post).

If you do need to go down the EDID road, the software required is called "EnTech Taiwan Monitor Asset Manager") and it will show you the EDID information for any connected monitor/audio device. You can then edit that information and perform various functions to override the standard information (and hopefully trick the source into outputting all channels, but that's another rabbit hole in itself). I can't give specific advice because I didn't solve my problem this way, but I hope it at least sets someone else down the right path, if they're having similar problems!
 

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