Comments on: Where’s real AC3 Passthrough on the Mac?

By: hot videos

hot videos — Thu, 07 Apr 2011 17:42:28 +0000

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By: Chris H

Chris H — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 18:33:28 +0000

I have filed report 8131881 with Apple.

By: Jerome

Jerome — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 00:47:31 +0000

Works dandy in Leopard on my mini. Now getting 5.1 from mkvs through to my Onkyo 807. Thanks a great deal, sir.

By: Graham Booker

Graham Booker — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 17:34:50 +0000

emd,
I don’t know much about the rentals since I’ve never rented anything from iTunes (too expensive). I expect it is easy if the DRM is first broken.

Otherwise, the only solution is to bug Apple about it: http://bugreporter.apple.com

By: emd

emd — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 04:33:21 +0000

Well, Apple enabled HD rentals on the desktop…have we any hope?

By: Nick Vance

Nick Vance — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 00:56:09 +0000

Sebastian: the point is to have one file that plays correctly with AC3 audio on the Mac and the AppleTV. Your solution does not fix that, because when you save it as a .mov you get (A) a second file and (B) that file will have the same problems with digital static as the first (or it would be in surround sound anymore; check your files if you don’t belive me).

My best current solution is to rip your DVD in HandBrake using the default AppleTV settings. This encodes a file with both AAC Dolby Pro Logic II and AC3 Dolby Digital sound. The AC3 Digital track will play correctly on your AppleTV (assuming you have it set up correctly to play digital audo and AC3 passthough) and will play on your Mac once Apple fixes the QuickTime bug (or if you revert to a pre-bug version of QuickTime). In the meantime, your Mac will correctly play the AAC Dolby Pro Logic II track for stereo sound (perhaps enhanced to 4.1 if you have a Pro Logic II decoder on your speakers).

By: Sebastian

Sebastian — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 13:21:54 +0000

OK Nick, than the right solution is to rip my DVDs to .mkv, import it into quicktime and save it to .mov, so it can be played with frontrow w/o problems. At least until that bug (if it is a bug and not a feature ) is fixed. That should work for your AppleTV, too.
If anyone wants to take a look at this: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1627107, that would be helpful.

By: Nick Vance

Nick Vance — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 05:03:07 +0000

Sebastian: the static noise from the .m4v file is the bug we’re talking about. The reason .mkv works is because it’s supported through Perian which doesn’t have the bug. I don’t want to use .mkv for my videos as it’s a poorly supported format on the Mac… and plays terribly on the AppleTV (where I watch most of my movies).

By: Sebastian

Sebastian — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 15:20:46 +0000

Hi all! I am using Leopard with all updates (QT 7.5) and the AC3-Hack works fine (Quicktime and VLC work with AC3 passthrough).
@Graham: I converted one of my DVDs with Handbrake 0.92 one time to m4v and one time to mkv, both times using H.264 for video and AC3-Passthrough for audio. the .mkv works in quicktime, with the .m4v I get static noise instead of sound. Movie Info from Quicktime says for the m4v [AC3, 5.1 (L C R Ls Rs LFE), 48,000kHz] and for the .mkv [AC3, 5.1 (L R C LFE Ls Rs), 48,000kHz]. Does that make a difference or is that the broken code you wrote about?
I can save the .mkv as .mov and that file works without flaws.

By: Rakor

Rakor — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 10:19:06 +0000

Heyho!

Is the new QT doing the AC3-passthrough? I really need to do an update because of iPhone2.0 but I don’t like to get trouble with my AC3 again…