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

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…

By: Graham Booker

Graham Booker — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 03:15:53 +0000

Reporting bugs only requires a (free) Apple ID. If Apple ignores a requested feature for this long, our only hope is that they pay attention to the volume of requests.

By: Crispin

Crispin — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 02:13:27 +0000

Why does Apple break my heart every time I am about to buy a Mac? They seem to miss the mark when I need to address advance features. Features that just work, without drama, in the Windows hardware/software environment. Even more heartbreaking, since I don’t have an ADC membership I cannot report the issue. Mac Pro purchase, pending. Foiled again.

By: Graham Booker

Graham Booker — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 18:46:12 +0000

Josh,
This is not a support forum, nor will I allow it to be so. Don’t ask for help here! Perhaps you should read the pre-existing documentation and tell Apple to get over their stupidity and do something right for a change.

By: Josh T.

Josh T. — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 17:51:09 +0000

(Let me preface this by saying that I just got all this up and running so the fact that I got the AC3 passing through last night was a major step.)

The problem I’m having now is that the only way that the AC3 comes through in Front Row is if it is the only audio track on the encode. If I encode a file with HB and choose AAC + AC3 it ALWAYS plays the AAC track. I’ve compiled the latest HB and even put track 1 as AC3 passthrough only and then track 2 as AAC hoping that Front Row would automatically go for track 1, no dice still defaults to AAC with no way that I know to switch it.

Obviously I could encode them as AC3 only, but then that only allows them to be played in our living room since no other room we have has Dolby Digital.

Anyone have a solution for this?

By: Josh T.

Josh T. — Sun, 08 Jun 2008 06:06:40 +0000

This worked great, used Pacifist to downgrade to 7.4.1 and all is well…

By: Graham Booker

Graham Booker — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 21:13:17 +0000

Dave,
Except, they’ve already done this with the DVD player for years; so there’s no excuse. They know how to do it, and QT is no different.

By: David Hampson

David Hampson — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 20:11:12 +0000

This is just a thought, but when we are using ac3 passthrough, then all other system sounds need to be diverted and/or blocked. This is very un-Apple™ like. This means that we won’t be alerted to an iCal alarm, iChat request, incoming mail, etc. ATV does not have to worry about these things, so it enabled passthrough.

Apple inc. is very resistant to doing un-Apple like things, we may want to change strategies in getting Apple to open this up.

–Dave