Question Denon AVR-X2600H. All audio coming out of all speakers from Sky Q box

nickfiend

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I've asked this question a while ago but never got to the bottom of it.
I have a Denon AVR-X2600H amp in my lounge and have now swapped the front L&R speakers over with the ones from my cinema room.

It's setup for bi-amping and the speakers are all connected correctly.

I've run the full audyseey setup, twice.

The amp is connected to my Sky Q box.

When leaving it set to Dolby Digital, on HD channels, I can hear all speech through the rear speakers, which clearly shouldn't be the case.

Basically, the front left, right, centre and both rear speakers are all playing all audio at the same level.

If I set it to DTS Neutral, it's better but still not great. However, if I watch a film on Sky Cinema, all is fine (in DD), as it is with watching anything from Netflix or my Amazon fire box.

Sad as it maybe, I'm currently watching Countdown on Channel 4. Via the Sky Q box and it's an HD channel.

If I leave the amp on DD, I can hear their voices from all 5 speakers. If I switch to DTS Neural, it's improved but still more "surroundy" than it should be.

I never had this problem with my previous Pioneer, Onkyo or Yamaha amps over the years.

I've used my digital sound meter and the rears aren't set too loud, and I don't want to turn the settings down on them as it will affect watching films.

Where am I going wrong? It's doing my nut in and I have to keep changing the audio output depending on what I'm watching
 
I think you might be applying the all channel stereo upmixer. If you press the movie button continuously you should be able to cycle through the different upmixers. Or, if you select straight / direct, you won't apply any upmixing at all.
 
The programme has just a stereo audio output. Neural will upmix to use all channels and can, at times, be quite heavy in surround use. As Rambles has said you could be applying all channel stereo to the mix and the surround will play the same output as the fronts.
 
Or set to ‘auto’ and it will decode according to source


Auto would still apply upmixing to non PCM 2 channel sources. It simply determines what type of upmixing to apply dependant upon the format being detected.

This mode detects the type of input digital signal, and automatically selects the corresponding mode for playback.

Perform stereo playback when the input signal is PCM. When the input signal is Dolby Digital or DTS, the music is played back according to the respective channel number.
 
I think you might be applying the all channel stereo upmixer. If you press the movie button continuously you should be able to cycle through the different upmixers. Or, if you select straight / direct, you won't apply any upmixing at all.
Hi, thanks for your reply.
I've spent a while cycling through the different options on the movie button (as I did with the previous speakers)
There's-
-Stereo
-Dolby Audio - Dolby Digital
-Dolby Audio - Digital Surround
- DTS Neural X
- Multi Ch Stereo
- Mono Movie
- Virtual

I would expect to leave it in "Dolby Audio - Dolby Digital" mode for everything, but that just puts voices through the back channels. It should be a case of voices through the centre speaker; front l&r audio through them and only rear channels for surround sound. i.e. not hearing vocals from all 5 speakers in blooming Countdown! :)
 
If hearing speech via the rear speakers then the mode being applied is more than likely the multichannel stereo mode. monoaural dialogue would ordinarilly still only be portrayed by the centre speaker in a surround sound setup if applying Neural:X or Dolby Surround upmixing. The same would be true of older upmixing processing such as Neo or Pro Logic. You'd not ordinarily get continious dialogue via the surrounds if using any of these upmixing modes, but are more than likely to experience this if using a mode such as the multichannel stereo mode. This mode basically mirrors the front left and right channels using the surround speakers.

Discrete Dolby Digital 5.1 encoded sources wouldn't portray dialogue via the surrounds. If you are getting dialogue being continuously portrayed via the surround while the receiver isn't applying any upmixing then there's an issue with the content being broadcast. SKY have a bad track record when it comes to the audio being corrupted.

Countdown is broadcast in stereo using 2 channel Dolby Digital via Channel 4's HD channel. If getting audio via the surrounds then you are applying some form of upmixing to it.
 
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For TV viewing, if you leave the receiver set to the Dolby Surround mode then this should result in all 2 channel audio being upmixed to utilise all of the speakers present in your setup, but wouldn't resukt in the dialogue being portrayed via the surrounds. This or Neural:X is what most people leave their AV receivers set to for TV sources.
 
Hi, thanks for your reply.
I've spent a while cycling through the different options on the movie button (as I did with the previous speakers)
There's-
-Stereo
-Dolby Audio - Dolby Digital
-Dolby Audio - Digital Surround
- DTS Neural X
- Multi Ch Stereo
- Mono Movie
- Virtual

I would expect to leave it in "Dolby Audio - Dolby Digital" mode for everything, but that just puts voices through the back channels. It should be a case of voices through the centre speaker; front l&r audio through them and only rear channels for surround sound. i.e. not hearing vocals from all 5 speakers in blooming Countdown! :)
Out of all of those modes, you should only be hearing dialogue from the surrounds in Multi Ch stereo mode. If you are getting main dialogue from the rear channels, something is wrong!

It could be a configuration issue, or it could be a faulty receiver.

Does it happen with all sources?

What does this screen look like for you:

denon.png
 
Have you tried flicking off the Dynamic Volume?
 
Have you tried flicking off the Dynamic Volume?


Dynamic Volume has no ability to upmix and wouldn't result in anything being portrayed via the surrounds that wouldn't have been portrayed by those speakers anyway.
 
Dialogue while not exclusively monoaural or centralised in nature will be in most instances be just that and as such will have the same phase when encoded into 2 channel stereo audio. This results in such dialogue being portrayed centrally by a 2 channel setup. All that happens when applying Dolby Surround or Neural:X upmixing is that anything encoded with the same monoaural phase will be directed to the centre speaker. The only time you'd get voices or dialogue represented via the surrounds is in instances where such audio is not intended to correspond with what is on your TV screen, a football crowd for instance. Dialogue associated with anyone who is central on the screen will always be portrayed via the centre speaker even if using Dolby Surround or Neural:X upmixing.

If anything, if viewing most content that includes a lot of dialogue then only the centre speaker will be audible most of the time even if applying Dolby Surround or Neural:X upmixing. News broadcasts and dicumentaries would be good examples of this and you'd be hard pushed to hear anything via the other speakers during such broadcasts.
 
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This may be way off but I'll mention it anyway. You say your are passive bi-amping, I wonder if you are getting cross-talk. There's little, if any, advantage in passive bi-amping as all you are doing is stealing power from the other connected speakers to drive the fronts. It's the same PSU that is supplying the power. Try a single wire connection and reconfigure the 2600.
 
Out of all of those modes, you should only be hearing dialogue from the surrounds in Multi Ch stereo mode. If you are getting main dialogue from the rear channels, something is wrong!

It could be a configuration issue, or it could be a faulty receiver.

Does it happen with all sources?

What does this screen look like for you:

View attachment 1406323
OK, so when on Channel 4, and BBC1: -
Source - Sky TV
Sound - Dolby Audio - Dolby Surround
Signal - PCM (not sure if that's right!)
Audyssey - MultEQ XT:Off

Input signal shows only FL and FR in blue. Active speakers (all in blue) - SW, FL C, FR, SL, SR
However, vocals coming from the rears.

Interesting you've asked this and I think it shows the issue points towards the way Sky put out their audio signals rather than an issue with the receiver, as when I got onto ITV (or BBC2), it's different -
There are no vocals coming from the rears.

Source - Sky TV
Sound - Dolby Audio - Dolby Digital
Signal - Dolby Audio - DD
Audyssey - MultEQ XT:Off

Input signal still shows only FL and FR in blue. But Active speakers (shown in blue) - SW, FL FR.
I've checked and indeed there is no sound coming from the centre, just the FL and FR's (hadn't noticed this before, but probably due to the FL and FR giving a phantom centre feeling).

Sky One HD is different again, and so on.

When using Nextflix (via the Sky Q), all is perfect. As is Blu-Ray and Amazon Fire TV.

I can't see why the receiver would be changing "modes" between different channels, so it must be a Sky thing i'll have to live with.

Really appreciate yours and others input on this (no pun intended!) and the speed of your responses, though admittedly a few of them went right over my head :)
 
Dialogue while not exclusively monoaural or centralised in nature will be in most instances be just that and as such will have the same phase when encoded into 2 channel stereo audio. This results in such dialogue being portrayed centrally by a 2 channel setup. All that happens when applying Dolby Surround or Neural:X upmixing is that anything encoded with the same monoaural phase will be directed to the centre speaker. The only time you'd get voices or dialogue represented via the surrounds is in instances where such audio is not intended to correspond with what is on your TV screen, a football crowd for instance. Dialogue associated with anyone who is central on the screen will always be portrayed via the centre speaker even if using Dolby Surround or Neural:X upmixing.

If anything, if viewing most content that includes a lot of dialogue then only the centre speaker will be audible most of the time even if applying Dolby Surround or Neural:X upmixing. News broadcasts and dicumentaries would be good examples of this and you'd be hard pushed to hear anything via the other speakers during such broadcasts.
Hi dante01.
I understand and concur with your points.

I started off with a Yamaha DSP E380 pro-logic processor back in 1991 and have had a few upgrades/changes since then (another Denon years ago, Onkyo, another Yamaha, then Pioneer). Whilst I can definitely say I've not got the knowledge you appear to have on how these things work, I guess i'm just saying I'm far from a newbie with using this sort of kit, which is why this issue is really frustrating me.

I've used my sound pressure meter and it showed the rear surrounds were a tad loud, so I've turned them down a bit, but I'm still getting vocals from the rears on some channels, including when there's news on.

I had a Pioneer amp in the lounge until a few months ago (the same one as I have in my Cinema room upstairs) and didn't have any such problems. I only replaced the Pioneer in the lounge as we moved all the AV kit into the fireplace when we mounted the TV above the fireplace, but the Pioneer was far too deep and stuck out too far. The Denon is much less deep, hence the "upgrade".

BD, Fire TV, Netflix via Sky Q and Sky Cinema are all perfect. Without making any changes to the receiver. Odd but frustrating.

It seems like the Denon is just trying to be too clever, unless Sky have made some changes recently.
I've been with Sky for a few years and the Pioneer amp always worked fine, but possibly as it wasn't as clever :)



Cheers,
Nick.
 
OK, so when on Channel 4, and BBC1: -
Source - Sky TV
Sound - Dolby Audio - Dolby Surround
Signal - PCM (not sure if that's right!)
Audyssey - MultEQ XT:Off

Input signal shows only FL and FR in blue. Active speakers (all in blue) - SW, FL C, FR, SL, SR
However, vocals coming from the rears.

Interesting you've asked this and I think it shows the issue points towards the way Sky put out their audio signals rather than an issue with the receiver, as when I got onto ITV (or BBC2), it's different -
There are no vocals coming from the rears.

Source - Sky TV
Sound - Dolby Audio - Dolby Digital
Signal - Dolby Audio - DD
Audyssey - MultEQ XT:Off

Input signal still shows only FL and FR in blue. But Active speakers (shown in blue) - SW, FL FR.
I've checked and indeed there is no sound coming from the centre, just the FL and FR's (hadn't noticed this before, but probably due to the FL and FR giving a phantom centre feeling).

Sky One HD is different again, and so on.

When using Nextflix (via the Sky Q), all is perfect. As is Blu-Ray and Amazon Fire TV.

I can't see why the receiver would be changing "modes" between different channels, so it must be a Sky thing i'll have to live with.

Really appreciate yours and others input on this (no pun intended!) and the speed of your responses, though admittedly a few of them went right over my head :)
Okay, my take from this is that the Sky box is outputting stereo in an odd way that when the Denon matrixes it to upmixing, it gets it wrong and sends vocals to the surround speakers.

The workaround is to not upmix those and stick to stereo, which is what you did when it says Dolby Audio - Dolby Digital.

Your Sky box is outputting PCM, I don't have Sky so I'm not the best person to help with this, but is there another way to have it output sound, check the Sky box audio output settings.
 
Related issue?

 
Okay, my take from this is that the Sky box is outputting stereo in an odd way that when the Denon matrixes it to upmixing, it gets it wrong and sends vocals to the surround speakers.

The workaround is to not upmix those and stick to stereo, which is what you did when it says Dolby Audio - Dolby Digital.

Your Sky box is outputting PCM, I don't have Sky so I'm not the best person to help with this, but is there another way to have it output sound, check the Sky box audio output settings.
That would make sense, though I'm not changing any settings at all when switching between channels.
Sky One HD is fine, BBC1 and some other channels aren't, sky movies and other sources are fine.
I just want the bloody thing to give me vocals from the centre speaker only when it should do (rather than only FR and FL), or at least be consistent when changing channels.
 
This may be way off but I'll mention it anyway. You say your are passive bi-amping, I wonder if you are getting cross-talk. There's little, if any, advantage in passive bi-amping as all you are doing is stealing power from the other connected speakers to drive the fronts. It's the same PSU that is supplying the power. Try a single wire connection and reconfigure the 2600.
Hi gibbsy, I've already tried single wired and reconfiguring. No progress :-(
Appreciate your suggestion though, and I have to confess - there is really no difference in the sound with passive bi-amping. Just using the same QED Silver Anniversary Bi-Wire cables I've had for a while and it seemed a bit daft to have 2 of the connections on each speaker just dangling.
 
Related issue?

Thanks CaptainJames,
I've had a brief look and this may well help. Seems i'm not alone.
Will take a proper look later, much appreciated!
Nick
 
Have you tried flicking off the Dynamic Volume?
I've now turned off Dynamic EQ and Dynamic volume.
Fingers crossed, so far, so good!
Thank you very much :)
 

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