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Hello

I'm new to all this so please bear with me.

I have a 2001 Samsung TV and Panasonic Player which happily plays DVDs with a DTS soundtrack and Blu Rays with Atmos through a Sonos Arc. The Player modifies the DTS track to make it acceptable and the TV is designed to cope with Atmos.

By trial and error I have ripped disks with DTS audiotracks and used Handbrake to mixdown to 5.1 channels and played the file from a USB disk and Sonos tells me I am getting 5,1 sound. Good.

But the tv cannot cope with 7.1 Atmos tracks via USB so I tried to downmix to 7.1 channels and the file plays OK but Sonos tells me it is only 5.1

Having read many posts and done lots of Googling, I am beginning to think that the only way I will get true Atmos sound is to buy an Nvidia Shield Pro. A bit expensive and another controller to add to the table-full I have already.

Will an Nvidia Shield work, or is there a better way?

Is the Sonos Arc is connected to the TV via an HDMI cable? Or is it connected via an optical cable?

If it is connected via HDMI, is it plugged into a port that supports ARC (audio return channel) or even better, the newer eARC?

According to the Sonos Arc FAQ, the best way to get Dolby Atmos or Dolby TrueHD support is via an eARC connection. I doubt a TV from 2001 supports eARC.

If using just an ARC connection, you might be able to get Dolby Atmos, but only if it is encoded in a Dolby Digital Plus stream. You can not get Dolby TrueHD, a lossless format that may also have Dolby Atmos (Atmos being the part that adds the height channels to the surround sound mix). Most newer blu-rays and UHDs with Atmos are using a TrueHD base stream with Atmos.

If using an optical cable, you don't get any of the fancy stuff, just the ubiquitous Dolby Digital (AC-3) 5.1 audio.

Thank you for the comments.

The connection from the TV to the Sonos Arc is by eARC - the TV is younger than I said: 2023.

I have the Atmos turned on in the TV settings and playing a blu ray I get Atmos on the speaker according to the Sonos app.

But with a HDD to a USB port on the TV gives no sound if the MKV file has an Atmos audio track and only 5.1 if it has a 7.1 audio track.

If I plug the HDD into a USB on the blu ray drive I randomly get no sound or Atmos - other people have reported this.

So I am left wondering if I need to get the data into the TV via an HDMI connection rather than USB, hence my question about Nvidia shield.

Regards

Ah, then yes, probably. I don't personally have any experience with an Nvidia Shield. Personally, I have an AppleTV 4K plugged into my TV. It will do Dolby Digital Plus up to 7.1 with Dolby Atmos but it won't do Dolby TrueHD with or without Atmos. So, if you're looking to have the lossless TrueHD with Atmos I can tell you the AppleTV 4K is not the device you want.

I'm sure the experience you have plugging a hard drive into the TV is a limit of whatever app is playing those files. I wonder if there's some other app you could put on the TV that would work differently? Again, I have an LG TV, not a Samsung, and all my streaming, movie playing, etc. is done with the AppleTV 4K. So again, I'm pretty much useless on this topic.

Lots of people have an Nvidia Shield. I'm sure someone will chime in with more details.