afalout
Member
Few clues here: Sony Corporation - 360Reality Audio | Developer site
Note the following statement: "Chromecast built-in™ Supports playback of 360 Reality Audio content."
I use my Chromecast HDMI to stream Atmos from tablet to receiver (well... to be more precise, to initiate the stream to the "sink"), no issues whatsoever. I would expect that 360 will do exactly the same. Bitstream to CC, CC bitstream to HDMI, HDMI via I2C to the decoder chip. Done.
In fact, as long as CC can bitstream, and it obviously can, what is encapsulated inside of that bitstream is irrelevant as far as CC is concerned. Plus, what is encapsulated is a MPEG-H bitstream, so not exactly a mystery or something specific to 360RA.
Regarding speakers, both the layout and the number, keep in mind that 360RA is purely object based. Not channel based. Atmos has objects, but it has the "bed" too (which directly mapps to pre-defined specific speakers in specific layaout), so any speakers "missing" in the default bed layout will need to be downmixed. Which implies loss of spatiality, and therefore a "recommended" minimum speakers configuration for half-serious listening. (NB. using the "bed" is not mandatory, but 95% of the content in Atmos does use it, for various reasons). Not so in 360RA, as EVERYTHING is an object and can be mapped (almost) anywhere, even if that "mapping" ends up to be a "phantom" speaker. Which is where spherical nature of the system comes to play...
The object coordinated/positioning in 360 is purely angular (spherical latitude/longitude vs rectangular in Atmos). So while Atmos recommended layout may not be 100% ideal for the reproduction on consumer side, it will work just fine - as long as the 360 decoder is aware of the layout. For instance, textbook 5.0.4 Atmos speaker layout will give you perhaps 95% of spatial perception of textbook 5.0.5 360RA layout - sans the bottom row 3. So you loose maybe 10-20 percent of front wall dimension/impact/depth which is maybe regrettable if you are an enthusiast, but not a deal breaker. "According to me" ™
Setup required or desired for producing audio in 360RA is not what is required or even in most cases desirable, for the consumer. Even for production studio certification, Sony is happy with 5.0.5 plus 3 on front bottom (so speakers 13 total). Which is not exactly unheard of number of speakers. Even first order Ambisonic sphere requires 16. In fact, 360RA is strongly influenced by elements of Ambisonic system/design/principles, and I dont think that the fact that Ambisonic is supported in MPEG-H and the fact that 360RA is using MPEG-H encoding is a coincidence. We may see some more developments in this area soon-ish, just dont tell anyone
Decoder info last updated June 2022 so I would expect them incoming: https://www.analog.com/media/en/dsp-documentation/certificates/decoder-certification-final.pdf
Note the following statement: "Chromecast built-in™ Supports playback of 360 Reality Audio content."
I use my Chromecast HDMI to stream Atmos from tablet to receiver (well... to be more precise, to initiate the stream to the "sink"), no issues whatsoever. I would expect that 360 will do exactly the same. Bitstream to CC, CC bitstream to HDMI, HDMI via I2C to the decoder chip. Done.
In fact, as long as CC can bitstream, and it obviously can, what is encapsulated inside of that bitstream is irrelevant as far as CC is concerned. Plus, what is encapsulated is a MPEG-H bitstream, so not exactly a mystery or something specific to 360RA.
Regarding speakers, both the layout and the number, keep in mind that 360RA is purely object based. Not channel based. Atmos has objects, but it has the "bed" too (which directly mapps to pre-defined specific speakers in specific layaout), so any speakers "missing" in the default bed layout will need to be downmixed. Which implies loss of spatiality, and therefore a "recommended" minimum speakers configuration for half-serious listening. (NB. using the "bed" is not mandatory, but 95% of the content in Atmos does use it, for various reasons). Not so in 360RA, as EVERYTHING is an object and can be mapped (almost) anywhere, even if that "mapping" ends up to be a "phantom" speaker. Which is where spherical nature of the system comes to play...
The object coordinated/positioning in 360 is purely angular (spherical latitude/longitude vs rectangular in Atmos). So while Atmos recommended layout may not be 100% ideal for the reproduction on consumer side, it will work just fine - as long as the 360 decoder is aware of the layout. For instance, textbook 5.0.4 Atmos speaker layout will give you perhaps 95% of spatial perception of textbook 5.0.5 360RA layout - sans the bottom row 3. So you loose maybe 10-20 percent of front wall dimension/impact/depth which is maybe regrettable if you are an enthusiast, but not a deal breaker. "According to me" ™
Setup required or desired for producing audio in 360RA is not what is required or even in most cases desirable, for the consumer. Even for production studio certification, Sony is happy with 5.0.5 plus 3 on front bottom (so speakers 13 total). Which is not exactly unheard of number of speakers. Even first order Ambisonic sphere requires 16. In fact, 360RA is strongly influenced by elements of Ambisonic system/design/principles, and I dont think that the fact that Ambisonic is supported in MPEG-H and the fact that 360RA is using MPEG-H encoding is a coincidence. We may see some more developments in this area soon-ish, just dont tell anyone
Decoder info last updated June 2022 so I would expect them incoming: https://www.analog.com/media/en/dsp-documentation/certificates/decoder-certification-final.pdf
