Dolby Atmos on MacOS

mkt · Dec 16, 2023

sjcorne said:
Or if you don't want to pay for Loopback, Existential Audio's Blackhole will work too

I did not figure out how to use Blackhole but Loopback seems to fix my issue with glitchy aggregate devices in Apple Music.

mkt · Jan 11, 2024

Franck said:
If others can comment my feedback report or open one, that would be awesome, I'm just a lonely voice and tickets get processed when they fix things for many people: Feedback Assistant - No longer a 5.1.4 option in configure speakers in Audio Midi Setup

That link doesn't work for me. I get "Feedback Not Found"

Franck said:
I also found out my 5.1.4 setup in the com.apple.audioSystemSettings.plist, so I should be able to have 5.1.4 by editing this file directly, in case I loose it.

Can you say where com.apple.audioSystemSettings.plist is located and what you put in it to get 5.1.4?

Thanks!

Franck · Jan 12, 2024

mkt said:
That link doesn't work for me. I get "Feedback Not Found"
Can you say where com.apple.audioSystemSettings.plist is located and what you put in it to get 5.1.4?
Thanks!

You will find it in /Library/Preferences/Audio

This is the extract of it that relates to my 5.1.4 setup on my rogueamoeba virtual audio device

For instance the outputs on my card are mapped like this
1->left speaker(1)
2->right speaker(2)
3->subwoofer(5)
4->center speaker(6)
5->surround left speaker(3)
6->surround right speaker(4)
7->height front left(13)
8->height front right(15)
9->height back left(52)
10->height back right(54)

in the developper doc, it shows that the 5.1.4 setup is encoded by this value
kAudioChannelLayoutTag_Atmos_5_1_4 = (195U<<16) | 10
which I think is 12779530 but I could not find this value in the file, so not sure it is important.

Let me know if that works for you.

XML:

<key>device.com.rogueamoeba.Loopback:4FF4210B-DAAF-43B0-9842-7083A1E70138</key>
    <dict>
        <key>global.arrival</key>
        <dict>
            <key>seed</key>
            <integer>292</integer>
            <key>time</key>
            <integer>2113005000000000</integer>
        </dict>
        <key>output.surround</key>
        <dict>
            <key>channel bitmap</key>
            <integer>0</integer>
            <key>channel descriptions</key>
            <array>
                <dict>
                    <key>channel flags</key>
                    <integer>0</integer>
                    <key>channel label</key>
                    <integer>1</integer>
                    <key>coordinates</key>
                    <array>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                    </array>
                </dict>
                <dict>
                    <key>channel flags</key>
                    <integer>0</integer>
                    <key>channel label</key>
                    <integer>2</integer>
                    <key>coordinates</key>
                    <array>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                    </array>
                </dict>
                <dict>
                    <key>channel flags</key>
                    <integer>0</integer>
                    <key>channel label</key>
                    <integer>5</integer>
                    <key>coordinates</key>
                    <array>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                    </array>
                </dict>
                <dict>
                    <key>channel flags</key>
                    <integer>0</integer>
                    <key>channel label</key>
                    <integer>6</integer>
                    <key>coordinates</key>
                    <array>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                    </array>
                </dict>
                <dict>
                    <key>channel flags</key>
                    <integer>0</integer>
                    <key>channel label</key>
                    <integer>4</integer>
                    <key>coordinates</key>
                    <array>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                    </array>
                </dict>
                <dict>
                    <key>channel flags</key>
                    <integer>0</integer>
                    <key>channel label</key>
                    <integer>3</integer>
                    <key>coordinates</key>
                    <array>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                    </array>
                </dict>
                <dict>
                    <key>channel flags</key>
                    <integer>0</integer>
                    <key>channel label</key>
                    <integer>13</integer>
                    <key>coordinates</key>
                    <array>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                    </array>
                </dict>
                <dict>
                    <key>channel flags</key>
                    <integer>0</integer>
                    <key>channel label</key>
                    <integer>15</integer>
                    <key>coordinates</key>
                    <array>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                    </array>
                </dict>
                <dict>
                    <key>channel flags</key>
                    <integer>0</integer>
                    <key>channel label</key>
                    <integer>52</integer>
                    <key>coordinates</key>
                    <array>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                    </array>
                </dict>
                <dict>
                    <key>channel flags</key>
                    <integer>0</integer>
                    <key>channel label</key>
                    <integer>54</integer>
                    <key>coordinates</key>
                    <array>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                    </array>
                </dict>
                <dict>
                    <key>channel flags</key>
                    <integer>0</integer>
                    <key>channel label</key>
                    <integer>-1</integer>
                    <key>coordinates</key>
                    <array>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                        <real>0.0</real>
                    </array>
                </dict>

mkt · Jan 12, 2024

Thanks! Is that portion of XML valid/complete? Or missing something like at the end?

I'm not seeing this part

XML:

                        <key>channel layout tag</key>
                        <integer>0</integer>
                        <key>number channels</key>
                        <integer>10</integer>

Maybe the formatting didn't survive the post. Maybe share the file

Franck · Jan 13, 2024

mkt said:
Thanks! Is that portion of XML valid/complete? Or missing something like at the end?

I'm not seeing this part

XML:

<key>channel layout tag</key> <integer>0</integer> <key>number channels</key> <integer>10</integer>

Maybe the formatting didn't survive the post. Maybe share the file

yes, add this, for me the number of channels is 16, and any channel past number 9 has a channel label of -1

gwlbe · Tuesday at 5:43 AM

What minimum MAC requirements would one need to run Blackhole? I’m a longtime PC user with little knowledge of the MAC world. Ironically, I use the IPhone and IPad since inception. A MAC AIR M3, 8gb, 256 SSD can be had for a grand US.

jimfisheye · Tuesday at 1:36 PM

gwlbe said:
What minimum MAC requirements would one need to run Blackhole? I’m a longtime PC user with little knowledge of the MAC world. Ironically, I use the IPhone and IPad since inception. A MAC AIR M3, 8gb, 256 SSD can be had for a grand US.

Any Mac that can at least Snow Leopard from 2006 or thereabouts. High Sierra (MacOS 10.13) is a good sweet spot currently for access to new and old software. Monterey (MacOS 12) is another decent landing point. I'd avoid the post-Jobs machines from the last few years now when they started soldering the hard drive in.

Monterey will have the newer audio controls and Atmos channel selections. I've written about the lock outs and muting the height channels for media players not whitelisted. The default 'no selection' workaround in Audio MIDI Setup lets you play 12 or 16 channel Atmos mixes in older MacOS back to at least Snow Leopard. I think the Dolby reference player needs High Sierra (10.13) or newer. Might not support newer than Monterey either though.

Monterey is a good newer MacOS build. Catalina is the first to "officially" support Atmos channel layouts. Still avoid Catalina (10.15) and Big Sur (MacOS 11). These were the "brick bug" prone builds. Black screen and firmware bricked after a random restart. Whole logic board replacement. Avoid that! Upgrade straight to Monterey or newer from older builds.

mkt · Tuesday at 3:51 PM

gwlbe said:
What minimum MAC requirements would one need to run Blackhole? I’m a longtime PC user with little knowledge of the MAC world. Ironically, I use the IPhone and IPad since inception. A MAC AIR M3, 8gb, 256 SSD can be had for a grand US.

Not exactly your question but I am using a 5 year-old intel MacBook Pro with Sonoma (14.4.1). No particular complaints but occasionally coreaudiod gets confused and I have to kill it. At some point I started using Loopback (not Blackhole), though in theory Audio MIDI Setup should be enough.

Interestingly (ok not really), Audirvāna plays to 12 channels devices regardless of whether or not they are configured in Audio MIDI Setup. Not my experience with other players.

If you buy from Apple you have 14 days to return for any reason. I used an Air as a loaner while I was getting a new battery and liked it.

jimfisheye · Tuesday at 4:06 PM

Have to try Audirvāna media player then! Sort of settled for VOX for newer OS in the meantime.

I use Loopback too.
The thing you're told not to do: Aggregate device of a virtual device + hardware. Clock sync has to be "virtual". Ticking resync in Audio MIDI setup for Loopback seems more bulletproof than it should be. It just always works.

High Sierra is still my daily driver. I only boot into Monterey on my 2011 Macbook Pro when I need to record off a Digico mixer from the USB/MADI port.

mkt · Tuesday at 4:25 PM

I have other complaints with the new(ish) Audirvāna. And the price of VOX is hard to beat.

gwlbe · Wednesday at 5:44 AM

Thanks all. I’ll continue my research. I would like to backup my ATMOS collection. Streaming is ok but i prefer my own library.

Dolby Atmos on MacOS

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