Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Why aren't my surrounds and subs working?

I noticed that it still said pcm even though I changed it. I tried restarting it to see if it would make a difference but it didn't. If I goto the audio settings it shows that hdmi raw is selected so I can't explain whats going on there.

I attempted to update the box, it says everything is up to date.

There must be something that I'm missing for this to make any sense.

Maybe I'll try a factory reset on the box and see if that works. I'm running out of ideas

Is there any way to see, via the box's GUI, what the box is outputting as opposed to what it's set to?

A factory reset is a good idea.

What does the Pioneer status read when you change the box to PCM?

You're not going to like this. The specs for audio read:

Support Music Format: MP3/WMA/AAC/WAV/OGG/AC3/DDP/TRUEHD/HD/FLAC/APE

In there you see AC3. AC3 is Dolby Digital. But Amazon and Netflix stream in EAC3. EAC3 is Dolby Digital+.

Since the box doesn't support EAC3, it can only output stereo rather than multi-channel.

I looked but couldn't find what it was actually outputting anywhere.

The status always says pcm regardless of what setting I choose.

I tried factory reset, it didn't work.

These are the specs for my box that is working:
MP3/WMA/AAC/WAV/OGG/AC3/DDP/TrueHD/DTS/DTS/HD/FLAC/APE

They are pretty much the same except the working box has dts.

I had another android box that was brand new in the box, it was supposed to be a gift for my brother in law but I hooked that up to try it and it doesn't work either. It has the identical specs to my box that is working.

I tried hooking up the android box to my other receiver just to 100% rule out my pioneer receiver wasn't somehow preventing the surround on the android box. It's definitely the android box that is the root of the problem.
When I watch a movie in kodi with the working android box you can check the "audio stream" and it says 5.1 or 7.1 channel"
When I check with the android box that isn't working it says "2 channel (default)".
Somehow this android box is stuck in 2 channel audio mode
There are even kodi specific settings for the audio. I changed them to allow 5.1 but it didn't make a difference.
I couldn't get this box to communicate with my Sony receiver so I was forced to hook it up directly to the tv. Don't know if that's a related issue or something all together different.

I am not surprised.

I managed to get surround sound when watching movies with kodi. There was a pass-through and stereo up mix setting that I enabled. It sounded a bit off but I think it's still better than the 2 channel sound it was outputting.
There are no audio settings that I can find anywhere in Netflix or Amazon prime unfortunately.
This is really annoying that it's so difficult to get it to work.
I contacted the person I purchased the android box from, maybe they can give me some answers.
Thanks for all of your help

It may be useful for you to know my Amazon Firestick 4K has been working flawlessly over the last year. I have it plugged into my 8 year-old Onkyo. The Onkyo does all the audio and video processing and fires it out to my not-so-smart nor so Sharp TV and my medley of Axioms.

I've never used or seen a firestick in person. Pretty much everything I read online says an Android box is better than the firestick.
Obviously I will assume that Amazon prime will work without issue, how do kodi and Netflix work on it?

It all depends on how folks define "better". Perhaps an Android box allows you to find more content. I don't know. I can vouch for the plug and play of the Firestick 4K and also the top notch audio and video processing.

I don't use Kodi. Apparently Kodi can be installed on the Firestick.

Netflix, Amazon Prime, YouTube and Spotify are top notch.