Xbox Series X has audio delay with dolby digital and won't even detect Atmos through TV

Interesting post, thank you for trying and posting your findings.

I've had the audio delay issue for years and tried everything. I had the nu8000 Samsung TV before and recently got the qn90b and the issue is still present.

My set up is, Xbox series x > qn90b > onkyo 676.

If I do 5.1, stereo uncompressed, mono, there's no delay. There is only an audio delay with dolby atmos for home theatre option.

Your suggestion does not work on my end however, because the only way I can set the qn90b to pass-through is if I unselect the dolby atmos option under it, which allows me to change audio output format from auto or pcm, to pass-through but when I do that, the Xbox series x no longer detects my set up as dolby 5.1/7.1/atmls capable and says not supported so I can't even force the Xbox to output atmos.

As for the qn90b audio delay option, it's already at 0, and the delay is very noticeable in shooter games, but especially while watching movie.

Well yes. The problem is constant. Whenever you’re in a game that uses Dolby atmos or even on Netflix through the series x. It needs a software patch to fix it. Delay is present on all Dolby atmos content

Hello AnchelLabena,

We appreciate you for bringing this up to Xbox Forum.

We are sorry to hear that you’re experiencing audio delay when using Dolby Atmos for Home Cinema on your Xbox Series X with LG OLED C2 TV and Samsung Q950T Dolby Atmos soundbar.

We've found similar issues with LG OLED and LG Atmos soundbar (with rear speakers) and used an earc extractor (4k Dolby Atmos compatible) which completely solved the problem. You pass the audio HDMI earc out from the TV through the extractor and into the HDMI in of your sound bar.

Another user, states having delays using the Xbox Series X with Dolby Atmos games and apps such as Youtube and Gears 5 but NOT from the Dolby Atmos app’s demos. The Xbox is connected directly to their LG BX TV via the HDMI 2.1 and using eARC > ARC on their Onkyo TX-NR656. The TV’s apps do not cause this delay using Atmos, and the Dolby App on the Xbox.

We also found an explanation from another that the delay exists because natively, surround audio from a gaming console is in LPCM. To output a bit streaming format (or in this case a proprietary PCM codec like DOLBY MAT 2.0) it has to re-encode the audio real-time which introduces delay. And keep in mind ONLY a very select few games are in Atmos.

It's good to know that connecting the Series X directly to the soundbar works just fine and Atmos content will play as intended with no delay. However, this causes a loss in other features such as VRR, 120 Hz and more due to the soundbar not supporting all HDMI 2.1 features.

We understand that you want to do the setup with the console connected directly to the TV, as should be intended. We hope that the information we provided is helpful.

If you have any other questions or concerns, please let us know.

We will be glad to follow up and help you.

Sincerely,



Moderator

Microsoft Community

I have the same problem with My xbox one x and 950 soundbar. I get audio delay once I enable Dolby atmos via the audio settings on my hdmi, but the soundbar works great with all other devices, cable TV, apple TV 4k. I've literally tried everything and
I'm thinking is has something to do with the Dolby atmos application. I've used optical and other sources and they sound good, obviously not Dolby atmos but they work. I don't think it's my TV or soundbar. I've also replaced the xbox one x to a new xbox one
x and same issue. It has to be a bug in the atmos connection from the speakers to the xbox. It's super frustrating. Not sure what else to do until I new update comes out.

Issue has been reported multiple times by many people as indicated in this and few other threads (reddit, xbox forums, etc). I myself have opened several tickets (currently have one ongoing now) on the issue and yet it still hasn't been resolved. I have also created help tickets with Dolby Access Support, and their responses continue to be that it is a Microsoft issue in how it is outputting Dolby Atmos. Summary of my issues is below:

- Bitstream audio out no longer an option in the HDMI output settings. In the November 2021 update on the Xbox Series X, the audio settings page was changed and unfortunately the option to output bitstream audio was removed. Despite the many issues this has caused, Microsoft still has not fixed the issue. Please bring back the bitstream/lossless output formats instead of forcing PCM only.

- Despite Dolby Atmos being selected as shown in the picture, the Xbox is outputting PCM 'multichannel audio' instead of Atmos (receiver display shown in lower portion of picture). This appears to be causing delays/hiccups in the HDMI handshake process as whatever PCM signal is being sent is not fully correct and the receiver bounces between seeing multichannel audio and dolby atmos until finally settling on multichannel audio. To my earlier comment, being able to pass true bitstream dolby atmos audio to the receiver should eliminate this issue.

- I have the Xbox Series X running to the AVR and then to the TV in order to have access to all the audio formats. When I tried to run the Xbox directly to the TV and then audio over eArc to the receiver, the Xbox will only output PCM Stereo, Dolby Digital or Dolby Atmos. I have tested the TV/receiver and they are able to pass other formats (such as DTS:X) over eArc so it is an Xbox issue of not allowing all the formats to be output (possibly related to bistream vs PCM also?).