Multichannel audio on optical output

[SGi]

Hi guys,

I am looking for a solution to play back Dolby multichannel (further called MC) sound from a media server using optical cable to a that will do the multichannel decoding. While it actually is a WINGS RX installation in that case, this matter I think is also a Windows/driver issue rather than server or software-related.

I have also already asked the AVS support team, but maybe to one of you this problem sounds familiar and he or she has a solution:


Situation:
The MC sound is originally encoded with the video (similar to Dolby Atmos demo clip, for example) and plays fine on the system as expected including all decoding when using the VLC Player. The audio signal uses an optical output to travel to the amp system and is decoded there.

Problem:
Since audio has to be treated separately in that installation, the sound is extracted to individual mono tracks or stereo pairs beforehand and played back in sync with the video file. No problem up to here. Unfortunately, to assign these separate tracks to the SAME optical output that feeds the Dolby amp system is not possible without losing the channel information, so all I get is a plain mixed-down stereo sum on the optical output, when e.g. assigning the same optical out to multiple the stereo outputs in the Extras-Options. The stereo tracks that were extracted do not have their channel information anymore.

Question:
I need something to route tracks to MC channels on the optical output. Has anyone explored any driver (or external FW/USB unit with such a driver) that allows to assign single tracks pairs in the media server software to single MC channels on the optical out? There is no analog ins to that Dolby amp system, so going optical -> analog decoder or using an analog sound card and then e.g. using 5 copper wires to get into the amp is not an option.

If anyone has experienced - or better solved - such a problem, I would be glad to read your reply or pm.

Thanks !

Sven