5.1 Surround - Windows Sending All Audio Channels to the Three Front Speakers

[drleblanc12]

I have had an Onkyo 5.1 audio receiver hooked up to my PC for years via HDMI with no past issues getting 5.1 audio to properly output. Today I tried to listen to an album mixed for surround and realized my setup was no longer channeling audio correctly.

I've gone through the Windows 10 speaker setup menu to confirm that they're still set for 5.1 Surround, but when I hit 'Test', the tones for all 5 channels individually play through the front speakers (Left, Right, Center), and no audio ever comes out of the rear speakers (though the tones intended from them do play through the three front speakers). The test tone for the bass plays normally. If I switch the Speaker Setup in Windows to just stereo, the stereo audio correctly plays with left audio coming out of front and rear left, etc.

If I go into the menu within the audio receiver, I am able to play test tones confirming that the receiver itself can send test tones to the proper speakers, which makes me confident this is coming from Windows and not my hardware setup.

I'm not sure how to trace this to a root cause as I'm not sure how long ago the setup stopped working correctly. I installed an Nvidia 1080 graphics card in Nov 2017, which is what the audio receiver connects to, but I'm confident the system has worked correctly since then. I have two monitors connected via DisplayPort cable to the same graphics card, though I've disabled their audio in Windows sound manager. I also have a stereo audio-out via digital optical cable that's connected to the motherboard rather than the graphics card (the HDMI surround sound and the optical stereo setup are in different rooms and I flip between them depending on where I am in the house). These DisplayPort and optical cable connections were added about a month ago.

The driver for the graphics card as well as the Nvidia HD Audio Driver are both up to date. Any input on how to get my surround audio channels sorted out would be greatly appreciated and I can provide whatever additional details might be helpful upon request.

 

[Lutfij]

See if the default audio output to the receiver being the Optical output in Windows Sound Manager changes anything. Make sure you're on the latest BIOS update for your motherboard and that you're on the latest audio drivers for your onboard audio chip(assuming you're powering off the onboard chip's optical output and don't own a dedicated sound card).

Well since you've stated it, please state your full system's specs and a pic of how you've connected to the receiver and the speakers.

 

[Lutfij]

MERGED QUESTION
Question from drleblanc12 : "5.1 Surround Audio Sending All Channels to the Three Front Speakers"

I have had an Onkyo 5.1 audio receiver hooked up to my PC for years via HDMI with no past issues getting 5.1 audio to properly output. Today I tried to listen to an album mixed for surround and realized my setup was no longer channeling audio correctly.

I've gone through the Windows 10 speaker setup menu to confirm that they're still set for 5.1 Surround, but when I hit 'Test', the tones for all 5 channels individually play through the front speakers (Left, Right, Center), and no audio ever comes out of the rear speakers (though the tones intended from them do play through the three front speakers). The test tone for the bass plays normally. If I switch the Speaker Setup in Windows to just stereo, the stereo audio correctly plays with left audio coming out of front and rear left, etc.

If I go into the menu within the audio receiver, I am able to play test tones confirming that the receiver itself can send test tones to the proper speakers, which makes me confident this is coming from Windows and not my hardware setup.

I'm not sure how to trace this to a root cause as I'm not sure how long ago the setup stopped working correctly. I installed an Nvidia 1080 graphics card in Nov 2017, which is what the audio receiver connects to, but I'm confident the system has worked correctly since then. I have two monitors connected via DVI to the same graphics card, though I've disabled their audio in Windows sound manager. I also have a stereo audio-out via digital optical cable that's connected to the motherboard rather than the graphics card (the HDMI surround sound and the optical stereo setup are in different rooms and I flip between them depending on where I am in the house). These DVI and optical cable connections were added about a month ago.

The driver for the graphics card as well as the Nvidia HD Audio Driver are both up to date. Any input on how to get my surround audio channels sorted out would be greatly appreciated and I can provide whatever additional details might be helpful upon request.

 

[drleblanc12]

See if the default audio output to the receiver being the Optical output in Windows Sound Manager changes anything. Make sure you're on the latest BIOS update for your motherboard and that you're on the latest audio drivers for your onboard audio chip(assuming you're powering off the onboard chip's optical output and don't own a dedicated sound card).

Well since you've stated it, please state your full system's specs and a pic of how you've connected to the receiver and the speakers.

At work, so I won't be able to post full specs for a bit. Here's a basic diagram of the my audio/video connections to the PC:

The optical output from the motherboard doesn't touch the receiver, I'm sorry if that wasn't clear before.