dolby digital

[donrsd]

well i have my setup simple for the kids (tv only) and for me when i want to blast it (optical ran to my receiver)

essentially i run the hdmi directly from my apple tv 2 to my plasma.
i get video & sound so the kids do NOT need the receiver on when they watch the apple tv.

when i want to crank it or watch a flick with the woman, i have a secondary optical cable running from my apple tv to my receiver (audio only, video goes to tv via hdmi and i turn the tv volume down to 0)

my question is this.
on my receiver (pioneer elite sc-27), i have an automatic level control. basically the car blasts to whispers all come thru at the same volume with no spikes in volume for car blasts or loud scenes(have to turn volume down) and no whispers too low (have to turn it up)volume
on my tv, obiviously i dont have this feature.

even if i turn dolby digital ON, OFF or AUTO on the apple tv settings.....the volume when connected hdmi to the tv (no receiver) always fluctuates.
needless to say, it gets me aggigated when the kids are watching a movie/cartoon and the volume gets LOUD for some scenes and other scenes they cant hear a thing.

when using media (jailbroken) to play from my NAS to the tv......no volume spikes.
when using xbmc......no volume spikes.
only when playing digital copies via icloud does this volume flucuation happen.

is there any fix for this?

 

[JAT]

Does your receiver handle these same shows well, using the dynamic limiter? It isn't clear if you've tried that or not. It's probably that Apple's base software doesn't include this function at all. And others do. Maybe the kids need to learn a bit more complexity. (I'm assuming yours are pretty young from the context, but they'll get it fast)

The authors can build in compatibility for ALC/DRC. It may be these particular shows arent done well (Apple's copies), too.