What can give me HBO GO in 5.1

Just announced is Xbox

No Blu-ray players yet. Right now, the list is:
Xbox
Select Samsung Smart TVs
Roku.

Only the Samsung Smart TVs can receive surround sound from HBO GO. You can put your receiver in Dolby PL II mode for the other devices and still get decent sound. Dolby Digital Plus is supposed to come to the Roku and Xbox later on.

Is Xbox 5.1?

If your with Comcast the only thing that will give you 5.1 is your cable box. Comcast only allows HBOGO with pc's and mobile devices.

I am on Verizon FiOS and tried out the HBO GO app on the Xbox 360. I watched "Sucker Punch." While the AVR reported receiving Dolby Digital, the LFE channel was clearly missing. I switched to my Mot 7100-P2 set top box and queued up the movie through VOD and the LFE channel was there. Exact same system and everything, just switching inputs to compare the two. Anyone else have a similar experience? Could it be just the movie was poorly encoded, or is this standard for HBO GO?

I am experiencing the same issue with HBO GO and DD (on the xbox 360) I emailed HBO GO support, no response yet. If you get any updates or fixes please let me know.

The Xbox is always going to output Dolby 5.1 if you have it set to output that, whether the source is DD 5.1 or not. (The Settings->System->Console Settings->Audio->Digital Output settings are "Digital Stereo", "Dolby Digital 5.1" and "Dolby Digital with WMA Pro"--I assume that the final setting is for the tiny number of AVRs which can decode WMA Pro, MS' digital surround sound encoding).

HBO Go announced that DD+ 5.1 was coming at CES in January, but I don't think it's available yet.

EDIT: It looks as though DD+ may already be available, but only on some Samsung televisions. AVS Forum member Ranger One (Gabe Gagliano) wrote the following in this 28 February article in his TechoftheHub.com blog:

You are exactly right. The app does not support surround yet. I tt xbox support a bit ago.

Any update on this? I thought my setup was jacked last night when all I could get out of HBOGo was stereo, didn't realize it only had stereo on Xbox at this time...

No update. It took quite a while for Netflix to get the update so there is no telling when it would happen. I emailed HBOGo team when I posted this (original post) and they never replied. That may be a telling answer b/c HBO is the owner of the app.

Any update on getting dolby digital 5.1 on Xbox 360 for HBO Go?

I would like to know this as well. Googling this doesn't result in many hits other than this thread. My Netflix outputs in 5.1 on Xbox, but not HBO GO. Receiver shows it is, but only 2 of the 7.1 channels output sound (L/R).

I'm curious if HBO is (or will be) sending 5.1 DD over the web.

I've been downright tickled with how good it looks when output over HDMI from my MacBook Pro onto my HDTV. I never believed that streaming would produce such high quality video!

However, despite sending optical audio from the MacBook to my receiver, my receiver reports stereo, not 5.1 DD.

Does anyone know if there's any configuration with a web-based HBO GO app that delivers 5.1?

I'm not aware of any streaming web players with 5.1 sound. Seems to me that someone could write a browser plug-in to support it but AFAIK no one has. Some Dolby Pro Logic matrix surround sound elements may survive in Netflix's audio but on the PC they use an especially low bit rate version of the sound, for unknown reasons.

If you receiver supports it, trying putting it in Dolby PL II mode. It may be able to pull out other channels if they are matrixed in (as michael refers to). The sound quality isn't as good as regular Dolby Digital but it will sound a little more immersive.

Thank you both. I was seeking to understand if I was setting it up incorrectly, or if it simply was not possible. Seems the latter!

Yes, my receiver has some advanced surround modes, such as Dolby Pro Logic II, that I use for non-DD content, and yes, it is better than stereo, but not as good as 5.1 DD.

The hilarious part about this that no one has mentioned is that Samsung TVs will not output 5.1 sound when watching video through an app. So, the HBOGO app being able to provide 5.1 audio to the TV is pointless.

AND, the Xbox program seems to still not support 5.1 audio, so, in the end, I have no way of using HBO GO with 5.1 audio!

So, 2 of the 3 devices that HBO GO supports can't take advantage of the 5.1 audio! What a joke.

There doesn't appear to be digital 5.1 sound available on HBO Go on any device yet, though they announced their plan to add it back in January.

Correction: I just tested again, and the HBOGO app on my Samsung TV will in fact receive 5.1 audio (the individual movies/episodes are labeled with "HD 5.1") and pass it out the optical output to my home theater system. This contradicts what the manual says, which is that the tv till only pass 5.1 audio out of the optical output when viewing the coaxial input. Go figure.

HOORAY!

So, rather than it being something that can't play 5.1 sound from HBO Go, the 2011/2012 Samsung TVs are actually the only devices which can play 5.1 sound from HBO Go--no sign of the capability in the Roku player or the Xbox (i.e., nothing marked as having 5.1 sound as far as I can see).

¡Felicitaciones!

HBO has updated Roku with 5.1 sound.

Yeah, I found that out a few days ago on the Roku forums. I didn't think of this thread. I checked and its still not on the Xbox.

It will be with Xbox, but not now, so just get a Roku.

HBO Go now supports DD+ on Xbox. Enjoy.

I got 5.1 through Airplay from an iPad to an Apple TV