This topic

When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

RichieT — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 16:00:18 GMT

I've had to come here as dealing with BT on the phone is like pulling teeth!

Can anyone tell me when Dolby Atmos was first broadcast on BT Sport?

And what platforms was it available on? ie BTTVBox, BT App, Android TV etc etc

Does the BTTV 4K Box output Dolby Atmos if the match is broadcast in Dolby Atmos, watching on BT Ultimate channel?

If a match is broadcast in Atmos and I'm watching on the 4K box on BT ultimate channel would the 4K box output as Stereo, DD+5.1 or Atmos? Surround is turned on on the 4K Box and TV is set to passthrough. Using a Sonos Arc so I can see on the Sonos app what audio codec is being output. All other channels/apps on my TV work as advertised including Dolby Atmos.

Also when did the BT Pro Box come out?

Is there a way to retrospectively find out what matches in the past were broadcast in Atmos?

A lot of these questions can supposedly be answered on the BT website but what it says and what is happening are two different things, hence all the questions.

I'm being told a load of nonsense on the phone so would be great to get some definitive answers on this.

Cheers

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

RichieT — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 16:02:01 GMT

I can see from this thread that "more" platforms were added around 2020

https://community.bt.com/t5/BT-Sport-on-TV-Online-player-or/Dolby-Atmos-on-BT-Sport-Ultimate-New-platforms/td-p/2116091

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

DarrenDev — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 18:12:51 GMT

The first question I'd have to ask is - why all the questions about the history of Atmos? You can answer most of those questions with a Google search though (2017 on set top box, 2020 in apps).

The 2 most recent boxes support Atmos, and will output Atmos from BT Sport Ultimate if the current programme has it, and if the box is configured in surround sound mode and is connected to suitable equipment.

There's no reliable way to find out retrospectively what was and wasn't in Atmos.

Is there a specific issue you're trying to resolve?

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

RichieT — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 18:40:34 GMT

Hi @DarrenDev

Thanks for your reply.

When you say the most 2 recent boxes, what are those boxes? Is the 4K box one of them?

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

NigelB72 — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 18:44:00 GMT

Yes. The 4K box supports Atmos if it is being broadcast

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

RichieT — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 19:22:01 GMT

@NigelB72 and @DarrenDev

Having looked at some of your posting history, I think I would be right in saying you know what you are talking about.

My reason for asking these questions is because I recently complained that matches that are advertised as being broadcast in Dolby Atmos are not being broadcast in Atmos (or the Atmos signal is not getting to me!)

I have tried to find the answer to this through 4 different calls/chats and eventually complaints including a final resolution complaint adviser calling me this afternoon and insisting that a 4K box does not output Dolby Atmos. I knew this wasn't true and when I implied the caller didn't know what they were talking about I was told in no uncertain terms that I was wrong and would have to purchase (OK it's free but £30 connection, connection for what by the way? I'll be the one plugging it in, I'm sure ZERO happens to warrant the connection fee) a Pro box to enjoy Dolby Atmos. This is the fourth time I've had people upselling me product that I do not need. I put this in my complaint, which I now intend to take to the ombudsman.

I can see on these boards many people complaining that matches are not broadcast in Atmos when they are advertised as being. With nothing pointing to exceptions about the various problems on various platforms. It's only through reading these boards I'm able prove this. When I told my complaint handler I could point to a dozen threads on this forum pointing to similar issues she refused to accept it as proof.

When I told her that ALL early kick off matches on Ultimate are advertised as being broadcast in Atmos she said "..only some matches are broadcast in surround"

This is the reason for all my questions.

I can accept that occasionally their might be broadcast or platform problems but I can't accept being constantly upsold kit I don't need, intentional wrong information and especially by a complaint handler absolutely zero grasp of the product they are dealing with.

Sorry for the rant, but the wasted hours with BT is totally avoidable if people just own their mistakes, something I've NEVER experienced with any member of BT I've had to deal with.

It seems the people on the boards are cut from a different cloth, and I can see a totally different attitude here, its as if you work for a different company 🙂

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

RichieT — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 19:25:06 GMT

I was also told by the complaint handler that Atmos has only been broadccast since the Pro box came out.

That's why I was asking about the date the Pro Box was released.

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

NigelB72 — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 19:45:58 GMT

Naaa Atmos has been around for a while now. Not all games on Ultimate are in Atmos though but most are. Jake and the gang will normally say during the build-up if it is.

Tbh I haven't even got surround sound at home because it's too much hassle sitting in the right spot and it'd probably drive the car bonkers 🤣

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

DarrenDev — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 20:17:19 GMT

A very frustrating situation @RichieT but also one that's very difficult to resolve.

Do you have Netflix? If so, does the Netflix app on your box show Atmos as available? Does your Amp then also show it playing Atmos?

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

RichieT — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 21:23:52 GMT

@DarrenDev

@I don't have Netflix but I do have Amazon Prime and Apple TV+

Amazon Prime on the BT4K Box and on on my LGTV app show the audio codec with the shows info. No show has higher than 5.1, this is confirmed by my Sonos app when playing. My Nvidia Shield playing Amazon Prime shows no audio codec info with the shows but when played (Jack Ryan S02 as a test) the Sonos app displays Dolby Atmos.

Apple TV+ on my LGTV and the Nvidia Shield both show Atmos and this is confirmed when playing the show on the Sonos app.

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

RichieT — Wed, 02 Feb 2022 21:32:02 GMT

I have an HDFury Arcana ( for those that don't know it's the only device that can extract Dolby Atmos Lossless TrueHD from a signal and split it into audio and video) I'll try the BT4K Box with that direct to the Sonos Arc to see if it makes any difference , just to be completely to sure it's not my TV. But the TV is in passthrough mode for the audio so I'm pretty certain it's not that. It's also allowing lossy Dolby Atmos from the Shield and Apple TV so another reason to think it's not the TV, but you never know.

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

RichieT — Thu, 03 Feb 2022 09:30:18 GMT

Just tried running the BT 4K Box directly to the HDFury Arcana. This splits the video and audio. The video goes to the TV and the audio then goes directly to the Sonos Arc. As I suspected it made no difference. Tested on Jack Ryan S02 and still broadcasts in 5.1. (Just wanted to check it didn't make a difference) I'm assuming Amazon are not broadcasting in Atmos at the moment????

I'll wait for a morning kick off match on Ultimate (games that are supposed to be broadcast in Atmos) and try with this setup again.

When I've noticed the games not being broadcast in Atmos I've also tried the BT app on my Nvidia Shield and it wasn't in Atmos on that either, but I can see from reading these threads that there have been some problems with Android TV.

This doesn't excuse BT Sport not broadcasting in Atmos when they state they do here.."All of BT Sport's 52 live Premier League games per season, as well as selected live UEFA Champions League, UEFA Europa League and FA Cup matches, will be supported by Dolby Atmos." on this link https://www.bt.com/sport/features/dolby-atmos-on-bt-sport

Especially when you use their own 4K box (confirms that ANY 4K box outputs Atmos here...https://www.bt.com/help/bt-sport/dolby-atmos-with-bt-sport-ultimate-channel )and receiving the feed via BT smart Hub2 and from BT broadband.

BT can't wriggle out of it by blaming anything else when they supply ALL the kit 🙂

If any of the information I've put here is incorrect, please correct me as all this is coming from the BT website today.

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

DarrenDev — Thu, 03 Feb 2022 10:18:33 GMT

I released an update to the Android TV app on Wednesday night that tells me much more about the device capabilities and also exactly what it's playing. Could you please update and give it a go? From that, I'll at least be able to tell you straight away whether the app will even offer you the Atmos stream.

My schedule doesn't currently list any events in the next 30 days as being Atmos enabled, however they've been making a LOT of last minute decisions with it lately, so I'd expect that to update on Saturday morning. If you could give the Burnley v Watford match on Saturday 6pm a try on your Shield, I'll at least be able to confirm for sure:
1. What your device says it can do
2. What the content says it contains
3. What your device ended up playing

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

RichieT — Thu, 03 Feb 2022 11:01:14 GMT

Thanks @DarrenDev

Don't know if you know but Android TV recently had a major upgrade that managed to brick the Nvidia Shield. Hotfixes have been released and streaming functionality doesn't seem to have been affected but just putting that out there for the sake of completeness when trouble shooting.

So I've turned off auto updates until Nvidia gets a proper fix out. I've just updated the BT Sport app on the Shield as you suggested and I'll keep an eye on the Burnley v Watford match.

I can see in the BT Sport app on the Shield that it has a "device checker" it would be good to put the audio capabilities on that as well. The device checker on my Shield has every box ticked by the way 🙂

I'm also well aware that some 3rd party devices can report wrong codec information occasionally ie: You can set your TV audio settings to Auto and it might not always automatically pick up the changes. I've had no such issues with my TV and I've got the audio settings on both the Shield and the TV set to "passthrough" so the Sonos Arc does all the audio processing. It does this perfectly with everything that I've thrown at it.

I realise some of these questions can be quite technical for a BT employee, especially if they haven't been trained but if they don't know what the customer is talking about it shouldn't be the default setting to try and upsell at every opportunity. The fact the complaint resolutions person still parroted the same line can only leave someone in my position to conclude this is a deliberate sales strategy.

Unfortunately this is the 3rd major screwup since joining BT where I've been told complete nonsense by numerous BT people only to have it confirmed they were all wrong, with absolutely no ownership of the mistakes at any time. 😞

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

DarrenDev — Thu, 03 Feb 2022 12:49:03 GMT

OK, so the good news is that your device is reporting full Atmos support with 8 audio channels. There's no reason that it shouldn't offer you Atmos when an event is broadcast. Let's wait and see what it reports when it actually attempts playback.

There was discussion about adding a test video to the app to allow users to verify Atmos behaviour, but nothing has happened yet unfortunately.
I've just chatted with the team about adding Atmos to the device checker - most platforms don't offer a way of identifying audio channel support which is why it's not there, but Android does so we're going to try to add something soon (subject to business approval).

I'll raise your upsell concerns with the product owner. Atmos support is a very niche product, and with so many thousands of consumer devices out there it's very hard to support. There's no excuse for saying a set top box upgrade is required if you already have a 4K capable model though.

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

RichieT — Thu, 03 Feb 2022 15:00:10 GMT

Thanks @DarrenDev that's good to know were both having the same info from the Shield.

What do you mean by "the product owner"??

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

DarrenDev — Thu, 03 Feb 2022 15:49:04 GMT

Every product or service that we sell in BT has a "product owner" - someone who is ultimately responsible for everything related to it. This includes making sure that the service desk and bt.com are fully up to date with the latest product information. If the service desk are telling you incorrect information, it's either because they're acting on incorrect briefings (which we can correct) or they're relying solely on their memory (unlikely in this case, as you've heard it from more than one person).

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

zulu17 — Thu, 03 Feb 2022 19:57:05 GMT

An observation @DarrenDev which could explain why if Customer Services received a similar brief could believe incorrectly that ATMOS was a new feature launched with the BT Pro Box.

If i look at the original news releases for the BT Pro box

BT unveils BT TV Box Pro

the article wording includes

BT TV Box Pro brings a new range of features to BT TV customers:

4K HDR - up to four times the detail of HD offering vivid, pin-sharp detail
Dolby Atmos - offering the best immersive audio experience
1TB of storage - double the capacity of the previous BT TV box, with up to 600 hours of recordings
4 Tuners - allowing customers to record up to 3 shows and watch a fourth simultaneously
Bluetooth remote - offering a quicker, smoother experience and allows the box to be stored out of sight, if needed

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

RichieT — Fri, 04 Feb 2022 14:56:44 GMT

@zulu17appreciate you are trying to solve the problem of misinformation.

Just feeds my complaint even more that the first selling points is...4KUHD

Exactly what the 4K box does, it's even in the name 🙂

So I'm not buying that as a reason, but do appreciate where your'e coming from.

Re: When Was Dolby Atmos first Broadcast on BT Sport?

DarrenDev — Fri, 04 Feb 2022 15:05:38 GMT

First selling point of the Pro box is 4K HDR. It's the first HDR capable box provided by BT.