hmm thanx tried -identity, why I have 2 audio channels on ac3 (a52) , which has to be 6 channels... ID_AUDIO_CODEC=a52 ID_AUDIO_FORMAT=8192 ID_AUDIO_BITRATE=448000 ID_AUDIO_RATE=48000 ID_AUDIO_NCH=2 ID_LENGTH=3445 > "mplayer -identify -frames 0 somefile" will deliver easily parseable > info about the file, both about audio and video will try pan= later