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I guess the only way to resolve this in a flexible and consistent way is to extend the preferred language system

Wouldn't it be natural to remember the channel selection per channel? It will probably be a long preference list for dvb-s setups, but that's what we have computers for..

It would, but on the other hand not every movie on particular channels has DD/DTS tracks. So you'd still end up manually switching sound tracks?

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There should be an option in DVB specs: Original movie soundtrack (If movie is French, then soundtrack would be in French, in English ....). Generally I don't want to hear dubbed soundtracks. Only actors whose face is on the picture and name is on the end titles is qualified to speak to me, not some bad dubbing actor. Generally if movie is in French, I can follow the movie from subtitles (ttxt or dvb). If it doesn't have subtitles, perhaps then dubbed soundtrack is possible.

Now for original soundtrack I'd always want best possible soundtrack: DTS,DD,MPEG2. And to mix things up, if DTS is 2.0 (if some format is standardized?) and DD is 5.1, I'd probably want DD5.1. Or if there is DD2.0 and DD5.1 then 5.1. But some ppl has different preferences (only 2.0 equipment for example).

So _my_ chain would probably be: DTS5.1, DD5.1, DTS2.0, DD2.0, MPEG2

Then the audio language: - original, english, finnish, swedish

So somekind of matrix combining subtitling languages, preferred languages what user can understand, info if subtitles are burned into picture etc.

But it is a shame that providers use DVB languages incorrectly. Finnish spoken movie with DD5.1 in finnish is on English-marked audio track, and mpeg2 audio on finnish audio track.

In Finland national broadcast company uses "dut" (Dutch) as speech-synth spoken subtitling audio track. So people with reading problems can hear what subtitles are saying, and with original soundtrack faded on the background.