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Quoting DarklyNoon:

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thx for doing that and also a big thx for telling me about ProjectX, didnt have a tool for DVDs yet !!

For DVDs you can use:

VLC
MediaInfo
ProjectX
PowerDVD (open Media File; writes "Dolby Digital 2.0" if Stereo, "Dolby Digital Surround 2.0" if surround)

They all differentiate between Stereo and Surround, with matching results, no copy-protection-removal software needed.

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Ace, you need to remove the copy protection, then every tool will work for you

Is there any shareware out there that will do this?  AnyDVD is not free.

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Dear Donnie and all the others,

sorry for being the grinch again, but can anybody tell me the advantage of BDInfo? What we have here is what we had before with the mentioned DVD tools: They all only show how the discs are flagged which obviously is suitable to only a limited extent to tell the correct way of playback.

All those wrongly flagged DVDs in the all those years from the beginning on. Why should it be different with Blu-rays now? It is still the problem of feature films that were presented in 4-channel matrixed DOLBY STEREO in cinemas and are flagged now 2.0 stereo and not 2.0 Surround. Even PCM 2.0 may of course contain Surround information.

Or did I misunderstand something? 

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Dear Donnie and all the others,

sorry for being the grinch again, but can anybody tell me the advantage of BDInfo? What we have here is what we had before with the mentioned DVD tools: They all only show how the discs are flagged which obviously is suitable to only a limited extent to tell the correct way of playback.

All those wrongly flagged DVDs in the all those years from the beginning on. Why should it be different with Blu-rays now? It is still the problem of feature films that were presented in 4-channel matrixed DOLBY STEREO in cinemas and are flagged now 2.0 stereo and not 2.0 Surround. Even PCM 2.0 may of course contain Surround information.

Or did I misunderstand something? 

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As for detecting "Surround" tracks, it does this by looking for the relevant bitstream flag being set in the audio tracks. Now, correctly encoded tracks should set the flags properly, but it has been known for them to be incorrectly coded. However, in this situation, our amplifier will also follow the bitstream flag, so you would have to know the flags are incorrect and manually override the amp (for example, a surround encoded track without the surround flag set).

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To clarify, BDInfo will only indicate "Surround" for AC3 (Dolby Digital) audio streams.
It does this by the following piece of code

From TSCodecAC3.cs

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                if (channel_mode == 0x2)
                {
                    dsurmod = buffer.ReadBits(2);
                    if (dsurmod == 0x2)
                    {
                        stream.AudioMode = PSAudioMode.Surround;
                    }
                }

and it indicates it to the user as follows

From TSStream.cs

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                if (ChannelCount == 2)
                {
                    switch (AudioMode)
                    {
                        case PSAudioMode.DualMono:
                            description += " / Dual Mono";
                            break;

                        case PSAudioMode.Surround:
                            description += " / Dolby Surround";
                            break;
                    }
                }

In the first section of code, it checks for the presence of a certain set bit in the stream (a "flag"). In the second, if the number of channels is 2 & the surround flag was detected, it marks it as "Dolby Surround".

It does not do any clever audio analysis: the process for decoding a Dolby Surround encoded audio stream is well known, however it would require some _very_ clever signal processing to determine that the resultant center and/or surround channels actually contained any "useful" information [for our ears].

Is it infallible? No: the audio tracks could be incorrectly marked for Surround, in either case when it really does or doesn't have Surround information.
Is it useful? Yes: it shows how the audio is encoded on the disc, at a "top level". This is the same as seeing what your amp does, etc. [assuming your player/amp/etc. work 100% correctly, and don't make "mistakes"]. For me, that means I can do my checking in front of my computer, and don't need to take over the TV while doing the checks: Family Friendly™ 

A warning:
BDInfo lists the audio tracks in the order that they are encoded in the audio stream (I requested the author include an option not to just sort the audio tracks alphabetically, so check the options first to confirm that setting).
This does not always line up with how the "Playlist" displays the audio streams in a Player: the player can display them "1 3 2 4" instead of "1 2 3 4", or any other different order. So you really do need to check in a player (PowerDVD, etc.) to see how they are presented to the "Viewer", otherwise you will end up with a game of "Ping Pong" 

The way I see it in the rules, we should prioritise audio as follows (lowest priority to highest priority)
1) Take the Audio from the rear cover, as the rules state ["Use the Audio specified on the DVD Cover"]
2) Use a method to check the encoding (without actually listening)
3) Listen and analyse the output audio to determine accurate audio channel information

(2)&(3) both fall under the section "unless you can verify there is a discrepancy between that and the actual Audio included on the disc": the methods are different, but they both determine discrepancies.

Anyone can do (1) [literacy assumed]. Read cover, type it in 
Most people can do (2) (either on their hifi equipment ["your DVD player"], or using computer programs ["DVD-ROM drive"])
A few people can do (3). This requires experience, know-how, equipment, and above all time.

As long as the method of determining the audio is documented in the Contribution Notes ["When contributing accurate, DVD based Audio, include your verification method in your Contribution Notes"], then future contributors and voters can decided if future contributions contains more accurate information.

In my experience, I have seen a lot of mistakes on the Audio Information on the back covers of DVDs, and even Blu-rays (perhaps because there is generally far more audio tracks on Blu-rays, with more format choices). I see value in any method that checks this information against what is listed on the cover.