Joshic

I was thinking how Xbox has almost all of its games in DD5.1. And how there are very few games on PS2 that take advantage of dts and/or DPL2.

Anyone know why this is the case? Is it harder to program or implement surround sound on the PS2? Or some other reason?

The Franchise

Most developers didn't have access to the DPL2 and DTS sound libraries for PS2 till very recently which is why you are only seeing more recent games using this. I know the in-game DTS library is very recent in fact. You should see more games utilizing this as time goes on.

jekbrown

DPL2? i thought DPL2 was just a way to simulate 5 speaker surround from a source encoded for less channels (1.0, 2.0, etc). With DD5.1 out there, why would anyone "encode" a game with DPL2?

at any rate, AFAIK its not any more difficult to use 5.1 on ps2 than it is on da box, though the fran guy may be right about the availability of sound libraries for dts. Personally I have never really found DTS to be all that much better than dd5.1... if games were designed to take advantage of the later, that'd be plenty good enough for me.

j

The Franchise

Actually you can't do true 5.1 on the PS2 in game. Even the DTS is 4 channel. If you listen to Vice City, it doesn't use the center channel. The PS2 can only handle DTS and DPL2 which is, as you noted, simulated Surround sound.

sdcrym

When I think simulated surround sound, I think of some feature that a TV manufacturer puts on their TVs to try to make 2 speakers sound more enveloping.

DPL2 gives very literal surround sound, it's just the signal contains 5 full channels matrixed over 2.

AgtFox

DTS is an interesting situation. First seen in SSX Tricky for the PS2, there has been little to no DTS games since then (NHL 2002 and Vice City are the ones I know of, there may be more). EA figured out how to use "DTS Interactive" (as it is called, since it technically is a 4.1 sound source and not 5.1) and from early reports EA was interested in selling the "secret" (technology) to other game companies. It is obvious that no other game company bit on the offer (EA may have been asking for mucho $$$), but Rockstar with its millions off of GTA3 probably paid for the technology from EA for use in Vice City.

I'm also sure it costs more money to get a system that can encode DPL2 into a game. Many of the high-profile games will have DPL2 in them and probably will have them in the future. Even GameCube games do not all have DPL2 in them...it seems only the higher-profile titles get it there as well. For example, Metroid Prime's sound was done by someone actually within Dolby Laboratories.

jeffdsmith

I know you have your website and all, but were did you read this? I can almost guarantee you this is not the case.

Everyone: Please do yourself a favor and goto dolby.com and read over the uses of the various technologies. It is obviouis that most people still have not grasped what can do what, and how each works. Dolby has a pretty simplified explaination that is correct. READ IT!

Gallant Pig

Um, it's a big website, where can we find this "explaination"?

The Franchise

I think this is what he was talking about.

cubanx

My Onkyo converts all stereo to DPLII.

Has anyone really done a comparision between what the recievers do internally and specifically encoded DPLII sound encode?

karnblack

Hey...doesnt the Xbox have hardware DD5.1 decoding, and all of the surround decoding on the PS2 have to be done in software? Wouldn't software decoding be more processor intensive than having a dedicated chip? Am I even close here?

jekbrown

<gets back from reading dolby.com>

ok, guess I know why you'd encode something for DPL2 now. didnt know you could get discreet surrounds with DPL2 (if u encode it for that)... but at least I was half right in that its a technology mainly intended to simulate surround from sources with fewer channels. At any rate, I'd rather have the Xbox's true 5.1 which most xbx developers dont seem to have tooo much trouble implementing.

j

menaz

DPL2 is not simulated surround sound, it is true surround, except the information of all 5 chanels comes out of 2 channels, but it is real surround. If you try to play a movie/game that is only stereo and not DPL2 in a DPL2 receiver, you will only get sound from the center speaker or in some I believe from the L and R speakers ONLY. Simulated surround is far different than DPL2, simulated is for stereo sources, in that case the receiver takes a guess at what sound frequencies should come out of what speaker, DPL2 knows exactly which speaker to send each channel to.

All this talk about PS2 not being true DTS is not fact. The PS2 does not decode the DTS information, it just sends the RAW binary code of DTS to the receiver via the optic cable to decode. If you are only getting sound out of 4 speakers when you are in DTS mode, it is the receivers fault, not the PS2.

AgtFox

Not my website, I just work for it. Metroid Prime's sound was mixed (the word I forgot to use) by someone in Dolby Laboratories to DPL2. The proof is at IGN on this page in the sound category. The overall sound/music was done by regular Metroid composer Kenji Yamamoto.

Since you are so into people reading about technologies, maybe you should read other things as well. I can understand you are getting tired of the constant sound questions that come up on this board (I am too...I feel like a broken record every 2 months saying the same thing about DTS and Dolby's different systems on videogame consoles). Thing is most people are not interested in the technical aspects of this stuff unfortunately.

jeffdsmith

Agtfox, I read plenty, trust me. When I responded to your post I thought you were saying that Dolby was responsible for the creation of the audio, obviously you did not and you meant the mixing.

My reference to "your site" was not a slander, but an admission that you may have read something I had not because of your experience.

When I said I could "almost guarantee" I was refering to Kenji Yamamoto being the one who "created" the audio, not Dolby.

I hope this makes more sense.

CreatureX

The only reason PS2 developers would add more DTS to their games would be if they had a huge demand for it from the PS2 audience. The fact that there are not that many DTS PS2 games would seem to indicate that the majority of PS2 fans don't really consider DTS all that important to them.

DigIt

I don't want to get into this too much, but this is basically wrong on both counts.

1. DPL2 can create surround sound from a stereo source, just like DPL. At any rate, the assertion that a stereo source will only come out of the center speaker is wrong.

2. There is such a thing as 4.1, and it might not contain any center channel information, so it might only come out of 4 speakers (+subwoofer). GTA:VC employs a four-channel DTS track.

menaz

1. I know I am not wrong because that is how my receiver works, I put it in a stereo input into MY receiver while it is set to DPL2 and I only get sound from the center channel.

2. I never claimed there wasnt such a thing as 4.1, there is 3.1 and 7.1 as well, but then that depends on the DTS track not the ps2, my point was that ps2 is not responsible for how man speakers work or do not work.