Dan1boy

Hey Guys...new to the BD format and loving it. I have a Panasonic 5.1 receiver and surround speakers which I've enjoyed for years. No HDMI going to it however.

We watched Incredible Hulk and were blown away with the incredible sound. We watched Serenity the other night in DTS and were blown away as well.

Last night, we watched Planet Terror in "True HD" Dolby and I had to crank it up to even catch the dialogue let alone enjoy any explosions and gunfire effects...and even those were weak..all coming from my center (or so it seemed..) Same thing trying to enjoy Dark Knight.

Please educate me on why studios release BD titles in different audio formats...why aren't all DTS? What should I look for before purchasing?

GenPion

Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD Master Audio, and Uncompressed PCM seem to be close to the same quality to me. I think it just depends on the movie/disc you are watching. Based on other stuff I've read they are supposed to be identical in what they can accomplish audio wise. I suspect the reason why your audio sounds better with DTS is because you are only listening to regular surround sound. Once you upgrade to an HDMI capable receiver with the capability of feeding you High Definition sound then things will sound noticeably improved. You might need to upgrade your speakers as well. It just depends on what you have. If your using HTIB speakers they won't be quite as effective as you would probably like them to be. That is a situation that I encountered not too long ago.

What you really need to look for in discs is seeing if they have HD audio. If they do not list Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD Master Audio, and Uncompressed PCM as audio options then you might not find the Blu-ray's worth purchasing. Once you've got the audio equipment to hear the difference you will understand why this is so important.

I hope I've managed to help you out a bit. And by the way, The Dark Knight sounded awesome with it's lossless Dolby TrueHD. Perhaps that is just my opinion, but I think that is one of the most action-packed and effective mixes I've had the pleasure of hearing.

XavierMike

GenPion is pretty spot on, but it is also worth noting that unless you use HDMI your player is only outputting the "lossy" core of the HD sound. So, if you select TrueHD but are using only optical then you are only getting the Dolby Digital core. Optical and coaxial do not have enough bandwidth to transmit the new lossless codecs.

Gizmo

Every Universal and Fox title has a DTS MA Track.
Every Disney release has a TrueHD/PCM/DTS MA Track
Almost every Sony release has a PCM/TrueHD Track
Warner....well, look at those.

Mr. Salty

You don't say what Blu-ray player you're using or how it's connected to the receiver. My concern would be how your settings are configured. That could be causing your problem.

SoSpacey

It sounds like your receiver doesn't support the new HD-Audio formats at all. So ithink on all of those movies you were trying to play HD-Audio but weren;t really getting it.

i can;t explain why some sounded good and others didnt. If I had to guess I would say that you chose compressed DTS on thoese first movies, which your receiver supports, OR your player/receiver made the appropriate changes but on Planet Terror your player was sending out a signal (TrueHD) that your receiver couldnt do anything with and all you were getting was a mix your receiver couldnt handle.

Go insert that disk again...go to audio options on the disk and change it to Dolby Digital. Try that and see what it sounds like.

HD-Audio will never be on option with your current set-up and you need to make the appropriate changes each and every time.

Dan1boy

You guys are absolutely terrific. All the responses make perfect sense and I now realize I may need a new receiver with HDMI capabilities.

Salty, I picked up the Sony BDP S350...the one on sale from Black Friday.

Two final questions, I promise!

1.) Can you recommend an inexpensive, yet effective 5.1 receiver with HDMI input? I've got wood floors in my condo but neighbors downstairs so I'm not looking for rattle-the-windows sound - just enough to impress.

2.) Considering my Panasonic surround speakers consist of a center, bass woofer, two rears and two uprights (4') - all within 7 feet of the viewing couch, do I need to replace these as well or can I just switch out receiver?

Yavin

Don't want to derail the thread here, but I have a related question. I have a temporary sound setup (I say temporary because right now I don't have the space for a full surround system setup but still wanted to have better sound than my TV's built-in speakers) where I have my PS3, HD-A3, and HD-PVR connected via HDMI to my TV. Then, from the TV's regular audio out (red and white) connectors, I have a simple 2.1 speaker system connected.

From what I understand (for the PS3 and I hope the HD-A3 as well), the players are doing the decoding of the soundtracks and sending this information via HDMI to the TV, but does the TV do any "editing" of this sound information (i.e., decoding of it's own to redistribute the 5.1 channels of sound to 2.1 channels of sound) when outputting it via 2.1? Or am I straight-forward just getting the sound meant for the front speakers plus subwoofer?

SoSpacey

Aren't we though?

A decent inexpensive receiver that is usually recommended around here is the Onkyo 605/606. Anything from Onkyo/Yamaha/Denon/HK is a good bet as long as it has the features you need.

While we are terrific we are also honest. Your speakers stink, relatively speaking. Will you hear a difference? Sure. If the $300 won't break your bank, buy the receiver for now and see for yourself. Just start budgeting for better speakers. No one says you need a 10k audio system, but Panasonic isnt known for their speakers and a Home Theater in a Box is not much to rely on good sound.

chipmac

Even after getting a receiver that supports HD audio each disc is mastered differently where you still need to select the HD audio from the setup menu or it defaults to standard DD. The Dark Knight is like this and some people who thought they were getting DD TrueHD were only hearing DD because they never changed it.

SoSpacey

chipmac

You're right I should have said it might default to DD but I just make it a practice now of always going to the setup menu to select the hires audio track because I can't trust the authors of the disc to make it the default.

beebs

What player are you using?

-beebs

SoSpacey

davidh777

While I don't go to the menu, I do more or less the same thing: instantly check the PS3 display when the movie starts playing to see what kind of audio I'm getting and whether I need to switch over. I was switching back and forth on one recent disc (Prince Caspian?) and thought that would be a good way to show people what the difference sounds like.