On more than one occasion I have watched an entire movie only to discover after finishing the movie that there was in fact an uncompressed lossless sound option (happened last night with deja vu). Sort of annoying. Is there anyway that there can be some autodection by the player so that the movie automatically plays in lossless sound if you have the ability to? Just hope that this tech is available for future movie releases but somehow I doubt that this exists.

Anybody else wish that it could autodetect your setup?

Some of the newer releases default to the PCM track, I noticed that the Avengers DB does this and that The Queen does as well.

Anybody else wish that it could autodetect your setup?

No. I wouldn't want the companies to spend money or time on something that may be impossible. How can the player communicate with your receiver to find out it's capabilities? Is that part of the HDMI specs? It certainly can't with component, analog, or S-Video.

Here's what I do. I look at the back of the case. I then bring up the player's menu to see which audio track is playing. If it isn't what I want, I switch to what I want. Takes all of a few seconds.

While auto detect would be nice, I personally have always gone straight to the menu of any dvd, HD or Blu ray movie to select what I want. Not what the player would want. What if there were two lossless versions on the same disc and it chooses one, but you want the other ? I just find it easier to select it myself.

It might actually be possible with HDMI. There is communication during handshaking, and I believe the "lip sync" feature possible with 1.3 involves exchanging information between components about how long it takes to process audio or video.

The problem, of course, is whether it's in the specs for the format, which it's probably not.

The closest thing we'll have to this is DTS-HD MA and Dolby TrueHD (FBA stream), which have a core lossy track as part of the stream with the lossless version. DTS-HD MA tracks, for instance, should automatically play as lossless when DTS-HD MA decoding becomes a reality, while those without lossless decoders will get the DTS core as we do now.

That is a good point about two lossless tracks though. I would like those Disney animated titles that have separate original and home theater mixes to have both tracks encoded as lossless. (Now that's where lossless compression could really come in handy.)

While autodetect is nice, all you need is a checkmark in the player set up for you to tell it that you can do lossless. The player can then default to the 1st lossless track from then on.

Could be an option in the player, you choose the formats you are able to play, it has a ranking for which is preferred, then the highest ranked format that you can play would be the default.

I also go to the menu 1st as well, just to see what the options are. I rent from BBO, so normally I don't have a case and am not sure if PCM is available or not.

it wasn't in the specs so I don't think it can be at the player level. But that being said, players have persistent storage and I always thought it would be good to use BD-J and persistent storage for studios to standardize for themselves some of these (i.e. the first disk from X you put in will let you "save" the setup and then every X disk will use that setup)

Just check the audio track you want when you start the movie. We've been doing that for 10 years with DVD.

Just check the audio track you want when you start the movie. We've been doing that for 10 years with DVD.

Sure, but we were hoping for something that could automatically do it for us in this next generation. That's what the topic is about.

Of course, part of the problem is that the "best" track isn't always obvious, such as with a remix vs. an original track. What I would want is the ability to select a preferred track so it is automatically selected on later viewings.

I agree with the poster that it would be cool if you could check off your preferences in the hardware and then the movie can default to your settings. Oh well. I guess wishful thinking. I just wish these things were smarter.

When I got my HDMI receiver, I watched 3 BDs thinking I was getting uncompressed sound. I wrongfully assumed that because I set the PS3 to output PCM sound, I was getting uncompressed/lossless audio. Then one day I hit 'display' and noticed I was getting 640kb Dolby Digital...Doh!

After realizing I had to go to the language/setup menu on each disc to switch to uncompressed....the difference is night and day! I've since gone back and watched the three movies I originally saw in DD. I can't believe how much better it sounds. Much more immersive. The electric bolts really crackle in The Prestige.

I parsed quickly through the BD spec today after reading this and I believe it would be possible in the BD-J environment. I'll try to build something to check it out.

I realize this is a BD thread, but this is also possible in the HD-DVD world. That I've already built and tested code for and it works flawlessly.

OK, I have the answer. Yes, it can be done. Good news is that it can be done in both HDMV and BD-J modes. So in theory, any BD movie could incorporate Jason's wish.

Word! Make it happen then. Seriously. I think I did the same thing with the Prestige and Babel. If I was a director of a movie I would want my presentation to be the best it can be.

How would it know which track to select if there are multiple PCM tracks (like with Identity), or PCM and TrueHD? Are the tracks flagged in a certain way?

Another easy way to do this is if part of the FW in the player would allow the user to prioritize audio tracks...ye olde IF, THEN commands.
On the other hand, we have been doing it manually with DVD for 10 years without much chagrine. :o

How would it know which track to select if there are multiple PCM tracks (like with Identity), or PCM and TrueHD? Are the tracks flagged in a certain way?

that is why I think it is better to standardise at least at the studio level. So that in set-up you prioritize what you want

then all they need to do is use that standard in each film and the set up on your player will be used

Personally my taste would be

1) Original PCM (if it is one of the three languages I understand)
2) Original DTS (if it is one of the three languages I understand)
3) Original DD (if it is one of the three languages I understand)
4) English PCM
5) French PCM
6) English DTS
7) French DTS
8) English DD
9) French DD
10) English subtitles
11) French subtitles

I think the issue is that there is no standardization, even if the player can tell what is connected or can be done you can’t be sure what you want. For example if a movie comes out and the Original is in PCM but it is in a language I don’t understand and English is in DD only, knowing I like PCM is not enough.

Though I also think it should be overwriteable without saving it as a default

(for some reason you might want to watch a movie in a particular setting that does not follow the rules for a particular movie or instance)

Could be an option in the player, you choose the formats you are able to play, it has a ranking for which is preferred, then the highest ranked format that you can play would be the default.

I have always wanted this option in a player. It seems so logical. I envision it to work simply when the player loads the disc, it scans the sound tracks and automatically selects the one chosen as the first choice if available in the setup menu. If choice 1 isn't available, it defaults to choice 2 and so on.

I can't believe this feature would be hard to implement.

A common preference I think would be:

1. Uncompressed PCM
2. Dolby TrueHD
3. DTS HD Master Audio
4. Dolby Digital Plus
5. DTS HD
6. DTS
7. Dolby Digital

or something very similar to this.

A common preference I think would be:

what if a disk has PCM but not in a language you would understand. Would you still prefer it?


That is why it becomes mre complicated then that and I don’t think a “pick the best my player/receiver can do” will work.

Subtitles probably aren't necessary in the order, because they are separate from language tracks, and players can be set to automatically display them anyway.

Foreign language films would potentially screw with this. Even if the standard is "English=Track 1," I would still have to manually select the original language track (while others would prefer the English dub).

Then, there are cases where there are multiple tracks that could be lossless and in the same language, like a remix vs. an original track, including Disney's separate original and home theater mixes. I guess they'd go with the "flashier" mix so that would mean the remix would be the default, but some of us would want the original, so it should definitely be able to be overwritten.

In fairness though, a system like this should cover more than 90% of movies for the typical consumer. Actually, as I said above, I would be happy enough with something that could just let you select a track and save it for subsequent viewings. I like to check out the audio menu first anyway to see what tracks the disc has and what I'm about to hear.