Not around here they don't.

My Sony 5.1 receiver does not have 5.1 inputs. The only way to get a 5.1 signal into it is through either the coax or optical feeds.

My friend's Onkyo receiver is the same way as is my wife's older Pioneer.

I will actually have to ask around and see just how many of my friends who own A/V receivers actually do have 5.1 inputs.

That's fair enough.

A couple of things:

1) My guess is more than 1% of HD player owners have analog inputs or HDMI receivers. But you can prove me wrong with facts.
1) a receiver with HDMI is less than $200 these days.
2) Every receiver I've ever had (Onkyos) have had 5.1 inputs - great for me! (love those anecdotal stories...)
3) Even if you can't enjoy lossless audio (my apologies), that doesn't mean lossless audio shouldn't be more greatly supported by the studios.

Simple!

Are you really going to tell me that you think that only 1% of people who have purchased HD players have HT systems with either analog inputs or HDMI?


...only about 1% of the people even have systems that support lossless...

Wow, you really morphed that one. I mentioned all peolple and you shrunk it down to people with HDM.

Also, to have a system that support lossless you need either:

- a reveiver with 5.1 (or 7.1) analog inputs, a player with 5.1 outputs, and the 5.1 cables.
- a receiver that supports HDMI audio in, a player with HDMI out (they all have that), and a HDMI cable.

So even in your senario, we are down to maybe 10%. After all most people who that those analog 5.1 inputs use the digital input instead. And you can't tell me that a 100,000 PS3 owners have brand new AV receivers that support HDMI audio in.

So let's get back to the topic. Lossless audio - Only a concern for a few consumers. I say true.

What do you say? True or False.

Don't believe what you say is completely correct. Is my understanding that in order to output 1080p@60, the HDM players do: 1080p24 source -> interlace and convert -> 1080i60 -> deinterlace/convert (within the player) and output 1080p60 to the TV. The differentiator, then, is whether the deinterlace process is better done by the player or the TV. It is not until you have a TV that will accept native 1080p24 (so far, most 1080p sets only take in 1080p60) that you eliminate the interlace/deinterlace steps (and get smoother video) - although with film based sources, the interlace/deinterlace process should be transparent.

My (poor?) understanding is that the original HD DVD players did this conversion to output 1080p, but that newer players skip the interlace and convert, then deinterlace and convert process. Can't newer 1080p tvs accept 1080p60?

But I welcome being proved wrong!

I'd say if 10% have compatible hardware, 1-2% probably actually know what the term Lossless means. The other 8-9% wouldn't look at the specs of a movie, wouldn't know which audio track to select and wouldn't not buy a movie because it doesn't specifically list lossless tracks.

So Lossless audio - Only a concern for a few consumers. I say true too.

That is not to say this won't change 5-10 years down the road. But lossless vs. non will have ZERO impact on the format war or the choice of which movies to buy vs. not buy.

That's fair enough.

A couple of things:

1) My guess is more than 1% of HD player owners have analog inputs or HDMI receivers. But you can prove me wrong with facts.
1) a receiver with HDMI is less than $200 these days.
2) Every receiver I've ever had (Onkyos) have had 5.1 inputs - great for me! (love those anecdotal stories...)
3) Even if you can't enjoy lossless audio (my apologies), that doesn't mean lossless audio shouldn't be more greatly supported by the studios.

Simple!

The other question I would think would be how many of the existing HDM players actually have 5.1 analog output?

Considering the percentage of people who even have HD players at all -- what, a couple million? Say 3 million? So MAYBE 1% of people have HD players in the first place -- it's simply more useful to focus on people who have already purchased HD players, since, as others have stated, "the average consumer doesn't care about lossless" or doesn't even have their player hooked to a receiver. I mean, how useful is it to say that there are billions of people in the world who can't use HD media -- not very. Does that make HD media irrelevant? me hopes not!

I don't believe I ever said "lossless is the most important thing in the world and is a concern for most consumers."

Indeed, HD media is also not a concern for most consumers. Does that mean we shouldn't have HD media?

In any case, you've been wandering between what people's system support and what they actually use. Pick one.

Even you have to admit that more than 1% of people's HT systems support lossless audio.

Whether they have the cables or not is a completely different question -- but they certainly can go and buy cables, right?

Considering that almost 1.5 million PS3s were sold, it's possible that 100,000 of those are hooked up to HDMI capable receivers, especially since you can get one for less than $200. I couldn't really guess though since I have no numbers.

Wow, you really morphed that one. I mentioned all peolple and you shrunk it down to people with HDM.

Also, to have a system that support lossless you need either:

- a reveiver with 5.1 (or 7.1) analog inputs, a player with 5.1 outputs, and the 5.1 cables.
- a receiver that supports HDMI audio in, a player with HDMI out (they all have that), and a HDMI cable.

So even in your senario, we are down to maybe 10%. After all most people who that those analog 5.1 inputs use the digital input instead. And you can't tell me that a 100,000 PS3 owners have brand new AV receivers that support HDMI audio in.

So let's get back to the topic. Lossless audio - Only a concern for a few consumers. I say true.

What do you say? True or False.

Considering that almost 1.5 million PS3s were sold, it's possible that 100,000 of those are hooked up to HDMI capable receivers, especially since you can get one for less than $200. I couldn't really guess though since I have no numbers.

Really? That support HDMI audio? I have to check.

BTW, I am glad we agree that Lossless audio only a concerns a few consumers like the topic says.

Also, I have nothing against lossless and have always said that. I just agree with the OP.

Let's try and be a bit more scientific, yeah?

1) We are pulling that 10% number out of the air -- 10% of what segment?
2) Let's focus on those people who have already purchased HD players -- how many of those people have receivers who have analog inputs and HD player with analog outputs or HDMI receiver.
3) We should also focus on those people who have purchased a HD player with the intent to watch movies
4) We all know that HD media is a niche market, driven primarily by HT enthusiasts, at least right now.
5) Generally, these early adopters are more knowledgeable about HT specs than the average consumer -- they can tell the difference between upconverting players, DD, DD+, lossless, etc.
5) some of the people in 5 will care about lossless audio (I'm one!)
6) Some people will get into the HD media game who are clueless about HD media in general - people with lots of disposable income and who don't mind spending it
7) Some of the people in 7 will walk into best buy, talk to some clerk about HD players and media, ask about TrueHD v. DD+, and be told, "Oh, it sounds better. But you may need a new receiver to enjoy it." They'll smile, nod, and happily plop down their cash or plastic and get both.
8) The kind of people who are so blissfully ignorant of lossless audio, and don't want to spend money on a new receiver, and think they are watching HD video when they plug their SD DVD player into their new flat screen, aren't buying HD media and players right now.
9) My guess, the majority of people buying HD media are those who are in 5 or 7 above. Not 8.

A good place to start -- tear it up I say!

I'd say if 10% have compatible hardware, 1-2% probably actually know what the term Lossless means. The other 8-9% wouldn't look at the specs of a movie, wouldn't know which audio track to select and wouldn't not buy a movie because it doesn't specifically list lossless tracks.

So Lossless audio - Only a concern for a few consumers. I say true too.

That is not to say this won't change 5-10 years down the road. But lossless vs. non will have ZERO impact on the format war or the choice of which movies to buy vs. not buy.

Isn't it humorous how often you can be "debating" something, only to find out you basically agree? haha. :eek:

Yeah, you can buy a $205 Sony receiver at Best Buy with HDMI audio -- pretty cool. Or pick up the Onkyo 505 for 219 at amazon!

Buy yeah, lossless audio concerns a small number of people -- just like HD media in general.

Agreed.

Really? That support HDMI audio? I have to check.

BTW, I am glad we agree that Lossless audio only a concerns a few consumers like the topic says.

Also, I have nothing against lossless and have always said that. I just agree with the OP.

I havent kept up but have Bose Lifestyle systems and Monster cables gone out of style then?
I would say Bose has decreased, and Monster sales have increased. Just a WAG though. The reason is that there are many (better) alternatives that have the WAF that the tiny Bose systems had - not true 10+ years ago. Monster cables are *EVERYWHERE* at every shop and the average consumer (I'd use J6P here, but I hate that term :) ) really has no clue about cables and what they really cost to manufacture, etc... OR they say "Screw it, if I'm spending $1700 on a TV and $500 on HD, why not spend a couple hundred on wires. While I'm at it, gimme that $300 Monster power strip..."

I would say Bose has decreased, and Monster sales have increased. Just a WAG though. The reason is that there are many (better) alternatives that have the WAF that the tiny Bose systems had - not true 10+ years ago. Monster cables are *EVERYWHERE* at every shop and the average consumer (I'd use J6P here, but I hate that term :) ) really has no clue about cables and what they really cost to manufacture, etc... OR they say "Screw it, if I'm spending $1700 on a TV and $500 on HD, why not spend a couple hundred on wires. While I'm at it, gimme that $300 Monster power strip..."

Yeah I remember back in the early 90's when I worked for a major computer retailer and discovered that the $30 printer cable we were selling cost the store a whopping $2.23. :eek:

Since that day I've been far more skeptical about cable prices in general.

...Or pick up the Onkyo 505 for 219...

FYI, It does not support HDMI audio. I had one, but switched to the 605 that did.

The other question I would think would be how many of the existing HDM players actually have 5.1 analog output?

I know there is some thread about this somewhere right? A master list of HD players and whether they support multi-channel audio. There should be! Ha.

Still, I think most new receivers these days are supporting HDMI -- looking prospectively, more and more consumers who purchase new receivers will have the capability to hear lossless audio. Like as in customers who go out and purchase right now.

I'm sure 1080p is also only a concern for a select few.

And scratch resistant coating.

Little by little though Blu Rays advantages add up.

-Brian

FYI, It does not support HDMI audio. I had one, but switched to the 605 that did.

I have no idea why I thought it did then - silly me, totally wrong.

in any case, it does have multi-channel inputs -- that I'm sure of!

I am also wrong about the $200. Stupid HDMI video switching only!

The 605 still seems like one of the best values on the market then!

yeah, the 505 is only pass through. and the "$200" sony the guy is referring to is probably the 710, which only does pcm stereo over hdmi, not multichannel.

I have no idea why I thought it did then - silly me, totally wrong.

in any case, it does have multi-channel inputs -- that I'm sure of!

I am also wrong about the $200. Stupid HDMI video switching only!

The 605 still seems like one of the best values on the market then!

Hey, I am the one who bought it and then had to exchange it. Don't feel bad.:D

Hey, I am the one who bought it and then had to exchange it. Don't feel bad.:D

ha. Very true!

Considering the percentage of people who even have HD players at all -- what, a couple million? Say 3 million? So MAYBE 1% of people have HD players in the first place -- it's simply more useful to focus on people who have already purchased HD players, since, as others have stated, "the average consumer doesn't care about lossless" or doesn't even have their player hooked to a receiver. I mean, how useful is it to say that there are billions of people in the world who can't use HD media -- not very. Does that make HD media irrelevant? me hopes not!

Good point actually.

What's really funny is that you have a feature like anamorphic video on DVD that 10 years later most consumers still don't care about or understand. Hopefully we can look back in 5 years and say "lossless wasn't standard like it is today" much like anamorphic is standard today. I guess the studios have to give you a good reason to buy yet another version of the same movie someday though. :p

The only people that are informed about lossless audio and the new hd formats are people that seek out the information. There is no way that the average consumer has been exposed to that kind of information before they walk into Best Buy or place their order online. I probably wouldn't care about lossless if I didn't read about it here first. Now I have to have it, of course.

What's really funny is that you have a feature like anamorphic video on DVD that 10 years later most consumers still don't care about or understand. Hopefully we can look back in 5 years and say "lossless wasn't standard like it is today" much like anamorphic is standard today. I guess the studios have to give you a good reason to buy yet another version of the same movie someday though. :p

I think you're right -- it's just annoying to think that studios will likely use that as a future double dipping scheme: "Look, we have lossless audio now! And PiP! Buy it again!!!!" :rolleyes:

The only people that are informed about lossless audio and the new hd formats are people that seek out the information. There is no way that the average consumer has been exposed to that kind of information before they walk into Best Buy or place their order online. I probably wouldn't care about lossless if I didn't read about it here first. Now I have to have it, of course.

haha, also quite true. Information can be expensive. =op

I guess the point is that the average consumer (and I'm glad I'm not the only one who doesn't like the J6P acronym) isn't buying HD media - yet. At least not in significant numbers.

My guess is that the people who purchase online are probably a little more knowledgeable about what they're buying -- but that could just be my hope. And as confusing it is for us tech nuts, imagine how confusing it is for the average salesperson at an electronics store!

I wonder if you can count the survival of anamorphic video despite the average consumer's distaste for it as an example of the enthusiast getting something she wants above and beyond the lowest common denominator.

Just as most people have no clue with anamorphic video is, you're right most people don't understand lossless audio. But they also don't really understand HD media either.

But if we, as enthusiasts bitch and moan and spend accordingly, maybe, just maybe, the studios will cater to a slightly higher denominator and include lossless audio in more movies -- even if most people can't handle it today, the day will come when they will. Why not get things ready for the average consumer and his TrueHD 7.1 HTiB now! :)

I've yet to hear anyone argue that including lossless audio is what is holding back the flood of HD media. If that is true, your argument loses some value. I mean, is it really that much more time consuming or expensive to include a TrueHD track over a DD+?

[QUOTE=archangel37;11743216]

Here is the problem with that.

J6P has no clue what "Lossless audio" is. The industry hasn't put the information out there on a broad enough level for the average consumer to be able to identify the difference between DD, DD+, Lossless, True HD, Etc.

For the past few years, all the media has told the consumer market is that 5.1 sound is "adequate", 6.1 is "better" and that 7.1 is "most desirable".

Bitrates, audio codecs and compressed audio vs. non-compressed audio are concepts outside the knowledge base of the average consumer.

So when J6P walks into BB and sees that receiver you linked with the 5.1 analog inputs he isn't going to be thinking "GREAT! Lossless audio analog inputs!", he'll be thinking "Meh, another 5.1 system.. I wonder if they have any cheap 7.1 receivers on sale?"

Add into this the fact that only a few of the HDM players which have been produced support 5.1 analog audio output from the player and it becomes even less likely that the average consumer will understand how to take advantage of this audio format.

And the movie industry knows this which is why they are not focused on the audio portion of the HDM as a priority yet.

Right now they simply want more titles of their respective formats on the shelves so they can say to the consumer this Christmas.."Hey, buy our HD Player! Look it has Hundreds (thousands) of titles available for it RIGHT NOW!"

The film industry is looking to make a big push into the home for HDM between now and the end of the year and re-recording extra audio tracks takes time and money which they don't want to spend since they consider it to be a non-issue for the vast majority of potential customers right now.

Especially since they know they can simply release "remastered for HD Audio" editions in a few years at their leisure, gaining additional revenue once the whole "format war" is a thing of the past.

I've yet to hear anyone argue that including lossless audio is what is holding back the flood of HD media. If that is true, your argument loses some value. I mean, is it really that much more time consuming or expensive to include a TrueHD track over a DD+?



It's not that much more expensive but it is still an added expense.

And when the movie industry is selling media in as small a quantity as they are currently seeing for HDM, then they are going to be reluctant to add any additional costs to the product that they feel won't be appreciated by the majority of purchasers.

Add in that additional time it takes to tweak the video codec and extras on the disk in order to maximize the audio tracks and you can see where many movie execs are happy just to slap a DD or DD+ audio feed on the disk and get it out the door.

Especially when the market is looking at both formats and one factor in which way they may decide to go is "who has the most titles on the shelf".

This would ring more true to me if the studios were consistent about NOT using lossless audio. But the fact is, they have used lossless audio on numerous occasions -- someone once said that it's more about style than technical issues. Who knows.

Do you really know it's an added expense? Meaning, do you know for a fact it's more expensive to do a TrueHD track over a DD+ track?

I think that especially because they are selling to such a small market, the home video enthusiast, they should include a lossless track. We are the people most likely to enjoy and appreciate it, are we not? And right or wrong, there are people who truly believe they hear a difference between TrueHD and DD+, and studios could easily sell more discs to those people who are reluctant to buy now, knowing a "super ultra titanium special edition with REAL HD Sound" might be coming down the pipeline.

The problem is, this little argument is really only going to be solved by someone with first hand knowledge of the production process, and how much extra time and money, if any, adding a TrueHD track adds to a movie.

I mean, it's not like those studios who favor DD+ are flooding the market with movies, are they?

For instance: Bluray has almost 55% of its movies with lossless tracks -- HD DVD has about 17% with lossless tracks -- and despite the time and cost advantage, HD DVD doesn't have substantially more movies. Even with Disney and Fox taking it easy!

I don't know about you, but I sure haven't seen any tangible benefit from studios have DD+ only -- they aren't cheaper and they don't come out more often.

It's not that much more expensive but it is still an added expense.

And when the movie industry is selling media in as small a quantity as they are currently seeing for HDM, then they are going to be reluctant to add any additional costs to the product that they feel won't be appreciated by the majority of purchasers.

Add in that additional time it takes to tweak the video codec and extras on the disk in order to maximize the audio tracks and you can see where many movie execs are happy just to slap a DD or DD+ audio feed on the disk and get it out the door.

Especially when the market is looking at both formats and one factor in which way they may decide to go is "who has the most titles on the shelf".

Do you really know it's an added expense? Meaning, do you know for a fact it's more expensive to do a TrueHD track over a DD+ track?

You are right. I can't say for certain that it costs more to produce a lossless track as opposed to a DD+ one.

It would seem to make sense since the DD+ format is merely an enhancement of an already produced DD soundtrack for most films but as I do not work in the sound industry I cannot say for certain.

I do however have a couple of friends who do work in it though albeit on the commercial side and I'll have to ask them over the weekend if they know the answer to this question.

And for some films it comes down to either being able to put the video, all the extras and DD+ sound on a single disk or putting the just the interactive extras, video and TrueHD sound on one disk and having to add a second disk to deal with some of the additional extras such as "the making of.." features, trailers and shorts. And extra disks equal extra costs.

On a different note, I went downstairs and looked at my older Sony receiver (which was stashed in the closet) and did in fact find a set of 5.1 analog inputs on the back.

So now if I end up getting one of the players which support analog output I can potentially join the ranks of those "demanding" lossless tracks on every release.

;)

I recently PM Richard of "nature's journey" fame to see if he can give us some idea.

On some gut level, it makes sense that it would cost extra - but whether that's true and how much, I would love to know!

If what your friends say is true, and I have no reason to doubt it, then that seems one real benefit to Blu-ray's space advantage.

;) Demanding stuff is fun. I'm actually waiting around for the Samsung Dual player. It can't come out soon enough.


You are right. I can't say for certain that it costs more to produce a lossless track as opposed to a DD+ one.

It would seem to make sense since the DD+ format is merely an enhancement of an already produced DD soundtrack for most films but as I do not work in the sound industry I cannot say for certain.

I do however have a couple of friends who do work in it though albeit on the commercial side and I'll have to ask them over the weekend if they know the answer to this question.

And for some films it comes down to either being able to put the video, all the extras and DD+ sound on a single disk or putting the just the interactive extras, video and TrueHD sound on one disk and having to add a second disk to deal with some of the additional extras such as "the making of.." features, trailers and shorts. And extra disks equal extra costs.

On a different note, I went downstairs and looked at my older Sony receiver (which was stashed in the closet) and did in fact find a set of 5.1 analog inputs on the back.

So now if I end up getting one of the players which support analog output I can potentially join the ranks of those "demanding" lossless tracks on every release.

;)

My (poor?) understanding is that the original HD DVD players did this conversion to output 1080p, but that newer players skip the interlace and convert, then deinterlace and convert process. Can't newer 1080p tvs accept 1080p60?

But I welcome being proved wrong!

I think the difference between current and prior generations of HDM players was the ability to output native 1080p@24 (although I think firmware upgrades have solved this problem in most of the early players too!). It is my understanding that all players still go through an interlace/deinterlace process to get from 1080p@24 to 1080p@60.

Also, 1080p displays have progressed in their input capability, from accepting 1080i only, to 1080p@60, and now to 1080p@24 (and in many of these cases, quadrupling the frame rate to 120hz). Most newer displays can certainly accept 1080p@60, but it is not clear to me that the capability to take in 1080p@24 is commonplace yet. And if you don't have the latter, then the difference between 1080i and 1080p@60 is, IMO, negligible.

... And if you don't have the latter, then the difference between 1080i and 1080p@60 is, IMO, negligible.

One thing to remember is that 1080i@60 is very close to 1080p@30. You truly are getting a resolution of 1920x1080 30 times a second. The only thing different would be if something in the picture moves a fair amount in that 30th of a second.

One problem though is that many TVs do not bother de-interlacing properly. They just thow away every other 1080i frame and double the ones they keep. You get less jaggies when there is rapid movement, but the picture is really just 540p.

I have tried switching my player between 1080i and 1080p and I have never been able to tell the difference.

I was able to confirm that the ol' Samsung-1000 did the interlace/deinterlace dance, but that was the only machine I could find.

Do you have any other evidence about newer machines being unable to go straight from p24 to p60?

Nonetheless, I think most people accept that the differences between 1080i and 1080p are negligible.

I think the difference between current and prior generations of HDM players was the ability to output native 1080p@24 (although I think firmware upgrades have solved this problem in most of the early players too!). It is my understanding that all players still go through an interlace/deinterlace process to get from 1080p@24 to 1080p@60.

Also, 1080p displays have progressed in their input capability, from accepting 1080i only, to 1080p@60, and now to 1080p@24 (and in many of these cases, quadrupling the frame rate to 120hz). Most newer displays can certainly accept 1080p@60, but it is not clear to me that the capability to take in 1080p@24 is commonplace yet. And if you don't have the latter, then the difference between 1080i and 1080p@60 is, IMO, negligible.

I was able to confirm that the ol' Samsung-1000 did the interlace/deinterlace dance, but that was the only machine I could find.

Do you have any other evidence about newer machines being unable to go straight from p24 to p60?

Nonetheless, I think most people accept that the differences between 1080i and 1080p are negligible.

Reliance on audio/video magazine reviews and observations I'm afraid! Largely reliable, but not always!

Reliance on audio/video magazine reviews and observations I'm afraid! Largely reliable, but not always!

I've done a quick job of scanning the threads, and I think that the Samsung 1200 can output a 1080p signal natively, without interlacing/deinterlacing first.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=828094&page=4

I've done a quick job of scanning the threads, and I think that the Samsung 1200 can output a 1080p signal natively, without interlacing/deinterlacing first.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=828094&page=4

Page you reference talks about native 1080p@24 not 1080p@60 - I still think this player does the interlace/deinterlace to get to 1080p@60. Am too lazy to troll through all 55 pages of the post.

I do think all this, including native 1080p@24 is a 'tempest in a tepot' as the old saying goes. I'm just not sure, at the end of the day, that it makes all that much difference. Shoot, there are plenty of people on this forum who claim to see no difference between HDM and SD DVD - in that context, the differences between 1080i/1080p60/1080p24 are truly inconsequential.

Having said that, of course, I am eyeing the new Sony VPL-VW200 - always have been a sucker for tech specs.

I should have been clearer that it was talking about p24 v. p60. I guess I just don't see what the difference is; the 3-2 pulldown should be the only step/difference.

I agree about the 1080p24 thing though -- there seems to be very little proof that it provides much of a real benefit.

Ah, I'm sucker for tech specs too -- I'm jealous! :D

Page you reference talks about native 1080p@24 not 1080p@60 - I still think this player does the interlace/deinterlace to get to 1080p@60. Am too lazy to troll through all 55 pages of the post.

I do think all this, including native 1080p@24 is a 'tempest in a tepot' as the old saying goes. I'm just not sure, at the end of the day, that it makes all that much difference. Shoot, there are plenty of people on this forum who claim to see no difference between HDM and SD DVD - in that context, the differences between 1080i/1080p60/1080p24 are truly inconsequential.

Having said that, of course, I am eyeing the new Sony VPL-VW200 - always have been a sucker for tech specs.

After reading a review on hometheatermag.com, they think that the 1200 doesn't interlace the 1080p signal -- but they admit there is no way to tell.

From everything else I've been able to gather, the 1080p60 --> 1080i60 --> 1080p60 step was a "problem" only with some first generation blu-ray players.

But I'm sure as hell not willing to bet my life on it. ha.

The majority (masses) are not buying HDM. Mostly early adopters/enthusiasts are what makes up the vast majority of HDM customers for the forseeable future.

There (Warner ect) not adding lossless because they want to re-sell their movies over and over which has nothing to do with the masses.

If the studios cared one iota about the masses, they would lower the pricing on HDM software to get them interested.
The fact is that the vast majority of current (and the only ) customers do want lossless audio as in PCM, DTS-MA, or DD-THD for the premium we are paying for HD releases.

Sony, Fox and Disney are giving us what we are paying for, and the other studios are ripping us off...plain and simple.

There (Warner ect) not adding lossless because they want to re-sell their movies over and over which has nothing to do with the masses.

That sounds like an extrapolation based on yourself, or your percieved notion, of what today's HDM customer wants. I watched God And Generals on BD this morn with it's "lowly" 640 Dolby. There is no way in hell I'm gonna run out and buy it again because the audio might be a few percent better at some future date. As far as I'm concerned the audio was very adequate. You could hear bullets zipping by and the dialog was always discernable.
I don't wanna repurchase Gods And Generals. Now, I want Gettysburg in HD!

That sounds like an extrapolation based on yourself, or your percieved notion, of what today's HDM customer wants. I watched God And Generals on BD this morn with it's "lowly" 640 Dolby. There is no way in hell I'm gonna run out and buy it again because the audio might be a few percent better at some future date. As far as I'm concerned the audio was very adequate. You could hear bullets zipping by and the dialog was always discernable.
I don't wanna repurchase Gods And Generals. Now, I want Gettysburg in HD!

I think that's the point he was making -- not that we're all going to run out and buy a movie again just because it has lossless audio -- but how frustrating it is that studios are not using lossless audio, perhaps as a future double dipping point.

Whether the audio was adequate or not, it would have been nice to have included a lossless track, no?

I personally don't care for lossless audio.

That sounds like an extrapolation based on yourself, or your percieved notion, of what today's HDM customer wants. I watched God And Generals on BD this morn with it's "lowly" 640 Dolby. There is no way in hell I'm gonna run out and buy it again because the audio might be a few percent better at some future date. As far as I'm concerned the audio was very adequate. You could hear bullets zipping by and the dialog was always discernable.
I don't wanna repurchase Gods And Generals. Now, I want Gettysburg in HD!
Seems like you get it. Horrible movie without that lossless track. Right? ;)

The whole lossless vs lossy debate is wearing thin for me. I've A/Bed a few titles and I can say that to me 640kbps is indeed very nice. The fact is 31% of BD titles only have DD and of the 55% lossless BD's 10% are DTS HD MA which very few of us can decode (me included) forcing us back to DD. In my book, unless you've done your own A/B tests on like material (i.e TrueHD at 48/24 vs DD+ at 48/24 on the same title), you really don't have much ground to stand on.

Others have and have reported no discernable differences.

And not all lossless is equal. There are different bit rates and in a few cases different sampling rates. To all that think lossless is so much better, try A/Bing the HD DVD version of Happy Feet and report back.

That said, I would prefer that all titles would have a lossless track if only to end these type of threads.

I think that's the point he was making -- not that we're all going to run out and buy a movie again just because it has lossless audio -- but how frustrating it is that studios are not using lossless audio, perhaps as a future double dipping point.

Whether the audio was adequate or not, it would have been nice to have included a lossless track, no?

Well, he may think that many folks will double dip for better audio. I'm not one of 'em. If I, and others akin to me, won't double-dip over audio, who will? ...not joe sexpack! Every audio-vidiot on this forum is not chomping at the bit to double-dip for slighty better (?) audio. Whenever I double-dipped on LD or DVD it was for better PQ.

Should Gods And Generals have PCM or True? ...couldn't hurt, but would it help, I can't say definitively! I ain't no X-pert. I doubt that G & G got deee-luxe audio at Skywalker Sound....? I didn't notice in the credits....wasn't looking. The audio seemed modest but effective.

When Jeff Daniel's character, Colonel Chamberlin, was laying in the field above Fredricksburg at night, hiding from the snipers behind dead bodies, bullets would zing by periodically and they sounded good to me. I really have to wonder if a superior sound format would make that effect better....? Was the effect created in such a superior manner that it would be some huge, obvious improvement? I'd bet not. G & G is not a mega-budjet, spend-to-the-roof film.

I'd hope that the inclusion of advanced audio is more on a need basis than just to save a buck basis. The optomist in me wants to root for the former. The pesimist in me says, hell yeah, the latter. The realist in me says it's a scrambled combination of both. I have many Disney and Sony BD's that I've listened to both ways, kuntry & western ;), the PCM is better but the 640 ain't shabby. Civilians, whilst rolling their eyes...:rolleyes:...over even being asked the question, proably wouldn't be able to tell the difference or wouldn't want to even answer the question in many cases.

I've heard some 640 & 576 Dolby and 1500 DTS that I believe competes well with lossless. It's obvious to me that what makes for great audio goes beyond what format it's presented in. The only BD or HD DVD that I can think of that I'd like to replace over audio, maybe, has PCM. That would be The Prestige. The dialog is hard to hear over the seemingly, ever-present effects noise. I think the audio is badly mixed. .....well, maybe the U-571 HD-DVD for similar dialog issues too.

The PQ is a way bigger issue for me with the new formats. If studios think we're all at the edge of our seat to upgrade discs for slightly better audio, they ain't thinkin' stray-eight, IMO!

Will my opine shift some when I get an Integra 9.8 HDMI pre...??? Maybe a few degrees, I suspect. I doubt I'll swing too many compass points. I believe many films were not recorded well enough for format to be a big issue. BTW, Onkyo can't supply the Intergra pre as fast as folks wanna buy 'em. I'm on a waiting list. It may be 6 months or more before I get my hands on one...???

Seems like you get it. Horrible movie without that lossless track. Right? ;)....The whole lossless vs lossy debate is wearing thin for me. I've A/Bed a few titles and I can say that to me 640kbps is indeed very nice.......That said, I would prefer that all titles would have a lossless track if only to end these type of threads.

Thank you! :) LOL!, "to end these type of threads". Wouldn't it be nice to have threads about what's good or bad about a specific soundtrack instead of why it can't be muy beuno because of format?

The majority (masses) are not buying HDM. Mostly early adopters/enthusiasts are what makes up the vast majority of HDM customers for the forseeable future.

There (Warner ect) not adding lossless because they want to re-sell their movies over and over which has nothing to do with the masses.

If the studios cared one iota about the masses, they would lower the pricing on HDM software to get them interested.
The fact is that the vast majority of current (and the only ) customers do want lossless audio as in PCM, DTS-MA, or DD-THD for the premium we are paying for HD releases.

Sony, Fox and Disney are giving us what we are paying for, and the other studios are ripping us off...plain and simple.

+1

I am so sick of audio double dipping from DVD (can you say DTS?). That is why I refuse to buy a disc without a lossless track. ie. the Bourne movies. (rental only)

If they fit on the disc, a lossless track will come.

Thank you! :) LOL!, "to end these type of threads". Wouldn't it be nice to have threads about what's good or bad about a specific soundtrack instead of why it can't be muy beuno because of format?

Yep. :) What is most frustrating is that many in the lossless crowd use NO science to back up their claims. It's always lossless must be better than lossy and I want it regardless even if you cannot tell a difference. That's just plain wrong. Another thing they don't mention is that not all lossless tracks are the same. Most lossless tracks are at 48/16. I would prefer a DD+ track at 48/24 any day of the week.

What also bothers me is the BD crowd claiming AQ superiority. Some have even said that 90% of BD titles are lossless. That is patently false. Many BD titles only have DD at 640kbps and as you have observed, that ain't bad. On the other hand, 97% of HD DVD titles have a DD+ soundtrack, arguably a better lossy codec.

There are several insiders that would back up the DD+ 1.5 codec as being transparent to the master track and they carry far more weight for me than others who just want lossless. And of the insiders that claim they can hear the difference, they are not saying that the lossy track sounds bad, it's more along the lines that they can tell the difference. So what.

The majority (masses) are not buying HDM. Mostly early adopters/enthusiasts are what makes up the vast majority of HDM customers for the forseeable future.

There (Warner ect) not adding lossless because they want to re-sell their movies over and over which has nothing to do with the masses.

If the studios cared one iota about the masses, they would lower the pricing on HDM software to get them interested.
The fact is that the vast majority of current (and the only ) customers do want lossless audio as in PCM, DTS-MA, or DD-THD for the premium we are paying for HD releases.

Sony, Fox and Disney are giving us what we are paying for, and the other studios are ripping us off...plain and simple.

Let's see, they sell on average 4 or 5 thousand HD discs per title (being generous), and you think their devious plan is to get those 4 or 5 thousand folks to double-dip for lossless audio? Does that really make sense to you?

The question is, wouldn't it be more difficult for studios to add a lossy track rather than a lossless one?

I find it somewhat ironic that in the same digital breath, you can tar "the lossless crowd" for falling for spec wars, and then claim that 8 more bits on a lossy track will make it better than a lossless track. Where's your science to back that up, eh?

Can you really tell the difference between a 48/16 lossless and a 48/24 lossy? And while we are talking about preferences, wouldn't you prefer a 48/24 lossless track?

But that's really the point -- we are talking about preferences here. While I can't speak for the "lossless crowd," I can speak for myself -- 1) I'm not going to avoid buying movies just because it doesn't have a lossless track; 2) I don't think that just because a movie doesn't have a lossless track, the lossy track will suck; 3) I find it frustrating that studios will likely use the addition of a lossless track as a double dipping point in the future; 4) all things considered, I would prefer to see a high quality lossless track if the format can handle it.

There is no inherent reason why the Bluray Camp should claim inhere AQ superiority. But one can obviously see why some HD DVD supporters are more likely to say "lossless doesn't matter." It's an interesting chain of logic -- If there are differences between lossless and lossy tracks, AND the reason that some movies haven't had a lossless track is because of space constrains, THEN blu-ray has one advantage over HD DVD.

Whoever said 90% of BD discs have lossless apparently has never seen bluraystats.com. I hope you set them straight.

By all accounts, DD and DD+ are very similar -- the latter is just a bit more efficient at compression. What would be interesting is to see what bitrates those 97% DD+ consist of -- by all accounts, when a movie is cross platform and HD DVD has DD+ and BR has DD, most reviewers have heard no differences. But what do they know. :rolleyes:

Honestly, I think you're arguing against straw men to some extent -- I certainly haven't said that DD+ (lossy) automatically sounds bad. Hell, I still have plenty of DD DVDs with amazing soundtracks (Return of the King!!!).

The point is, at least some experts claim they can tell a difference and that generally, the lossless track is better -- So if both formats are capable of using a track that at least some people consider better, at no cost to those who don't hear a difference, Why Not add the lossless track? Hell, if for no other reason than marketing?

Yep. :) What is most frustrating is that many in the lossless crowd use NO science to back up their claims. It's always lossless must be better than lossy and I want it regardless even if you cannot tell a difference. That's just plain wrong. Another thing they don't mention is that not all lossless tracks are the same. Most lossless tracks are at 48/16. I would prefer a DD+ track at 48/24 any day of the week.

What also bothers me is the BD crowd claiming AQ superiority. Some have even said that 90% of BD titles are lossless. That is patently false. Many BD titles only have DD at 640kbps and as you have observed, that ain't bad. On the other hand, 97% of HD DVD titles have a DD+ soundtrack, arguably a better lossy codec.

There are several insiders that would back up the DD+ 1.5 codec as being transparent to the master track and they carry far more weight for me than others who just want lossless. And of the insiders that claim they can hear the difference, they are not saying that the lossy track sounds bad, it's more along the lines that they can tell the difference. So what.

I find it somewhat ironic that in the same digital breath, you can tar "the lossless crowd" for falling for spec wars, and then claim that 8 more bits on a lossy track will make it better than a lossless track. Where's your science to back that up, eh?

Fact: 24 bits has more dynamic range. In addition I have made this argument before and have had an insider (for future refenece, I mean someone who works in the industry and has does sound mixing. I'm not mentioning names out of repect for their privacy. Not sure it's necessary but that's why.) verify what I said. Here's an article for reference.

http://www.tweakheadz.com/16_vs_24_bit_audio.htm

Can you really tell the difference between a 48/16 lossless and a 48/24 lossy? And while we are talking about preferences, wouldn't you prefer a 48/24 lossless track?
As to your first question, not sure. All else being equal I would hope that I could but I don't have an all else being equal test. I would really like to know. As to your second question, do you think I am stupid? :rolleyes: Of course I would prefer the lossless. Who wouldn't.

But that's really the point -- we are talking about preferences here. While I can't speak for the "lossless crowd," I can speak for myself -- 1) I'm not going to avoid buying movies just because it doesn't have a lossless track; 2) I don't think that just because a movie doesn't have a lossless track, the lossy track will suck; 3) I find it frustrating that studios will likely use the addition of a lossless track as a double dipping point in the future; 4) all things considered, I would prefer to see a high quality lossless track if the format can handle it.

1. Agreed. However there are others who say lossless at all costs. For example, some in the Transformers thread have stated they will not buy the movie because it does not have a lossless track. It's their loss.
2. Agreed
3. Disagree somewhat. I don't think the studios would re-release just to add lossless. It would have to be part of a bigger package such as calling it the Directors Cut.
4. Agreed.

There is no inherent reason why the Bluray Camp should claim inhere AQ superiority. But one can obviously see why some HD DVD supporters are more likely to say "lossless doesn't matter." It's an interesting chain of logic -- If there are differences between lossless and lossy tracks, AND the reason that some movies haven't had a lossless track is because of space constrains, THEN blu-ray has one advantage over HD DVD.

I wasn't gonna bring HD DVD and BD into this discussion, it's not necessary. I don't agree with "facts" in your chain of logic. If I did, we wouldn't be having this discussion. Here's an alternative, some of it conjecture:
1) There are no perceivable difefrences between a lossy encode and a lossless encode.
2) Lossless is not as cost effective. For example, while you can directly get the mandatory AC-3 track from a DD+ or TrueHD track, you can't get AC-3 directly from a LPCM track. At the very least you'd have to reencode it which I don't think is done. To have LPCM you must carry two tracks.
3) DD+ can produce equal qaulity to lossless at a lower bitrate. This bitrate can then be used to pump up the video (As you pointed out, HD DVD can certainly use this extra bandwidth).

Whoever said 90% of BD discs have lossless apparently has never seen bluraystats.com. I hope you set them straight.
I'm trying. :)


By all accounts, DD and DD+ are very similar -- the latter is just a bit more efficient at compression. What would be interesting is to see what bitrates those 97% DD+ consist of -- by all accounts, when a movie is cross platform and HD DVD has DD+ and BR has DD, most reviewers have heard no differences. But what do they know. :rolleyes:
Kinda proves my point. DD+ on HD DVD can go as high as 3.0mbps and is typically encoded at 1.5mpbs. It also converts to lower bitrates (i.e. AC-3) easily. DD on BD only does 640kbps. So the reviewers are not hearing a diffenece on the lower bit rates on BD for cross platform titles. Interesting.


Honestly, I think you're arguing against straw men to some extent -- I certainly haven't said that DD+ (lossy) automatically sounds bad. Hell, I still have plenty of DD DVDs with amazing soundtracks (Return of the King!!!).

I would not put you in the "straw men" group. There are already enough members there (re: Transformer bigots). :) I do agree with your statement.

The point is, at least some experts claim they can tell a difference and that generally, the lossless track is better -- So if both formats are capable of using a track that at least some people consider better, at no cost to those who don't hear a difference, Why Not add the lossless track? Hell, if for no other reason than marketing?
There are also some insiders who claim that they cannot honestly tell the diffrence. But your statement is of course a reasonable argument, especially the last sentence. I have not read anywhere where a major studio has stated why they use lossy encodes, I can only guess.
That said, they are using lossy encodes but is it a big deal? I would claim not. I have tried A/Bing some titles. Here is what I found.

POTC (BD): 48/24 LPCM vs DD 640kbps.
Minor diffences between the 2. LPCM is crisper, seems to be more directional. DD track though was no slouch. Without the A/B test I probably would not have know the difference.
+1 for LPCM

Happy Feet (HD DVD): 48/16 Truehd vs DD+ (do';t know for sure but would assume 48/16 @ 1.5 mbps).
A/Bed the track in multiple places. Could not find any difference at all.
+1 for no diffeence.

End Of Time (HD DVD): TrueHD vs DD+ ( I have been told this is at 48/24 for both. No independent verification however).
Not sure what to make of this title. The differences between the two tracks was minor, but there were differences. The TrueHD track sounded better to me at times. However, I did find some anomolies that make me question this title. For further details, see my post in this (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=911610&page=5)thread.
+1 for Lossless TrueHD

To bottom line all this, to use the lack of a lossless track to disparage a given title or an entire format is IMO not of much value. I would need a lot more proof that lossless is significantly superior to a like DD+ encode. I would also need to know from a reputable source the reasons why lossy is chosen over lossless. For now, I have to assume there is a good reason for lossy over lossless.

Fact: 24 bits has more dynamic range. In addition I have made this argument before and have had an insider (for future refenece, I mean someone who works in the industry and has does sound mixing. I'm not mentioning names out of repect for their privacy. Not sure it's necessary but that's why.) verify what I said. Here's an article for reference.

http://www.tweakheadz.com/16_vs_24_bit_audio.htm


As to your first question, not sure. All else being equal I would hope that I could but I don't have an all else being equal test. I would really like to know. As to your second question, do you think I am stupid? :rolleyes: Of course I would prefer the lossless. Who wouldn't.


1. Agreed. However there are others who say lossless at all costs. For example, some in the Transformers thread have stated they will not buy the movie because it does not have a lossless track. It's their loss.
2. Agreed
3. Disagree somewhat. I don't think the studios would re-release just to add lossless. It would have to be part of a bigger package such as calling it the Directors Cut.
4. Agreed.


I wasn't gonna bring HD DVD and BD into this discussion, it's not necessary. I don't agree with "facts" in your chain of logic. If I did, we wouldn't be having this discussion. Here's an alternative, some of it conjecture:
1) There are no perceivable difefrences between a lossy encode and a lossless encode.
2) Lossless is not as cost effective. For example, while you can directly get the mandatory AC-3 track from a DD+ or TrueHD track, you can't get AC-3 directly from a LPCM track. At the very least you'd have to reencode it which I don't think is done. To have LPCM you must carry two tracks.
3) DD+ can produce equal qaulity to lossless at a lower bitrate. This bitrate can then be used to pump up the video (As you pointed out, HD DVD can certainly use this extra bandwidth).


I'm trying. :)


Kinda proves my point. DD+ on HD DVD can go as high as 3.0mbps and is typically encoded at 1.5mpbs. It also converts to lower bitrates (i.e. AC-3) easily. DD on BD only does 640kbps. So the reviewers are not hearing a diffenece on the lower bit rates on BD for cross platform titles. Interesting.


I would not put you in the "straw men" group. There are already enough members there (re: Transformer bigots). :) I do agree with your statement.


There are also some insiders who claim that they cannot honestly tell the diffrence. But your statement is of course a reasonable argument, especially the last sentence. I have not read anywhere where a major studio has stated why they use lossy encodes, I can only guess.
That said, they are using lossy encodes but is it a big deal? I would claim not. I have tried A/Bing some titles. Here is what I found.

POTC (BD): 48/24 LPCM vs DD 640kbps.
Minor diffences between the 2. LPCM is crisper, seems to be more directional. DD track though was no slouch. Without the A/B test I probably would not have know the difference.
+1 for LPCM

Happy Feet (HD DVD): 48/16 Truehd vs DD+ (do';t know for sure but would assume 48/16 @ 1.5 mbps).
A/Bed the track in multiple places. Could not find any difference at all.
+1 for no diffeence.

End Of Time (HD DVD): TrueHD vs DD+ ( I have been told this is at 48/24 for both. No independent verification however).
Not sure what to make of this title. The differences between the two tracks was minor, but there were differences. The TrueHD track sounded better to me at times. However, I did find some anomolies that make me question this title. For further details, see my post in this (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=911610&page=5)thread.
+1 for Lossless TrueHD

To bottom line all this, to use the lack of a lossless track to disparage a given title or an entire format is IMO not of much value. I would need a lot more proof that lossless is significantly superior to a like DD+ encode. I would also need to know from a reputable source the reasons why lossy is chosen over lossless. For now, I have to assume there is a good reason for lossy over lossless.

My goodness! What a sensible, intelligent post!:)

My goodness! What a sensible, intelligent post!:)

Its the rare kind of post that you should normally see on this forum but do not.

My goodness! What a sensible, intelligent post!


Its the rare kind of post that you should normally see on this forum but do not.

Thanks guys, you made my day. I'm blushing! :D

How are most stores advertising HD DVD and Blu-Ray. With a 5.1 surround set up playing a movie which has a TrueHD or PCM track? No

They are playing movies on a 1080p HDTV using TV speakers. The picture quality is going to be the main selling point.

How are most stores advertising HD DVD and Blu-Ray. With a 5.1 surround set up playing a movie which has a TrueHD or PCM track? No

They are playing movies on a 1080p HDTV using TV speakers. The picture quality is going to be the main selling point.

I kinda agree with this. There will be exceptions, but you may be very close to the majority of B&M stores. That said, if they have both types of players on like equipment and like marketing fluff, as we already know there is very little to no difference in PQ between the 2 formats, even when comparing the 1080i output on some HD DVD players and the 1080p on all BD players.

So how does one decide on a format if that is all one has to go on? Price!

Of course we know there is much more to it. But will the average consumer know? I really don't know. It's why I am very interested in seeing how the numbers stack up this holiday season.

How are most stores advertising HD DVD and Blu-Ray. With a 5.1 surround set up playing a movie which has a TrueHD or PCM track? No

They are playing movies on a 1080p HDTV using TV speakers. The picture quality is going to be the main selling point.

Absolutely correct. With a very few exceptions (one of them being a Sony display for Blu in the Circuit City in Sugarland TX. marvelous surround sound setup there) this is the way that the major retailers are introducing HD media to the public.

As for:

Disagree somewhat. I don't think the studios would re-release just to add lossless. It would have to be part of a bigger package such as calling it the Directors Cut.

Based upon the number of DVD titles which were re-released in the early 2000's badged "Now with Remastered 5.1 surround sound", I have to disagree.

Although I have to admit, in many cases the titles were not true "re-releases" more a case of a simple re-issue with the new audio track added (but with the "remastered sound" blurb added on the case.)

Basically they were re-issues with a slight upgrade that many felt they had to purchase in order to experience the better quality sound.

Frankly this is what I expect to see from the movie industry in a few years for many of the titles released to date with lower quality audio tracks.

First off, an excellent post - I wholeheartedly agree with those assessments.

Now to the bread and butter:

I know that 24 bits has a wider dynamic range, but I've also heard that many master tracks aren't recorded at 24 bits anyway. There's a good chance that's wrong though. I have no idea if that's true beyond what I've (occasionally) read here.

We're in an interesting pickle here -- what differences there are between lossless and lossy in general, and more specifically between high quality lossless and high quality lossy; and the differences between a 16 bit lossless and 24 bit lossy track.

We really need a reputable website or AV magazine to put these theories to the test. It's a wonder no one has stepped up to the plate, as yet.

And no, I don't think you're stupid! :o

1. I bet some of the people who say "lossless or bust" on Transformers are probably bitter Blu-ray fans; some likely are HD DVD owners who simply prefer "the look and sound of perfect" as consistently advertised by Toshiba. Still, one would think, if any soundtrack MIGHT benefit from lossless, it would be a big summer blockbuster!

3). Agreed as well -- I think they'll add a few minutes, generally useless, throw in a new extra, slap some TrueHD on it, and call it the Super Special Titanium Edition.

I also completely agree with your opinion that bringing HD DVD and Blu-ray into this discussion is, for the most part, unnecessary. And I'm sorry if my little logical game came across as me trying to "prove some facts." I wasn't going for that, and I acknowledge that there are some VERY important assumptions I made. still...

1) Even if there are no REAL perceivable differences, some people still think so and will likely think so against all evidence to the contrary. Assuming space or bandwidth is not an issue, why not use lossless, again, if for no other reason than marketing. Creeping specs anyone?

2) Having uncompressed audio (which is technically, though maybe not practically, different than lossless) and a legacy DD track may not be more cost effective -- but then again, studios don't pay licensing fees on uncompressed audio. It might be comparable to having a TrueHD or DTS MA track with their individual core legacy tracks. Insiders would be better equipped to answer that one!

3) If true, I think that's one argument against HD DVD! We shouldn't be bumping up against format limitations already, if you ask me.

And you're doing a fine job! :D

I think Universal is (or was?) the only studio encoding at 1.5 megabits for DD+. Paramount was doing in the 700 K range and Warner is (was?) doing in the 600K range for both DD+ and DD. I think most of the reviews were on Warner titles with similar, if not exact, bitrates between the DD+ and DD tracks. Still, very interesting indeed. Also worth a look for some serious AV website or magazine.

Thank you for not lumping me in with the transformers bigots -- ha ha -- which sounds hilarious!

In any case, I really agree with your last few statements -- not buying a movie or knocking HD DVD because the non use of lossless or the inadequate use of lossless is probably silly. But I would LOVE to hear why studios are choosing not to use lossless -- is a cost thing? Space thing? Bandwidth thing? Laziness thing? Double dipping thing? And until we have a firmer, more scientific grasp on what, if any, differences there are between HQ lossless and HQ lossy tracks, we'll have troube determining whether any of this even matters.

Still fun to talk about though. ha. :rolleyes:

Fact: 24 bits has more dynamic range. In addition I have made this argument before and have had an insider (for future refenece, I mean someone who works in the industry and has does sound mixing. I'm not mentioning names out of repect for their privacy. Not sure it's necessary but that's why.) verify what I said. Here's an article for reference.

http://www.tweakheadz.com/16_vs_24_bit_audio.htm


As to your first question, not sure. All else being equal I would hope that I could but I don't have an all else being equal test. I would really like to know. As to your second question, do you think I am stupid? :rolleyes: Of course I would prefer the lossless. Who wouldn't.


1. Agreed. However there are others who say lossless at all costs. For example, some in the Transformers thread have stated they will not buy the movie because it does not have a lossless track. It's their loss.
2. Agreed
3. Disagree somewhat. I don't think the studios would re-release just to add lossless. It would have to be part of a bigger package such as calling it the Directors Cut.
4. Agreed.


I wasn't gonna bring HD DVD and BD into this discussion, it's not necessary. I don't agree with "facts" in your chain of logic. If I did, we wouldn't be having this discussion. Here's an alternative, some of it conjecture:
1) There are no perceivable difefrences between a lossy encode and a lossless encode.
2) Lossless is not as cost effective. For example, while you can directly get the mandatory AC-3 track from a DD+ or TrueHD track, you can't get AC-3 directly from a LPCM track. At the very least you'd have to reencode it which I don't think is done. To have LPCM you must carry two tracks.
3) DD+ can produce equal qaulity to lossless at a lower bitrate. This bitrate can then be used to pump up the video (As you pointed out, HD DVD can certainly use this extra bandwidth).


I'm trying. :)


Kinda proves my point. DD+ on HD DVD can go as high as 3.0mbps and is typically encoded at 1.5mpbs. It also converts to lower bitrates (i.e. AC-3) easily. DD on BD only does 640kbps. So the reviewers are not hearing a diffenece on the lower bit rates on BD for cross platform titles. Interesting.


I would not put you in the "straw men" group. There are already enough members there (re: Transformer bigots). :) I do agree with your statement.


There are also some insiders who claim that they cannot honestly tell the diffrence. But your statement is of course a reasonable argument, especially the last sentence. I have not read anywhere where a major studio has stated why they use lossy encodes, I can only guess.
That said, they are using lossy encodes but is it a big deal? I would claim not. I have tried A/Bing some titles. Here is what I found.

POTC (BD): 48/24 LPCM vs DD 640kbps.
Minor diffences between the 2. LPCM is crisper, seems to be more directional. DD track though was no slouch. Without the A/B test I probably would not have know the difference.
+1 for LPCM

Happy Feet (HD DVD): 48/16 Truehd vs DD+ (do';t know for sure but would assume 48/16 @ 1.5 mbps).
A/Bed the track in multiple places. Could not find any difference at all.
+1 for no diffeence.

End Of Time (HD DVD): TrueHD vs DD+ ( I have been told this is at 48/24 for both. No independent verification however).
Not sure what to make of this title. The differences between the two tracks was minor, but there were differences. The TrueHD track sounded better to me at times. However, I did find some anomolies that make me question this title. For further details, see my post in this (http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=911610&page=5)thread.
+1 for Lossless TrueHD

To bottom line all this, to use the lack of a lossless track to disparage a given title or an entire format is IMO not of much value. I would need a lot more proof that lossless is significantly superior to a like DD+ encode. I would also need to know from a reputable source the reasons why lossy is chosen over lossless. For now, I have to assume there is a good reason for lossy over lossless.

How are most stores advertising HD DVD and Blu-Ray. With a 5.1 surround set up playing a movie which has a TrueHD or PCM track? No

They are playing movies on a 1080p HDTV using TV speakers. The picture quality is going to be the main selling point.

Oh don't get me wrong, I don't think lossless is the sort of feature that is going to make HD players fly off the shelves -- then again, they're not flying off the shelves now!

My guess is that right now, the majority of the people buying HD players probably do have access to a HT system -- these early adopters are more likely than the average consumer to care about a lossless track, whether Wal Mart poorly sets up a 5.1 system or not!

Speaking of Wal Mart, I walked into a store the other day, despite my better judgment, and saw a fairly decent display stand with two Sony Bravia tvs and rows of HD DVDs and Bluray titles. What concerned me is that the picture on both TVs looked HORRENDOUS. Way to bright, washed out colors, the sharpness turned all the way up. The Demo stuff looked terrible.

Now if I'm the average consumer, and I see this fancy little TV hooked up to some 200-500 dollar HD Player, playing some 20-40 dollar movie, and think, "Wow, that HD picture doesn't look all that impressive," I just might stick with the 45 dollar upconverting dvd player and 5 dollar dvds. 1080p or not, it could be 4000p, but if most of these retail stores keep setting up their displays so poorly, even the superior PQ of HD won't be a selling point!

As a side note, I took the time to do some quick field surgery on the display and toned down the brightness and reduced the sharpness -- it looked much better, and saw a few smiling Wal Mart customers behind me after I was finished. Hopefully they'll give HD media a shot. Who knows!

Well I could care less about lossless at this point, I'm still using S/PDIF on both my HD DVD and Blu-Ray players.

I'm glad I took this time to add so much to this discussion.

...not ever considering the fact that some movies can sound just as good with 1.5 mbit DD+. Sad indeed.

Approaching this from another perspective, I challenge you to show me a single review that saids the loseless track sounds worse than the lossy.

For me, audio quality is FAR more important than video. Our standards should be much higher than settling for DD+.

Wow, the tone of this thread is excellent. Excellent posts by all. Let's keep it going and show what AVS can really be about. I especially want to thank you archangel37 because the post I responded to was just slightly acerbic but your last post is excellent.

I'm gonna cherry pick a few issues here and in some case only post a partial quote. If I take anything out of context by doing please call me on it.


I know that 24 bits has a wider dynamic range, but I've also heard that many master tracks aren't recorded at 24 bits anyway.
I'm not in the know either. I have read where an insider stated that the music tracks tend to be 24 bits and sound effects are also 24 bits. The main dialogue may be at lower bitrates for some movies but this is an educated (some would say poorly) guess by me based on going through many posts. It appears that 24 bits is becoming/has become more prevalent.


We really need a reputable website or AV magazine to put these theories to the test. It's a wonder no one has stepped up to the plate, as yet.

Agreed. However, if you want to do some testing on your own, Richard from R&B Films is putting togther a disc that will have different vidoe encodes at different bitrates and the same for audio. You can see for yourself. BTW: I own Natures Journey from this studio and it perhaps the best visuals I have ever seen. Check it out!


And no, I don't think you're stupid! :o

I wasn't offended, noticed I put a sarcastic face there. :)


1. I bet some of the people who say "lossless or bust" on Transformers are probably bitter Blu-ray fans; some likely are HD DVD owners who simply prefer
"the look and sound of perfect" as consistently advertised by Toshiba.
LOL, lot's of truth in that one.


3). Agreed as well -- I think they'll add a few minutes, generally useless,
throw in a new extra, slap some TrueHD on it, and call it the Super Special
Titanium Edition.

I usually go for the gold editions. At least you can melt those down
and get some money back hwne you find out they really didn't add much. :)
Actually, I never double dip for those types of releases.


I also completely agree with your opinion that bringing HD DVD and Blu-ray into this discussion is, for the most part, unnecessary. And I'm sorry if my little logical game came across as me trying to "prove some facts." I wasn't going for that, and I acknowledge that there are some VERY important assumptions I made.

still...
1) If space or bandwidth is not an issue, why not use lossless, again, if for
no other reason than marketing.

That is what confounds me. The logic is so simple that if that is true, we
should see a lot more TrueHD tracks (LPCM on HD DVD is not a good use of
limited resource). That's why I really want to know why losssy is used. There
must be something we're missing or not being told.

One thing I have read that may be messing this up is that TrueHD encodes have a problem. At times, the bitrate jumps dramatically, cutting into the limited bandwidth available which would then limit the bandwidth you have for video. It sounds like it a bug. The fact is you have to give the audio the peak bandwidth required otherwise you'll get sound drop outs which is not acceptable. I suppose they can reencode around these trouble spots, but it may be prevalent and not worth doing.

As long as HD DVD discs stick at 1.0 speeds, you'll need high quality, low bit rate encodes. That's a fact. And TrueHD in it's current for may not be able to deliver. Hence DD+ which has no such problem.


3) If true, I think that's one argument against HD DVD! We shouldn't be bumping up against format limitations already, if you ask me.

I'm not sure how big a problem this is. Natures Journey has a 26mbps VC-1
encode and a 96/24 DTS HD (not DTS HD MA) track. It's has a playing time of 67 minutes and is on a single layer 15GB HD DVD. Richard admitted that he didn't really try to find the optimal Video encode rate and pumped it up to 26 when it may have been equally fine at a lower bitrate. That would have allowed for a lossless track.

An aside.
Interesting Factoid (Doing this from memory so it my be a Jim kollar factoid):

HD DVD and Blu ray have the exact same bitrate. At 1X you pull the data off the disks at exacly the same rate of 36mbps. The advantage to BD is that you need slower rotational speeds for the same datarate. In any event, to get the 54Mbps on BD you need 1.5x speeds which is alrady being done.

If, and a big if, TL51 discs at 1.5x were to become producable, there would be no real difference between the two as far as disc specs go. Max bitrates and storage would nearly identical. But I digress, just thought some of you might find that interesting.


I think Universal is (or was?) the only studio encoding at 1.5 megabits for
DD+. Paramount was doing in the 700 K range and Warner is (was?) doing in the 600K range for both DD+ and DD. I think most of the reviews were on Warner titles with similar, if not exact, bitrates between the DD+ and DD tracks. Still, very interesting indeed. Also worth a look for some serious AV website or magazine.

Just goes to show you can't trust eveerything you read. :D


Thank you for not lumping me in with the transformers bigots -- ha ha -- which sounds hilarious!
You are so not in that crowd! Have you read some of these bigots posts? They're laugable. I'd be embarrassed.


In any case, I really agree with your last few statements -- not buying a movie or knocking HD DVD because the non use of lossless or the inadequate use of lossless is probably silly. But I would LOVE to hear why studios are choosing not to use lossless -- is a cost thing? Space thing? Bandwidth thing? Lazinessthing? Double dipping thing? And until we have a firmer, more scientific grasp on what, if any, differences there are between HQ lossless and HQ lossy tracks, we'll have troube determining whether any of this even matters.

Still fun to talk about though. ha. :rolleyes:

Oh, I have enjoyed this very much!

Approaching this from another perspective, I challenge you to show me a single review that saids the loseless track sounds worse than the lossy.

For me, audio quality is FAR more important than video. Our standards should be much higher than settling for DD+.

I do not believe anyone has made that claim. You can't turn the argument around that way, it's not being "scientific". The arugument is, and remains that DD+ can sound as good as a lossless track. I ask you, prove otherwise.

I believe that a lot of people are happy with DD or DD+ because they have never heard anything better. Here is something they can do with very little money (but some effort). All you need is any surround receiver, even a 15 year old Dolby Pro-Logic receiver, and cheap 30 year old Dynaco speakers.

Go borrow a laserdisc player (they are worth essentially nothing, so you can even buy one for $25). Get a major studio release laserdisc, preferably Jurasic Park, and go to the end segment where the helicopter is flying off into the sunet.

The audio quality will blow you away (it's in PCM as are virtually all laserdiscs), and is so consitently good from laserdisc title to laserdisc title, that you will wonder how you ever settle for DD or DD+.

Go borrow a laserdisc player (they are worth essentially nothing, so you can even buy one for $25). Get a major studio release laserdisc, preferably Jurasic Park, and go to the end segment where the helicopter is flying off into the sunet.

The audio quality will blow you away (it's in PCM as are virtually all laserdiscs), and is so consitently good from laserdisc title to laserdisc title, that you will wonder how you ever settle for DD or DD+.

I don't know if it's because it was in PCM, but I have to say my biggest disappointment in going to DVD from laserdisc was the audio experience in Jurassic Park. I always used the T-Rex in the rain at night with the goat part falling onto the stalled car as my demonstration material for surround sound. The rain, the footsteps, the roar of the T-Rex, all of it made for one of the most enveloping experiences I've ever had with home theater.

Now, I have what should be a better system in every way and I get absolutely nothing special out of the audio from that movie. If that sound experience cannot be recreated in DD+, the I don't want it.

I am an HD DVD owner, but I'm still seeking the JP laserdisc audio experience of years ago, and to my ears, King Kong does not deliver it.

I always used the T-Rex in the rain at night with the goat part falling onto the stalled car as my demonstration material for surround sound. The rain, the footsteps, the roar of the T-Rex, all of it made for one of the most enveloping experiences I've ever had with home theater.


I was going to mention that scene as well. As for KK, I find that the DD+ track on the HD-DVD sounds "thin", even though I have to admit that it is the best of the DD+ tracks I have heard.

It boggles my mind that we had better audio quality 25 years ago than today.

I don't know if it's because it was in PCM, but I have to say my biggest disappointment in going to DVD from laserdisc was the audio experience in Jurassic Park. I always used the T-Rex in the rain at night with the goat part falling onto the stalled car as my demonstration material for surround sound. The rain, the footsteps, the roar of the T-Rex, all of it made for one of the most enveloping experiences I've ever had with home theater.

Now, I have what should be a better system in every way and I get absolutely nothing special out of the audio from that movie. If that sound experience cannot be recreated in DD+, the I don't want it.

I am an HD DVD owner, but I'm still seeking the JP laserdisc audio experience of years ago, and to my ears, King Kong does not deliver it.

Just curious. What kind of sound is available with JP laserdisc ? (1.5mbs DTS ? PCM ? I missed out. I agree "King Kong" was a sonic disappointment but maybe my expectations were too high.

Just a minor point, not meant to stir up trouble, but if you only watch lossless, then what about all the broadcast material? The HD stations at best have gone to DD 5.1. And I have some amazing recordings from them. The NBC broadcast of The Eagles Farewell Tour 1 was phenomenol. I've preserved it on DVHS and still listen to it periodically.

Just curious. What kind of sound is available with JP laserdisc ? (1.5mbs DTS ? PCM ? I missed out. I agree "King Kong" was a sonic disappointment but maybe my expectations were too high.

PCM. There is no DTS or DD.

Just a minor point, not meant to stir up trouble, but if you only watch lossless, then what about all the broadcast material? The HD stations at best have gone to DD 5.1. And I have some amazing recordings from them. The NBC broadcast of The Eagles Farewell Tour 1 was phenomenol. I've preserved it on DVHS and still listen to it periodically.

Have you heard the Eagles "Hotel California" on DVD-A (5.1 24/96 MLP (lossless) audio) ? That's the standard you should be shooting for in music. Actually 5.1 SACD or 24/192 lossless would be even better. Most anything can sound awesome until you've heard better.

I've had to alternate between watching "Hotel California" on DVD with lossy DTS, but I'm not happy with the sound because I've heard the DVD-A 24/96 sound.;Or listening to the the DVD-A but I'm still not happy because there's no video. Blu-ray gives me the possibility of having both video (high def at that) and 5.1 24/96 (or better) lossless audio.

I don't know if it's because it was in PCM, but I have to say my biggest disappointment in going to DVD from laserdisc was the audio experience in Jurassic Park. I always used the T-Rex in the rain at night with the goat part falling onto the stalled car as my demonstration material for surround sound. The rain, the footsteps, the roar of the T-Rex, all of it made for one of the most enveloping experiences I've ever had with home theater.

Now, I have what should be a better system in every way and I get absolutely nothing special out of the audio from that movie. If that sound experience cannot be recreated in DD+, then I don't want it.

I am an HD DVD owner, but I'm still seeking the JP laserdisc audio experience of years ago, and to my ears, King Kong does not deliver it.

Truer words could not be spoken! Man I remember JP on LD and damn that rocked! I do believe it was only DTS and not PCM (if I remember correctly it was PCM for stereo) for surround but at the time it felt so new and exciting like 5.1 PCM does now- This is the number one reason I support Blu-Ray more than HD-DVD, I'm really hoping by CES '08 Uni will go both ways (you know what I mean-Say no more;);).)

POTC (BD): 48/24 LPCM vs DD 640kbps.
Minor diffences between the 2. LPCM is crisper, seems to be more directional. DD track though was no slouch. Without the A/B test I probably would not have know the difference.
+1 for LPCM


Out of curiosity I just did this myself. Although I'd call the difference a bit more than minor, it's certainly not a great difference. Given the LPCM is about 7mbit vs 640k for the DD+, the latter's compression hit is pretty minimal.

I honestly tried to find the specs on the LD version of Jurassic park. This is what I came across.

http://www.yanman.com/HomeTheater/Reviews/JurassicParkReview.htm

I do not know if this is correct, but the review erclearly states that the laser disk uses DD 2.0 Prologic. I would assume that this encoded into a PCM stream hence the confusion. In any event, no where can I find where it is stated that the master PCM track was directly transferred to laserdisc. If that was not done, then you're hearing the DD or DTS track converted to PCM. Do laser disc players decode DTS or even DD? I really know very little about LD capabilities. After all, in the end all formats must drive the DACs and PCM is the end result of all conversions. It just that a PCM track does not need to be converted.

I completely agree about the more recent tone of this thread -- it's how I wish all the other threads would be like. Cordial, honest, and admitting our limitations where they appear.

Like I said, almost no real knowledge of the studio masters -- but I have no reason to doubt what you say, and that makes me happy. I'm all for more bits! :cool:

I actually haven't made the plunge into HD media as yet! I've been waiting for Samsung's UP5000 player --- and silently cursing its rumored delay! Everything else is ready to go -- Onkyo 605, Sharp 37" 1080p display, 6.1 speaker setup -- about the best I can get away with in a Berkeley apartment! ha.

Nature's Journey is absolutely one of the first titles I'll pick up, however. And I'll look forward to doing my own A/B tests -- although the reason I wanted a site like audioholics to do it is so we can all yell at one place/person. tee hee.

I try my best to avoid double dips -- and have generally been very good at it -- but throw me a good Diamond Edition with some fuzzy dice, and you might get another convert.

Like you, I just want to know WHY studios aren't using lossless all the time -- maybe that will change with the more recent introduction of DTS MA hardware?

That does sound like a bug -- even if it's not. Still, it is this sort of thing that makes me wonder about HD DVD.

IF, and as you say, a big if, HD DVD does pull out a TL 51 disc, that would (presumably) go a long way to erasing the technical advantage, IF current players could use those discs. I wonder how the BDA would counter - TL 75 discs? Free toasters?

I have read the Transformers thread and would be embarrassed saying some of those things. But obviously, that happens all to frequently on both sides of this silly format war.

In any case, I would gleefully like to thank you for your sane, reasonable, and humorous take on all this. Again, lots of fun. Let's keep it up.

Wow, the tone of this thread is excellent. Excellent posts by all. Let's keep it going and show what AVS can really be about. I especially want to thank you archangel37 because the post I responded to was just slightly acerbic but your last post is excellent.

I'm gonna cherry pick a few issues here and in some case only post a partial quote. If I take anything out of context by doing please call me on it.


I'm not in the know either. I have read where an insider stated that the music tracks tend to be 24 bits and sound effects are also 24 bits. The main dialogue may be at lower bitrates for some movies but this is an educated (some would say poorly) guess by me based on going through many posts. It appears that 24 bits is becoming/has become more prevalent.


Agreed. However, if you want to do some testing on your own, Richard from R&B Films is putting togther a disc that will have different vidoe encodes at different bitrates and the same for audio. You can see for yourself. BTW: I own Natures Journey from this studio and it perhaps the best visuals I have ever seen. Check it out!


I wasn't offended, noticed I put a sarcastic face there. :)

LOL, lot's of truth in that one.


I usually go for the gold editions. At least you can melt those down
and get some money back hwne you find out they really didn't add much. :)
Actually, I never double dip for those types of releases.


That is what confounds me. The logic is so simple that if that is true, we
should see a lot more TrueHD tracks (LPCM on HD DVD is not a good use of
limited resource). That's why I really want to know why losssy is used. There
must be something we're missing or not being told.

One thing I have read that may be messing this up is that TrueHD encodes have a problem. At times, the bitrate jumps dramatically, cutting into the limited bandwidth available which would then limit the bandwidth you have for video. It sounds like it a bug. The fact is you have to give the audio the peak bandwidth required otherwise you'll get sound drop outs which is not acceptable. I suppose they can reencode around these trouble spots, but it may be prevalent and not worth doing.

As long as HD DVD discs stick at 1.0 speeds, you'll need high quality, low bit rate encodes. That's a fact. And TrueHD in it's current for may not be able to deliver. Hence DD+ which has no such problem.


I'm not sure how big a problem this is. Natures Journey has a 26mbps VC-1
encode and a 96/24 DTS HD (not DTS HD MA) track. It's has a playing time of 67 minutes and is on a single layer 15GB HD DVD. Richard admitted that he didn't really try to find the optimal Video encode rate and pumped it up to 26 when it may have been equally fine at a lower bitrate. That would have allowed for a lossless track.

An aside.
Interesting Factoid (Doing this from memory so it my be a Jim kollar factoid):

HD DVD and Blu ray have the exact same bitrate. At 1X you pull the data off the disks at exacly the same rate of 36mbps. The advantage to BD is that you need slower rotational speeds for the same datarate. In any event, to get the 54Mbps on BD you need 1.5x speeds which is alrady being done.

If, and a big if, TL51 discs at 1.5x were to become producable, there would be no real difference between the two as far as disc specs go. Max bitrates and storage would nearly identical. But I digress, just thought some of you might find that interesting.


Just goes to show you can't trust eveerything you read. :D

You are so not in that crowd! Have you read some of these bigots posts? They're laugable. I'd be embarrassed.



Oh, I have enjoyed this very much!

Out of curiosity I just did this myself. Although I'd call the difference a bit more than minor, it's certainly not a great difference. Given the LPCM is about 7mbit vs 640k for the DD+, the latter's compression hit is pretty minimal.

Thanks arfster! I was hoping someone would step up to the plate. Did this go against your preconcieved notions?

BTW: I don't think the 640k track is DD+. If, and I stress if I remember this right, the downconvert is to DD only. DD+ will downconvert to DD DTS which is arguably a better encode.

Go borrow a laserdisc player (they are worth essentially nothing, so you can even buy one for $25). Get a major studio release laserdisc, preferably Jurasic Park, and go to the end segment where the helicopter is flying off into the sunet......The audio quality will blow you away (it's in PCM as are virtually all laserdiscs), and is so consitently good from laserdisc title to laserdisc title, that you will wonder how you ever settle for DD or DD+.

I even had Dynaco speakers...A-25's and A-35's....back to the dino movie, Jurassic Park, IMO, the Muse LD's audio is even better than any of the NTSC LD's I've seen. They toy with us too much over audio!

My Panny takes True and outputs it as PCM and it seems pretty comparable.....

Have you heard the Eagles "Hotel California" on DVD-A (5.1 24/96 MLP (lossless) audio) ? That's the standard you should be shooting for in music. Actually 5.1 SACD or 24/192 lossless would be even better. Most anything can sound awesome until you've heard better.

I've had to alternate between watching "Hotel California" on DVD with lossy DTS, but I'm not happy with the sound because I've heard the DVD-A 24/96 sound.;Or listening to the the DVD-A but I'm still not happy because there's no video. Blu-ray gives me the possibility of having both video (high def at that) and 5.1 24/96 (or better) lossless audio.

Forgive me for taking on only a few of your points.

There are indeed HDM discs out there where music is the main source and some of them have a 96/24 lossless encode. Don't know of any at 196 though, but I digress. Of course I would love to have just such a disc of Hotel California but you are not comparing apples to apples. You have a DTS encode at 48/16 compared to 96/24. Of course you're gonna be blown away by the latter.

However, when talking about film about the best you're gonna hear is 48/24 and in many cases 48/16. That's a fact and it's not gonna change soon. There are exceptions, but they are rare.

And finally why are you bringing BD into this? I have already pointed out a title that is HD DVD that has a 5.0 (no LFE track apparently) at 96/24 DTS HD and a 26mbps VC-1 encode. 67 minutes long and on a SL 15 HD DVD.

Forgive me for taking on only a few of your points.

There are indeed HDM discs out there where music is the main source and some of them have a 96/24 lossless encode. Don't know of any at 196 though, but I digress. Of course I would love to have just such a disc of Hotel California but you are not comparing apples to apples. You have a DTS encode at 48/16 compared to 96/24. Of course you're gonna be blown away by the latter.

However, when talking about film about the best you're gonna hear is 48/24 and in many cases 48/16. That's a fact and it's not gonna change soon. There are exceptions, but they are rare.

And finally why are you bringing BD into this? I have already pointed out a title that is HD DVD that has a 5.0 (no LFE track apparently) at 96/24 DTS HD and a 26mbps VC-1 encode. 67 minutes long and on a SL 15 HD DVD.


If you are referring to the Nature's Journey HD DVD, it's only DTS HD HR @ 3Mbps (about 1/3-1/2 the bitrate for 5.1 24/96 PCM). And RBFilms got beat up pretty good anyway because they didn't include a lossless audio track on HD DVD because of bandwidth limitations. I wish they had used full lossless and cranked down the video bitrate to fit to see what the end result would have been video-wise.

And I guess I'll reiterate I'm interested in music videos as well as movies; in which case sound quality becomes much more important.

I honestly tried to find the specs on the LD version of Jurassic park. This is what I came across.

http://www.yanman.com/HomeTheater/Reviews/JurassicParkReview.htm

I do not know if this is correct, but the review erclearly states that the laser disk uses DD 2.0 Prologic. I would assume that this encoded into a PCM stream hence the confusion. In any event, no where can I find where it is stated that the master PCM track was directly transferred to laserdisc. If that was not done, then you're hearing the DD or DTS track converted to PCM. Do laser disc players decode DTS or even DD? I really know very little about LD capabilities. After all, in the end all formats must drive the DACs and PCM is the end result of all conversions. It just that a PCM track does not need to be converted.

At a time when I paid no attention to specs, I had both the JP laserdisc (since sold) and DVD. There was no comparison. I don't know how or why the sound was so much more impressive to me, but I've seen this mentioned by others here as well. The audio was far superior to my ears on the LD.

Yes.

PiP - Only a concern for a few consumers?

YES.

At a time when I paid no attention to specs, I had both the JP laserdisc (since sold) and DVD. There was no comparison. I don't know how or why the sound was so much more impressive to me, but I've seen this mentioned by others here as well. The audio was far superior to my ears on the LD.

With all due repsect, I am not questioning that the sound on LD was superior. What I question was was it lossless? At what sampling rate and bit depth? And what did you compare it against? Unless you compare lossless apples to lossly apples you do not have a datapoint. :) And, you may indeed be saying that your Dolbly Pro Logic II of JP on LD blew away your DVD DD DTS recording or perhaps you were only listening to it in stereo (that makes more sense btw). In a way, this entire thread is about specs. It's title: "Lossless audio - Only a concern for a few consumers".

I'm more concerned about audio mixes where the dialog is sometimes at such a low level that it's hard to hear. If you turn up the volume, in a few minutes you have to turn it back down to avoid blasting the neighbors in the adjacent apartment.

If you are referring to the Nature's Journey HD DVD, it's only DTS HD HR @ 3Mbps (about 1/3-1/2 the bitrate for 5.1 24/96 PCM). And RBFilms got beat up pretty good anyway because they didn't include a lossless audio track on HD DVD because of bandwidth limitations. I wish they had used full lossless and cranked down the video bitrate to fit to see what the end result would have been video-wise.

And I guess I'll reiterate I'm interested in music videos as well as movies; in which case sound quality becomes much more important.

Yeah, Richard got beat up bad about that one. And I too wish he had put a lossless track on the title for comparison but he did not. It also would probably have be DD DTS MA which I can't decode anyway. :)

I only have two points to make here:

1) VC-1 and TrueHD (haven't heard DTS HD MA but would assume the same) can produce high quality video and audio at realtively low bit rates. Bandwidth is not the big issue as some would make it to be.

2) In theory, you should not hear a diffence between TrueHD - PCM - DD DTS MA (drop the subulties please: i.e dialnorm). I doubt you could hear a difference between the lossless tracks and DD+ HD with the original and DD+ tracks coming from the the same source and at the same sampling frequencies and bit depths.

Yeah, Richard got beat up bad about that one. And I too wish he had put a lossless track on the title for comparison but he did not. It also would probably have be DD DTS MA which I can't decode anyway. :)

I only have two points to make here:

1) VC-1 and TrueHD (haven't heard DTS HD MA but would assume the same) can produce high quality video and audio at realtively low bit rates. Bandwidth is not the big issue as some would make it to be.

2) In theory, you should not hear a diffence between TrueHD - PCM - DD DTS MA (drop the subulties please: i.e dialnorm). I doubt you could hear a difference between the lossless tracks and DD+ HD with the original and DD+ tracks coming from the the same source and at the same sampling frequencies and bit depths.


That's a supposition on lossy vs lossless. Until I hear otherwise, my working assumption is lossless will always be discernibly better. I imagine in a few days/weeks we'll start hearing from a few folks who will be able to directly compare DTS core @1.5Mbs with DTS HD MA with multiple movies. I believe most of the DDplus tracks are also at 1.5Mbs so it should be roughly equivalent to a DD+/TrueHD comparison (dialnorm not withstanding...)

I'm more concerned about audio mixes where the dialog is sometimes at such a low level that it's hard to hear. If you turn up the volume, in a few minutes you have to turn it back down to avoid blasting the neighbors in the adjacent apartment.

I've permanently elevated my front centre channel for said reason. On occasion, I'll pause the film and turn down the centre channel. Those are rare occasions! Also, does your head unit have a Night Mode?

That's a supposition on lossy vs lossless. Until I hear otherwise, my working assumption is lossless will always be discernibly better. I imagine in a few days/weeks we'll start hearing from a few folks who will be able to directly compare DTS core @1.5Mbs with DTS HD MA with multiple movies. I believe most of the DDplus tracks are also at 1.5Mbs so it should be roughly equivalent to a DD+/TrueHD comparison (dialnorm not withstanding...)

That is exactly what I am positing. I have read where industry insiders who actually mix these tracks have stated that they cannot accurately tell the difference, even on their own tracks.

To be fair, Richard claims he can. I'm not buying it. For me, the jury is still out. I have mentioned a title that no one has challenged me on, Happy Feet. It is the sheer vitriol that "some" in the lossless camp have against DD+ and linking in HD DVD that has gotten my dander up. To the lossless crowd, I say prove it. I have done my best to provide examples for my viewpoint.

That is exactly what I am positing. I have read where industry insiders who actually mix these tracks have stated that they cannot accurately tell the difference, even on their own tracks.

To be fair, Richard claims he can. I'm not buying it. For me, the jury is still out. I have mentioned a title that no one has challenged me on, Happy Feet. It is the sheer vitriol that "some" in the lossless camp have against DD+ and linking in HD DVD that has gotten my dander up. To the lossless crowd, I say prove it. I have done my best to provide examples for my viewpoint.

Unfortunately, "Happy Feet" isn't my cup of tea. There will be other movies (I hope) which will be suitable for comparisons.

"Nature's Journey" wasn't my cup of tea either but in the interests of "Science" (?), we might put this one to a blind (er...unknown source) video test. I got a buddy with 1080p 126" FP.

Unfortunately, "Happy Feet" isn't my cup of tea. There will be other movies (I hope) which will be suitable for comparisons.

"Nature's Journey" wasn't my cup of tea either but in the interests of "Science" (?), we might put this one to a blind (er...unknown source) video test. I got a buddy with 1080p 126" FP.

I agree about Nature's Journey but I had to see it just because it pushed the envelope. That said, I learned alot just by watching the title and talking about it. For example, there was banding in some scenes but that came from the master. No amount of encoding is gonna get rid of that. Did not expect that at all. Also, you are aware that the source was shot in 1080i? But I digress....

I wasn't gonna buy Happy Feet but one of my HD buds stated it was reference quality so I decided to get it. The visuals are phenomenal as you would expect with an animated film and the music was surprisingly good. I don't have kids (I'm a dink) so it was even harder for me to justify but I bit the bullet anyway. Not the best movie, but for PQ and AQ, very good video and very good audio even at 48/16.

With all due repsect, I am not questioning that the sound on LD was superior. What I question was was it lossless? At what sampling rate and bit depth? And what did you compare it against? Unless you compare lossless apples to lossly apples you do not have a datapoint. :) And, you may indeed be saying that your Dolbly Pro Logic II of JP on LD blew away your DVD DD DTS recording or perhaps you were only listening to it in stereo (that makes more sense btw). In a way, this entire thread is about specs. It's title: "Lossless audio - Only a concern for a few consumers".

With all due respect in return, I didn't realize this thread was about specs. I thought it was about audio quality. I guess I'm not following.

I was listening to Dolby Pro Logic II analog output stereo LD. Based on my understanding, it was lossless. My point was that I found the DD output of the DVD to be inferior to the stereo Pro Logic output. Since it's the same movie and the same scenes with originally the same equipment, I consider this to be an apples to apples comparison.

The LD sound was stunning. I do realize that it was great for its time, and maybe that's coloring my memory, but there really are not "data points" for how our ears perceive the signals they receive. My initial assumption was that DVD, with its improved video quality would at least match the LD audio. IMO, that was not the case.

With all due respect in return, I didn't realize this thread was about specs. I thought it was about audio quality. I guess I'm not following.

I was listening to Dolby Pro Logic II analog output stereo LD. Based on my understanding, it was lossless. My point was that I found the DD output of the DVD to be inferior to the stereo Pro Logic output. Since it's the same movie and the same scenes with originally the same equipment, I consider this to be an apples to apples comparison.

The LD sound was stunning. I do realize that it was great for its time, and maybe that's coloring my memory, but there really are not "data points" for how our ears perceive the signals they receive. My initial assumption was that DVD, with its improved video quality would at least match the LD audio. IMO, that was not the case.

I'm not questioning that. I believe you actually think your heard better sound quality on your LD. :D (Small joke, please take out the think in the last sentence, really just joking). Actually, I really do believe you.

I don't know if you remember, but I mentioned that I used End of Days as a title to compare TrueHD to DD+. I breifly tried the DD 2.0 (Pro Logic) track and was frightened. It sounded better to me than the TrueHD track I was just listening to. Of course, I immediately stopped listening because I could not stand to have my holy cow theory blasphemed by such a lowly encode.

I have not reported this because I thought I would be at best laughed at and at worst banished from AVS altogether. If I get my courage up, I may try this test again.

And for you I have this link:

http://www.mindspring.com/~laserdisc-forever/prologue.htm

(added brief quote at end of my post)

Not sure what to make of it but your ears were not deceiving you! I started thinking about it and I seemd to remember that LD had analog stereo tracks, hence the search. If you're gonna toss LD into this discussion, then I'm in big trouble! :( ;)
Analog stereo tracks? Yep, that's lossless and we'll NEVER get that on BD or HD DVD. Seems like a format that was ahead of it's time.




BTW: I may have said this badly. My interpertation:

This thread is about lossless audio. I have taken that to mean lossless in the digital domain. Once you switch to the time domain we're back to analog and lossless no longer applies except for degradation of an analog signal.

Some tend to lump lossless all under one roof. Unfortunately, since we are in the digital domain, lossless must also be talked about as to the information it contains. For example, how many samples were taken over a given timeframe? What is the bit depth of the slice of sound you a taking? Not all lossless is equal.

I have also read into the title, perhaps at my own peril, that the opposite of losssless is lossy so when making points about lossless audio it is appropriate to talk about lossy encodes at the same time where some of the digital information is interpolated (thrown away if you like). Unfortunately this is all in the digital domain so specs and compression techniques are important. It's how these specs and their compression techniques get translated to the real world (re: time domain via DACs) that is subjective and is the point of the discussion.
------------------------------------------------------
From link:

The audio is a different story. Listening in 2-channel stereo, laserdisc audio almost always sounds richer and fuller than its compressed DVD counterpart. DVD sound quality is generally acceptable, but barring substantial mastering differences the 2-channel downmix sounds thinner and less vibrant than the uncompressed PCM audio on a laserdisc. Both formats offer Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1 channel surround sound for those with high end audio equipment, and these soundtracks tend to be closer in quality (with the edge still usually going to laserdisc).

As for the reasons why this happens, there are several factors at work:

Laserdiscs have four separate and distinct audio channels. Two carry the PCM digital stereo signal and two carry the analog stereo. If a laserdisc includes a Dolby Digital 5.1 track, that signal is distributed in RF-modulated form through one of the analog channels. The other analog channel usually has either a mono sound mix or an audio commentary. This leaves both digital stereo tracks free.

With all due respect in return, I didn't realize this thread was about specs. I thought it was about audio quality. I guess I'm not following.

I was listening to Dolby Pro Logic II analog output stereo LD. Based on my understanding, it was lossless. My point was that I found the DD output of the DVD to be inferior to the stereo Pro Logic output. Since it's the same movie and the same scenes with originally the same equipment, I consider this to be an apples to apples comparison.

The LD sound was stunning. I do realize that it was great for its time, and maybe that's coloring my memory, but there really are not "data points" for how our ears perceive the signals they receive. My initial assumption was that DVD, with its improved video quality would at least match the LD audio. IMO, that was not the case.

Dolby Pro Logic II is a lossy format, but maybe what you heard was an uncompressed PCM stereo track. I have no idea. My first thought was the quality of DAC and analog circuitry could be a lot better in the LD player but DACs have gotten a lot better since.

Dolby Pro Logic II is a lossy formatPLII is surround processing, not data compression. So it can't be "lossy". That would be like saying bass management is lossy because it can be applied to a legacy DD or DTS signal.

Sanjay

Dolby Pro Logic II is a lossy format, but maybe what you heard was an uncompressed PCM stereo track. I have no idea. My first thought was the quality of DAC and analog circuitry could be a lot better in the LD player but DACs have gotten a lot better since.

As stated above, the Pro Logic II was the surround sound decoding done in the receiver of the PCM stereo tracks. The sound was better, extremely full and rich (all subjective terms, but that's what we have). I guess as we continue to go backwards as far as digitized audio, it's time for me to upgrade to the best, most natural sounding DACs I can find.

I've permanently elevated my front centre channel for said reason. On occasion, I'll pause the film and turn down the centre channel. Those are rare occasions! Also, does your head unit have a Night Mode?
I'm running a 4.0 system -- that is with a "phantom" center channel. Your question about a "night" mode is very interesting. I looked in the manual for my Sony DG800 AVR. It turns out to have a compression level setting - off, standard and maximum. It says this only works with Dolby Digital signals. From my regular DVD player this would be a nice option. My Toshiba HD-A1 converts many signals to DTS so that presumably won't work.

Thanks for the question! I'll give it a test. Hopefully I'll remember to set it back to standard or off...
Ron

Thanks arfster! I was hoping someone would step up to the plate. Did this go against your preconcieved notions?


A little yes - although I'm pretty dubious there's much of a difference between lossless and 1.5mbit DD+ (3:1 compression in AV should really be completely transparent with today's tech), 640k is basically DVD bitrates. I expected it to be more obvious.

A little yes - although I'm pretty dubious there's much of a difference between lossless and 1.5mbit DD+ (3:1 compression in AV should really be completely transparent with today's tech), 640k is basically DVD bitrates. I expected it to be more obvious.

I finally upgraded to the latest Pioneer Elite receiver. I have say I'm a little underwelmed by lossless. I through in Apocalypto and listened to it's lossless track and it wasn't the major improvement I was expecting...

:eek:

I say again, we really need audioholics or some reputable AV magazine to do some serious A/B testing -- it will remove a lot of the variables involved and give us a better picture of what, if any, differences there are between high quality lossless and high quality lossy tracks.

No doubt, this will vary from disc to disc, and even from scene to scene.

I like to believe that I was never under the spell that Lossless = 200% better than lossy; but either Dolby and DTS were lying about how transparent there DD+ and DTS 1.5 megabits core tracks are, or they are lying about much of a difference there is between those and their lossless counterparts.

Thanks for the question! I'll give it a test. Hopefully I'll remember to set it back to standard or off...
Ron

You're welcome! :) I hope it works for ya. I'm 5 years graduated from my apartment dayz.....back then I actually used, yuck ;), my Night Mode....that's what Marantz calls it.

Uncompressed audio always sounds better(or equal) to the compressed tracks. Sometimes its a big difference, sometimes its small, but its better and thats all that matters. You don't need very good speakers to tell the difference either. I was living with DD from dvd for a long time. First time I heard an uncompressed audio track, it was a BIG difference. Screw DD, DD+ etc.. I won't buy a blu-ray that doesn't have an uncompressed audio track, I want the best picture AND sound I can get, however big or small the difference is.

Uncompressed audio always sounds better(or equal) to the compressed tracks. Sometimes its a big difference, sometimes its small, but its better and thats all that matters. You don't need very good speakers to tell the difference either. I was living with DD from dvd for a long time. First time I heard an uncompressed audio track, it was a BIG difference. Screw DD, DD+ etc.. I won't buy a blu-ray that doesn't have an uncompressed audio track, I want the best picture AND sound I can get, however big or small the difference is.

Whatever.

Whatever.

What do you mean whatever?? Are there any DD+ or DTS tracks that sound better then the uncompressed pcm track?? No. The uncompressed track is ALL the data. Maybe the difference is small sometimes, but at worst they are equal.

Look at video quality. We have a Tier rating now of BR movies. 0 is the best and it goes down from there. The difference between 0 and 1 can be VERY small, but people notice small things. Sometimes its just a brief color banding or a bit of grain a frame or 2 that seperates tier 0 from tier 1. For sound its the same thing. Maybe the only difference was a more realistic sword clang, a crisper dialog, a slightly wider more difuse sound. Whatever, its LITTLE things that make the differnce. Some people spend $10k on a speaker over a $1k speaker. Why?? Because of a SMALL difference in certain sounds. To most people the $1k speaker would sound perfect, to others they are looking got the small little things that seperate the two and make you say wow. People spend thousands of $$ more on expensive cables(which do nothing really) in hopes to make the picture/sound just a hair better.

For some people, a movie can be made by just one super detailed scene or one sound that just sounded so real. Something that makes you say WOW one time. The difference in LPCM to DD+ sometimes is just enough to make you think WOW, instead of very nice. I think most of use early blu-ray/HD-DVD people appreciate any little improvement.

What do you mean whatever?? Are there any DD+ or DTS tracks that sound better then the uncompressed pcm track?? No. The uncompressed track is ALL the data. Maybe the difference is small sometimes, but at worst they are equal.

Look at video quality. We have a Tier rating now of BR movies. 0 is the best and it goes down from there. The difference between 0 and 1 can be VERY small, but people notice small things. Sometimes its just a brief color banding or a bit of grain a frame or 2 that seperates tier 0 from tier 1. For sound its the same thing. Maybe the only difference was a more realistic sword clang, a crisper dialog, a slightly wider more difuse sound. Whatever, its LITTLE things that make the differnce. Some people spend $10k on a speaker over a $1k speaker. Why?? Because of a SMALL difference in certain sounds. To most people the $1k speaker would sound perfect, to others they are looking got the small little things that seperate the two and make you say wow. People spend thousands of $$ more on expensive cables(which do nothing really) in hopes to make the picture/sound just a hair better.

For some people, a movie can be made by just one super detailed scene or one sound that just sounded so real. Something that makes you say WOW one time. The difference in LPCM to DD+ sometimes is just enough to make you think WOW, instead of very nice. I think most of use early blu-ray/HD-DVD people appreciate any little improvement.

Agreed, and also I guess the OP was also refering to 2 different user, the normal can't be bothered with other than TV speakers, and us folks who spend just as much for our audio gear ( if not more) than our TVs.

In this last category, why not get the best AQ to match our PQ, and loseless is better, by how much needs to be determined, but better :)

I don't have a high end system (Onkyo 605, Polk Audio R50 speakers etc.) and I CAN hear a difference between lossy and lossless audio. There is a depth and vibrancy in lossless that is absent from vanilla DD & DTS. I can only imagine just how much better it would sound if I had high end components.

My components put me squarely in the 95% crowd, not the 5%.

+1 (got the same Onkyo). I hear a difference, but discs not having lossless will not stop me from buying them.

Although for what Fox and Paramount charge EVERY SINGLE ONE had better have lossless.

As for the $22 WB, Universal, and Sony titles, DD+ is fine for me, and lossless would just be a perk.

Are there any Universal titles with TrueHD? They are the "Look and SOUND of Perfect" folks, and after a quick look, I noticed none of my Universal titles have lossless audio, yet WB has it on almost every deserving HD-DVD title.

I rather enjoy the DTS offered on nearly every HD-DVD import.

Look at video quality. We have a Tier rating now of BR movies. 0 is the best and it goes down from there. The difference between 0 and 1 can be VERY small, but people notice small things.....

That video is compressed to approx 70 times smaller than the original, while a DD+ 16/48 track is 1/3rd the size of the original. Not exactly comparable.

Look at it another way: 1.5mbit gives 300kbit per channel. In blind tests even those with golden ears can't tell the difference between the original and 320kbit mp3s (ie 160kbit per channel). Nearly everyone fails to tell a difference between 256kbit and the original - that's well under half the bitrate per channel of DD+, and using an older compression standard.

What do you mean whatever??

Meant to be dismissive (your first post). You presented no facts, contributed nothing to the ongoing discussion. You even had the stated that you would not buy a blu ray title without uncompressed audio (hence LPCM) which means you also won't buy TruehD ot DTS HD MA compressed lossless tracks and finally, you stated that lossless always sounds better than lossy. All this as fact and no science to back it up. So hence the dismissive "whatever".

As to what you added in your second post, already talked about.

In this last category, why not get the best AQ to match our PQ, and loseless is better, by how much needs to be determined, but better :)

Amen. To me this is common sense. Lossy means it cannot be reconstructed so it is identical to the original, so by definition it is not faithful. Maybe some can hear a huge difference, maybe some cannot hear any difference, but why take the chance. We should not be setting our standards so low.

Amen. To me this is common sense. Lossy means it cannot be reconstructed so it is identical to the original, so by definition it is not faithful. Maybe some can hear a huge difference, maybe some cannot hear any difference, but why take the chance. We should not be setting our standards so low.


Indeed. Well said.

Amen. To me this is common sense. Lossy means it cannot be reconstructed so it is identical to the original, so by definition it is not faithful. Maybe some can hear a huge difference, maybe some cannot hear any difference, but why take the chance. We should not be setting our standards so low.

Setting our standards low?

Maybe .1% can hear the difference, or....maybe it's .0001% which would be completely meaningless.

If you can't perceive a difference, what's the point? I tire of the holier-than-thou attitude I see in so many posts which seem to imply that people who demand lossless, care more about AQ than those who don't. Poppycock!

I'd suggest you look for the test results which FilmMixer will be providing at some point in the not-too-distant future. They should be very enlightening.

Setting our standards low?

Maybe .1% can hear the difference, or....maybe it's .0001% which would be completely meaningless.

If you can't perceive a difference, what's the point? I tire of the holier-than-thou attitude I see in so many posts which seem to imply that people who demand lossless, care more about AQ than those who don't. Poppycock!

I'd suggest you look for the test results which FilmMixer will be providing at some point in the not-too-distant future. They should be very enlightening.

I believe it all depends on your frame of reference. Compared to SD-DVD, I am sure DD+ sounds good. But my frame of reference is PCM from laserdiscs, and frankly, I find DD+ sounds hollow and unsatifying by comparison. I sure hope this isn't as good as it gets, or else in 25 years we have not only made no progress, we have gone backwards.

I really encourage everyone to go out and buy a used laserdisc player (they are worth maybe $25), and then do your comparison. Only then will you realize how horrible DD+ is.

I believe it all depends on your frame of reference. Compared to SD-DVD, I am sure DD+ sounds good.

People here are comparing to lossless, no-one's comparing to DVD soundtracks.

Incidentally, what bitrate DD+ are you talking about? Remember Bluray DD+ is limited to 640k, and is sometimes even 448k - in other words the equivalent of a goodish mp3 per-channel bitrate. HDDVD is max 3mbit, and typically 1.5mbit - equal to a 600kbit stereo mp3, way past the point people can discern it from the original CD.

I believe it all depends on your frame of reference. Compared to SD-DVD, I am sure DD+ sounds good. But my frame of reference is PCM from laserdiscs, and frankly, I find DD+ sounds hollow and unsatifying by comparison. I sure hope this isn't as good as it gets, or else in 25 years we have not only made no progress, we have gone backwards.

I really encourage everyone to go out and buy a used laserdisc player (they are worth maybe $25), and then do your comparison. Only then will you realize how horrible DD+ is.

I find it hard to believe that your frame of refrence is PCM from laserdiscs. Are you sure? The PCM tracks on LD are at most 44.1/16 which is CD quality. I wonder, were you listening to the analog signal? Were you using RCA jacks to get the sound or optical?

It may surpise some here, but LD actually had true analog sound tracks and if done right, will sound better than than all but the finest vinyl since the SNR is improved by the lack of a physical mechanism to read the vinyl with all it's pops and hisses. If done properly, you get the analog version of the soundtrack in very high quality. I can see where this could indeed sound better than the correspond CD quality PCM track.

Today, for the "newer" formats we have only digital versions of sound tracks on CD, DVD, and HDM. That is not going to change. It's a digital world and if you don't like it, well, there's not a whole lot one can do about it.

BTW: Really, you really shouldn't like todays PCM, DD+, DD or any other digital recordings.

you stated that lossless always sounds better than lossy.

Why wouldn't it?? I didn't say it always sounds better, I said better or equal to at worst. How can a DTS-HD MA track not sound > = to the compressed lossy core track?? It has all the info of the core track PLUS a lot more data that is being compressed out. What data do I need to show you to prove this, its a simple concept. If you can't hear the difference and are happy with compressed tracks, then you can save yourself a lot of money on equipment. How can you defend the argument that lossless isn't better then lossy??

My reason for not buying BR discs that don't have an lossless audio track is simply that I want to support what I like. I will rent the movie maybe, but I only buy the best audio/video BRs that come out. BR discs are not just about better video, but should also be about better audio then DVD.

Uncompressed audio always sounds better(or equal) to the compressed tracks. Sometimes its a big difference, sometimes its small, but its better and thats all that matters.

This is your direct quote. In the first sentence you say it can be equal. In the second, you state lossless is always better.

Why wouldn't it?? I didn't say it always sounds better, I said better or equal to at worst.

As to your question:
How can a DTS-HD MA track not sound > = to the compressed lossy core track??
If it sounds equal, then why not use the more efficient lossy codec. And I have NEVER said that under the same conditions/tech specs a lossy track will sound better than a lossless track. I am not defending that position.

That said, you seem to ignore some very important points. Not all lossless tracks are the same. Let me repeat that: NOT ALL LOSSLESS TRACKS ARE THE SAME.

It's possible that you could have a disk that has a lossless track at 48/16 and a lossy track at 48/24. That would be a case where the lossless track would sound worse.

Personally though I have tested and found that if they put a 1.5mps DD+ 5.1 @ 48/16 track on a disk all else being equal, there's no need for a lossless track. I can't hear the difference and I doubt there are many (any?) that can.

If it sounds equal, then why not use the more efficient lossy codec

Because it has potential to sound better and it will never sound worse, with the same master being used. Why not use lossless when it doesn't add any more cost, and with bluray, the extra space it uses means nothing. Maybe it will sound the same except for a few small parts or some clearer background dialog. Whatever the small improvement might be, if any, why not use it. Also the piece of mind knowing that you aren't missing anything from a movies track is worth something. Lossless audio on a HD disc should be mandatory and it is for me.

I also hope that movie studios don't just sit on their ass and not try to ring out the best audio they can for each disc. I would love to see 48-96/24 movies as the norm!! Transformers on HD with no lossless track makes me laugh. The biggest title of the year for a dying format and they don't show off the format to its extreme. Maybe its a video/audio bitrate limitation, but this again makes hddvd look bad.

What is the "Original" ... ?

The difference is very noticeable every step of the way from 56k / 64k Satellite Radio, 128k, 320k, and so forth and so on all the way up to 192/24.

That video is compressed to approx 70 times smaller than the original, while a DD+ 16/48 track is 1/3rd the size of the original. Not exactly comparable.

Look at it another way: 1.5mbit gives 300kbit per channel. In blind tests even those with golden ears can't tell the difference between the original and 320kbit mp3s (ie 160kbit per channel). Nearly everyone fails to tell a difference between 256kbit and the original - that's well under half the bitrate per channel of DD+, and using an older compression standard.

Because it has potential to sound better and it will never sound worse.

Amen. I hope we can at least agree on that.

I just noticed that the BR Spiderman 3 actually has two loseless English tracks (PCM and TrueHD). And here the biggest hit of the year from HD-DVD, and they can't even bother with one. If I don't dislike Sony so much, I would go format neutral in a second. But I am beginning to be swayed.

It's possible that you could have a disk that has a lossless track at 48/16 and a lossy track at 48/24. That would be a case where the lossless track would sound worse.


Isn't this a red herring? Turning the tables around, "you could have a disk that has a DD+ track at 48/16 and a loseless track at 48/24 ..." It should simply be whatever the master is, whether it is 16 or 24.

pleaaaaase, it's lossless.

without reading through the many arguments I'm sure have come up, I'll just say this: as much as I like discrete surround sound, lossless isn't that big'a'deal with me simply because my HT isn't in a dedicated room with ultra high-end equip. Let's see...I got the A/C turning on which sounds like a vacuum cleaner, the refrigerator switching on and off, noises from outside, fan noises from equipment...etc. That doesn't mean it shouldn't be included as an option, it should in fact--why not let those that can enjoy it, have their cake????... maybe offer a super-bit version without all the extra stuff, just maximum PQ/AQ...of course that costs too much at this stage, but maybe further down the road.

why not let those that can enjoy it
Presumably. Sure, include it if feasible but I'm still highly skeptical anyone is actually detecting (not imagining it by way of bias or placebo) any noticeable degradation from DD+ at 1.5 Mbps aka 320 kbps per channel.

Given that early adopters are the main driving force behind HDM right now and that most of us that own these formats now do have at least somewhat above average A/V systems, I think that lossless audio on most, if not all titles, should be the main concern for the studios, not countless extras. While I think that extras are important for sales, and sometimes there is some interesting stuff they add, I would wager that most of the people that own HDM right now have the "superbit" mentality. We just want the best looking and sounding audio and video that can be stuffed on the disc. If there is room for extras after that, great, if not, no great loss. We can just buy the super-duper-special edition in a year or 2, with crippled audio and 20GB of fluff that caters to the "average consumer".

Screw extras, I don't even care if it has a menu. I would rather have a movie that has max bitrate for video/audio then anything else. Max out that and if you have any room left over, go from there with the extras. Most people, esp. HDM, don't care about all this fluff, we buy the discs that look and sound the best. There should be no reason not to have max bitrate for video and audio on most movies.

Given that early adopters are the main driving force behind HDM right now and that most of us that own these formats now do have at least somewhat above average A/V systems, I think that lossless audio on most, if not all titles, should be the main concern for the studios, not countless extras. While I think that extras are important for sales, and sometimes there is some interesting stuff they add, I would wager that most of the people that own HDM right now have the "superbit" mentality. We just want the best looking and sounding audio and video that can be stuffed on the disc. If there is room for extras after that, great, if not, no great loss. We can just buy the super-duper-special edition in a year or 2, with crippled audio and 20GB of fluff that caters to the "average consumer".

The early adopters on here might be that way, but I doubt that's true for the majority of people buying these discs. It would seem (and this is a guess, because who knows) that most people buying these discs are people who have a PS3 and want to watch some stuff that looks good, or .. well, I don't know the typical person that would buy HD DVDs, but a nice chunk of them are 360 add-on users, which don't have the capability for lossless audio in the first place. I can only speak from different message boards that I'm on, and I've never, ever seen sound as a factor in the purchase of Blu-rays/HD DVDs. In fact, here are a couple of gems from the rare Blu-ray owners on a car message board that I post on:

btw, I dont know about everyone else, but I dont watch blurays for the sound. sure its fine and dandy, but I watch it for the picture!

and another gem in response to BR/HD's superiority over SD DVD audio

This comment is retarded... Exactly how many BD or HD-DVD movies have DTS/Dolby Master Audio, and how many people on here have receivers capable of processing those sound formats. If the answer is not many, then the sound is the same because BD/HD-DVD have backup 5.1-7.1 tracks in DTS and DD.

If you ask me, the only two things that matter to a large part of the people buying HD movies are picture quality and price. I would also bet that the overwhelming majority of HD/BR owners either have the sound through their TV or via optical to an average receiver/HTiB. Personally, I'm far more appalled at the amount of sub-par video transfers out there than titles lacking lossless audio.

....Personally, I'm far more appalled at the amount of sub-par video transfers out there than titles lacking lossless audio.

Me too!

...


If you ask me, the only two things that matter to a large part of the people buying HD movies are picture quality and price. I would also bet that the overwhelming majority of HD/BR owners either have the sound through their TV or via optical to an average receiver/HTiB. Personally, I'm far more appalled at the amount of sub-par video transfers out there than titles lacking lossless audio.

Well, both audio and video matter to ME. So I will lobby to get the best possible audio and video on an HD format. And I'm convinced Blu-ray has the better ability to give me the best possible audio and video.

I agree concerning sub-par video transfers. I have a number of Sony Blu-ray releases which are appalling sub-par. Too many of the Universal (and other HD DVD) releases are also subpar. I fault the studios for not making the effort to give us the best possible transfers and encodings. And with Blu-ray, lossless audio is basically a freebie while HD DVD has to do tradeoff studies to allocate audio and video bitrates because of the bandwidth limitations. That's probably a very big reason why so few HD DVDs have lossless audio.

If you ask me, the only two things that matter to a large part of the people buying HD movies are picture quality and price.

For me, the sound quality improvement over SD-DVDs is more important than the picture quality improvement. Picture quality-wise, HD broadcasts already offer an improvement over SD-DVD, but no such "step" exists for audio.

For me, the sound quality improvement over SD-DVDs is more important than the picture quality improvement. Picture quality-wise, HD broadcasts already offer an improvement over SD-DVD, but no such "step" exists for audio.

We are discussing HDM and even if you only get 640 Dolby, it's better than DVD. As far as HD broadcasts go, the Dolby audio is better than analog broadcasts.

Ive been looking for an answer in these forums but cant seem to find one.

What is the difference in end-result between PCM, TrueHD and DTS-MA? I know there is a difference in decoding and bit-rate, but if they all claim to be LOSSLESS, meaning no compression, wouldnt they all end up sounding the same-just like the audio master?
I guess my question is: Will I hear a difference between the 3 formats?

Ive been looking for an answer in these forums but cant seem to find one.

What is the difference in end-result between PCM, TrueHD and DTS-MA? I know there is a difference in decoding and bit-rate, but if they all claim to be LOSSLESS, meaning no compression, wouldnt they all end up sounding the same-just like the audio master?
I guess my question is: Will I hear a difference between the 3 formats?

In theory, you will hear no differences because they are alleged "lossless" formats. However, in practice, there seem to be quite a few people who have claimed to have heard differences between True HD and uncompressed PCM, usually with a preference to the PCM soundtracks.

I'll add a new rumor I heard from a (Custom HT installer?) rep at an HD movie/lossless audio demo room at RMAF. The rumor is Dolby Digital Labs is aware of the issue and they are currently investigating what's wrong with TrueHD because it just might be less than "True" HD. I'll caveat this rep seemed less than perfectly knowledgeable about the HD audio formats and may have had a preference for Blu-ray which might have made him a FUDmeister.

I'll add a new rumor I heard from a (Custom HT installer?) rep at an HD movie/lossless audio demo room at RMAF. The rumor is Dolby Digital Labs is aware of the issue and they are currently investigating what's wrong with TrueHD because it just might be less than "True" HD. I'll caveat this rep seemed less than perfectly knowledgeable about the HD audio formats and may have had a preference for Blu-ray which might have made him a FUDmeister.

:rolleyes:

In theory, you will hear no differences because they are alleged "lossless" formats. However, in practice, there seem to be quite a few people who have claimed to have heard differences between True HD and uncompressed PCM, usually with a preference to the PCM soundtracks.

Somy has done a couple of True BD's sans Dialnorm. My Panny transcodes the True to PCM. The discs also had PCM. I couldn't tell the difference. On the Warner HD-DVD's I have that have True, which I believe have Dialnorm, I've felt like there is less gain. No fair comparrisons here, just suspicon. The Warner True that I've listened to definitely has better bass but didn't seem a huge upgrade in other respects.

I need more data....my outlook may soon change. I'm getting an Onkyo 805 to use as a pre. The days of fighting over a solitary 5.1 analog input are almost over.

I'm likin' Sony's True and less thrilled with Warners so far. Maybe my increased connectivity and processing will level things out some? I think I'm gonna be able to hear DTS Master from my Euro HD-DVD's...? Next weekend is gonna be fun! My Panny can't pass the Master, sadly.....

In theory, you will hear no differences because they are alleged "lossless" formats. However, in practice, there seem to be quite a few people who have claimed to have heard differences between True HD and uncompressed PCM, usually with a preference to the PCM soundtracks.I would think that at encode time a lossless encode can be easily exactly checked for being truly lossless. Not a difficult engineering task to do. If a lossless encode was proven to be "not lossless" to what went in --- that would be a scandal. :eek:

I would think that at encode time a lossless encode can be easily exactly checked for being truly lossless. Not a difficult engineering task to do. If a lossless encode was proven to be "not lossless" to what went in --- that would be a scandal. :eek:

Well, if there is a difference, it might have something to do with Dialnorm which to me seems to be digital bit manipulation not equally applied to ALL channels; I don't know the specifics nor have I listened for the differences (if you already have an uncompressed PCM track, why bother with TrueHD?). All I can say is third hand knowledge of other people who claim to have heard a difference; and not in favor of "True" HD.

Interesting -- according to highdefdigest, BR has about twice as many 5 star audio tracks than HD DVD. That doesn't mean as much as people might think, of course -- could be that BR movies, on average, have more impressive soundtracks to begin with. And I have no idea how many of those audio tracks are lossless v. lossy. Way to lazy for that.

On movies I don't want lossless, DD+ is perfect. The lossless formats will be usefull for music discs. Then I'd rather have 88/20.

Daniel.

Well, both audio and video matter to ME. So I will lobby to get the best possible audio and video on an HD format. And I'm convinced Blu-ray has the better ability to give me the best possible audio and video.

I agree concerning sub-par video transfers. I have a number of Sony Blu-ray releases which are appalling sub-par. Too many of the Universal (and other HD DVD) releases are also subpar. I fault the studios for not making the effort to give us the best possible transfers and encodings. And with Blu-ray, lossless audio is basically a freebie while HD DVD has to do tradeoff studies to allocate audio and video bitrates because of the bandwidth limitations. That's probably a very big reason why so few HD DVDs have lossless audio.

Good post :) , Agree 100%

Interesting -- according to highdefdigest, BR has about twice as many 5 star audio tracks than HD DVD. That doesn't mean as much as people might think, of course -- could be that BR movies, on average, have more impressive soundtracks to begin with. And I have no idea how many of those audio tracks are lossless v. lossy. Way to lazy for that.

Well, since HD DVD fans are quoting 5/5 HiDef reviews for Transformers, it certainly bears noting that BD movies hit the 5/5 mark twice as often as HD DVD. It also bears notice that Blu Ray has 4X the lossless soundtracks. So..... I can see why the BD discs are overall better rated.

Like said above, the best possible sound matters to me... Obviously, not the masses here that prefer lossy over lossless.

Given that early adopters are the main driving force behind HDM right now and that most of us that own these formats now do have at least somewhat above average A/V systems, I think that lossless audio on most, if not all titles, should be the main concern for the studios, not countless extras. While I think that extras are important for sales, and sometimes there is some interesting stuff they add, I would wager that most of the people that own HDM right now have the "superbit" mentality. We just want the best looking and sounding audio and video that can be stuffed on the disc. If there is room for extras after that, great, if not, no great loss. We can just buy the super-duper-special edition in a year or 2, with crippled audio and 20GB of fluff that caters to the "average consumer".


Eh. Studios know early adopters will buy the titles anyway... as they are demonstrably superior to DVD (or should be, with careful workflow).

They want to transition to mass-adoption, which means they'll be targeting features that will have wider appeal. 95+% of people won't be able to detect the presence of lossless. 100% of people can detect the absence of extras/IME.

Question: As per your sig, is the 360-add-on your only HD DVD player?

For me, the sound quality improvement over SD-DVDs is more important than the picture quality improvement. Picture quality-wise, HD broadcasts already offer an improvement over SD-DVD, but no such "step" exists for audio.

Interesting.

Given the ratio of of compression, audio has always enjoyed significantly more "data per second of A/V experience" than video.

Given the additiona data rate combined with the efficiency of newer codecs, video has taken a great jump forward, yet still lags even SD DVD in the number of bits geiven to it in relation to it's uncompressed parent.

Although human perception of audio and video are different, it certainly seems that video has benn "more deserving" of the bump it's been given.

In theory, you will hear no differences because they are alleged "lossless" formats. However, in practice, there seem to be quite a few people who have claimed to have heard differences between True HD and uncompressed PCM, usually with a preference to the PCM soundtracks.

I'll add a new rumor I heard from a (Custom HT installer?) rep at an HD movie/lossless audio demo room at RMAF. The rumor is Dolby Digital Labs is aware of the issue and they are currently investigating what's wrong with TrueHD because it just might be less than "True" HD. I'll caveat this rep seemed less than perfectly knowledgeable about the HD audio formats and may have had a preference for Blu-ray which might have made him a FUDmeister.

Of course, knowing for a fact what the mastering steps were before hand would be helpful before laying any discrepency at the feet of the codec.

On movies I don't want lossless

What?? Why would you not want lossless?? I could see if you said you don't care if its lossless, but you don't want it, lol?? Is the lossless audio too clear for you?? On BD, you aren't sacrificing anything for a lossless track, so why not??

If you ask me, the only two things that matter to a large part of the people buying HD movies are picture quality and price. I would also bet that the overwhelming majority of HD/BR owners either have the sound through their TV or via optical to an average receiver/HTiB. Personally, I'm far more appalled at the amount of sub-par video transfers out there than titles lacking lossless audio.

I couldn't disagree more. The audio improvement is what made me buy a BR player to begin with. I wouldn't shell out all that money just to have a better picture, the sound is the best part of BR to me. Early adopters to HDM usually have decent sound systems. People who don't have a home theater, are most likely using SD-DVD still.

I couldn't disagree more. The audio improvement is what made me buy a BR player to begin with. I wouldn't shell out all that money just to have a better picture, the sound is the best part of BR to me. Early adopters to HDM usually have decent sound systems. People who don't have a home theater, are most likely using SD-DVD still.

I'm not referring to anyone individually, as I certainly won't doubt anyone who realizes the difference and has the system/ears to realize the difference. If that's important to you/them, that's perfectly fine. What I was saying in the above post, however, was that the majority (some might even say vast majority) of HDM purchasers don't care that much about it. I'm sure a lot of them have decent sound systems, but I highly doubt that the majority of them have lossless-ready systems, and I would say even fewer of them care about lossless audio. As far as the general buying masses are concerned, my opinion is that the factors important to them are picture quality and price, with everything else a VERY distant third.

Let's say Sony runs an experiment with some movie, and releases it as only two editions: one with 1080p video but regular audio (say, a 384kbps DD track), and one with 480i video but a lossless track. Both are $19.99. I would venture a guess that the one with HD video would outsell the other one exponentially.

Eh. Studios know early adopters will buy the titles anyway... as they are demonstrably superior to DVD (or should be, with careful workflow).

They want to transition to mass-adoption, which means they'll be targeting features that will have wider appeal. 95+% of people won't be able to detect the presence of lossless. 100% of people can detect the absence of extras/IME.

Question: As per your sig, is the 360-add-on your only HD DVD player?

I understand most of the strategy the studios are using, but I don't necessarily agree with it. Technically speaking, HDM in general is only a concern for a small amount of people, and I feel most of those people are A/V-philes who do their homework, know how to hook up their systems properly and can (or will be able to in the near future) take advantage of 1080p and lossless audio. HDM is going to have a slow road road to mass adoption, with catalog titles suffering the most. I just think the studios should take this into consideration. I would guess, given the choice between superb video and lossless audio or cutting corners in these departments to make room for extras, the majority of people who own HDM today would probably forego the extras. Just IMHO.

And no, right now I have an XA2 and a Denon 987 receiver, so I am taking advantage of lossless right now.

Eh. Studios know early adopters will buy the titles anyway... as they are demonstrably superior to DVD (or should be, with careful workflow).

They want to transition to mass-adoption, which means they'll be targeting features that will have wider appeal. 95+% of people won't be able to detect the presence of lossless. 100% of people can detect the absence of extras/IME.

Question: As per your sig, is the 360-add-on your only HD DVD player?

My guess is that less than 100% of people will detect the fancy extras -- but that's neither here nor there.

More important, I suspect the vast majority of people can't even use some of the fancier online interactive extras -- how many people have broadband? And how many of those people have home networks? And how many of those people have ethernet jacks near their players? Or how many of those players know how to set up a wireless bridge, or have a wireless network in the first place?

And I would LOVE to know the percentage of people who find PiP on a movie a useful and entertaining feature. Personally, I don't.

And I would LOVE to know the percentage of people who find PiP on a movie a useful and entertaining feature. Personally, I don't.

Fortunately for you, I know the answer.

Approximately 99.9999294829839283% of people that run studios and make decisions on making movies and releasing them on shiny silver discs.

Fortunately for you, I know the answer.

Approximately 99.9999294829839283% of people that run studios and make decisions on making movies and releasing them on shiny silver discs.

:D That's a lot of percent.

Seriously though, it's not out of the realm of possibility that studios provide those PiP extras as gimmicky tricks to try and sell HD video and audio when many people find SD video and stereo just fine?

:D That's a lot of percent.

Seriously though, it's not out of the realm of possibility that studios provide those PiP extras as gimmicky tricks to try and sell HD video and audio when many people find SD video and stereo just fine?
You seem to have a fairly clear understanding of the sichiashun.;)

You seem to have a fairly clear understanding of the sichiashun.;)

sichiashun? :confused:

(by the way, I keep meaning to mention your sig line -- I love it! Silly Socrates...)

Like said above, the best possible sound matters to me... Obviously, not the masses here that prefer lossy over lossless.
Can you please show me one post where someone has said they prefer lossy over lossless? I must have missed those posts...

EDIT: Apparently I *did* miss this one:
On movies I don't want lossless, DD+ is perfect. The lossless formats will be usefull for music discs. Then I'd rather have 88/20.

I apologize. Insanity has officially now taken over the forums. (Please, snaggs.... chime in here and say my sarcasm meter is broken. Please?)

If DD+ is perceptually imperceptible versus lossless, why couldn't we call this perfect? It frees up space for other data after all.

Can you please show me one post where someone has said they prefer lossy over lossless? I must have missed those posts...

EDIT: Apparently I *did* miss this one:


On movies I don't want lossless, DD+ is perfect. The lossless formats will be usefull for music discs. Then I'd rather have 88/20.

I apologize. Insanity has officially now taken over the forums. (Please, snaggs.... chime in here and say my sarcasm meter is broken. Please?)

Classic!

But there's alot more than one.... But it will all change with the 51 gb discs...then the HD DVD folks will hum a new tune. For now, only 12% of all HD DVD discs have lossless..compared to over 45% for BD

No, I won't sing a new tune. It will be nice to have, no lie...but as long as it's a burden to include and there is great doubt (subjective anecdotes doing little to erase that doubt) that there's any perceptual difference between the 2, my position stays the same. "320 kbps per channel, can *you* hear the difference or did you just imagine it?" or something along those lines is going to be my signature slogan.

My guess is that less than 100% of people will detect the fancy extras -- but that's neither here nor there.

More important, I suspect the vast majority of people can't even use some of the fancier online interactive extras -- how many people have broadband? And how many of those people have home networks? And how many of those people have ethernet jacks near their players? Or how many of those players know how to set up a wireless bridge, or have a wireless network in the first place?

And I would LOVE to know the percentage of people who find PiP on a movie a useful and entertaining feature. Personally, I don't.

Undoubtedly a subset. But the same could be said for number of people who have AVR's that can deal with lossless audio.

I understand your point, and cjr1's. My point is that what early-adopters/enthusiasts want is not going to dictate strategy when there's billions of dollars to be made marketing the product in such a way as to drive mass adoption.

Scoff at it as much as you like, studios have years worth of sales data that tells them whether a special edition DVD set with extras sells better than something that may be less tangible, like a higher bit rate audio track.

'Tis reality, I'm afraid.

If DD+ is perceptually imperceptible versus lossless, why couldn't we call this perfect? It frees up space for other data after all.

Not all of us are convinced "DD+ is perceptually imperceptible versus lossless". Until we are, it ain't "perfect", merely "good enough" at best. My working assumption is it isn't "good enough". Otherwise, what's the point of developing TrueHD and DTS HD MA ?

Indirectly, my experience has been that in general, movies with lossless audio tracks sound better than movies with lossy audio tracks. But I've yet to directly compare soundtracks from the same movie.

320 kbps per channel, can *you* hear the difference or did you just imagine it?"

There is no question in anyones mind that Lossless audio sounds better then regular DD even at 640, nevermind 320, jeeze. The question is if lossless is a big improvement over DD+ or the core DTS track at 1.5mbs+. I personally notice a difference, but some don't or don't think the difference is much. Putting an uncompressed track on doesn't add expense, if anything its cheaper then using a lossy format.

I've got an idea.

Why won't we do a nation wide blind test?

That should result in a more definitive reasoning on wether or not lossless is needed.

In my book, I can only account for what I heard in terms of a blind test I did back when I was in radio and can see it translating to HDM. The station manager told me unless it's a CD, I can only play ripped tracks above a certain bit rate due to the quality. I was all about lossless at the time and how ripping a track means compressing, which means the quality goes down. He assured me that HDD space would be an issue if every DJ and studio exec stored raw wav files. He then took one of my CDs and encoded a track in different bitrates and above 256 (if I recall) I couldn't tell much difference. At 320 and above it just sounded the same. Granted this was for radio, couldn't we set something similar given a few HDM discs that have multiple audio tracks both lossless and lossy and do a blind test?

Not all of us are convinced "DD+ is perceptually imperceptible versus lossless". Until we are, it ain't "perfect", merely "good enough" at best. My working assumption is it isn't "good enough". Otherwise, what's the point of developing TrueHD and DTS HD MA ?

Indirectly, my experience has been that in general, movies with lossless audio tracks sound better than movies with lossy audio tracks. But I've yet to directly compare soundtracks from the same movie.

Is it at all possible that when you are comparing [different] movies - one with lossless audio track to one with lossy audio track - what you end up preferring might be "the composition" of the lossless track as opposed to "the quality" of the lossless track?

I personally think lossless versions of Michael Bay/Jerry Bruckheimer productions might sound more dynamic, cinematic etc. compared to, say, a lossy version of a Philip Glass composition.

Apples to bananas comparison, actually.

There is no question in anyones mind that Lossless audio sounds better then regular DD even at 640, nevermind 320, jeeze. The question is if lossless is a big improvement over DD+ or the core DTS track at 1.5mbs+. I personally notice a difference, but some don't or don't think the difference is much. Putting an uncompressed track on doesn't add expense, if anything its cheaper then using a lossy format.
Um.... did you miss the 320 per channel part?

I've got an idea.
Why won't we do a nation wide blind test?

Great in theory, almost impossible in practice. First hurdle is making sure everyone has level matched the applicable inputs. We would only be able to assume someone has done this, or take their word for it.
Then we'd have to find a disc with the same quality recordings to work with... as in, 24 bit TrueHD vs. 24 bit lossy encode (for example).
Then comes the problem with actually conducting a true double blind test to eliminate bias. Not easy to do at all, unfortunately...

A great attempt at a test is what scaesare is/has been doing with his DBT threads...

The difference between the lossy and lossless tracks isn't always the sound quality itself, but a lot of times its the enhanced space you get. With good lossy, the sound itslef is very close quality to lossless. The difference I see mostly is that with lossless, the sound seems to fill the room more and is less directional. A lot of times the sound is just more real and less digital(tinny). Instead of hearing a helicopter sound around you, it feels like you are in the copter with lossless, because of its wider/less directional sound.

I prefer lossless audio. I do not prefer that lossless audio if it's 16 bit and if they could fit a 24bit lossy track in the same amount of space.

The goal of lossy codecs is not to throw away useful information, it's to get rid of unnecessary information. Lossless codecs just keep all information that's scanned. If you have a 24bit master audio track from the studio, but you create a "lossless" 16 bit soundtrack from it, you "should" have an inferior sounding soundtrack than if you created it using 24 bit DD+ or DTS-HD.

I know that I've compared hd dvds that have both a truehd track and a dd+ track and preferred the truehd track. Just felt like it had more range to it with deeper bass, though that may have been because I "expected" it to sound better. The problem with this comparison is, did they maximize the lossy encode? If they're putting a truehd track on the disc, why bother doing anything more than a 640kb/s dd+ encode?

I'd like to see a sample disc with the Pearl harbor attack sequence on it with:

16/48 dd+ 1.5mb/s
24/48 dd+ 1.5mb/s
16/48 truehd
24/48 truehd
16/48 dts-hd
24/48 dts-hd
16/48 dts-hd ma
24/48 dts-hd ma
16/48 pcm
24/48 pcm

Off the top of my head, I can't think of any other soundtracks that should have as much going on at one time.

I prefer lossless audio. I do not prefer that lossless audio if it's 16 bit and if they could fit a 24bit lossy track in the same amount of space.

The goal of lossy codecs is not to throw away useful information, it's to get rid of unnecessary information. Lossless codecs just keep all information that's scanned. If you have a 24bit master audio track from the studio, but you create a "lossless" 16 bit soundtrack from it, you "should" have an inferior sounding soundtrack than if you created it using 24 bit DD+ or DTS-HD.

I know that I've compared hd dvds that have both a truehd track and a dd+ track and preferred the truehd track. Just felt like it had more range to it with deeper bass, though that may have been because I "expected" it to sound better. The problem with this comparison is, did they maximize the lossy encode? If they're putting a truehd track on the disc, why bother doing anything more than a 640kb/s dd+ encode?

I'd like to see a sample disc with the Pearl harbor attack sequence on it with:

16/48 dd+ 1.5mb/s
24/48 dd+ 1.5mb/s
16/48 truehd
24/48 truehd
16/48 dts-hd
24/48 dts-hd
16/48 dts-hd ma
24/48 dts-hd ma
16/48 pcm
24/48 pcm

Off the top of my head, I can't think of any other soundtracks that should have as much going on at one time.

A very good post. I wonder to how many lossless tracks have been forced to go down to 16 bits though -- perhaps they were 16 bit masters anyway? Do we have any sense of any movie that was a 24 bit master that was downsized to a 16 bit lossless track?

oscar,

Not all of us are convinced "DD+ is perceptually imperceptible versus lossless".

Not everyone is convinced the Earth is round, that the moon landing really occured. Also, some people believe in imps, and gnomes, and fairies and the like.

So, are we to assume the earth is flat, the moon landing was faked and that fairies are real?

I prefer lossless audio. I do not prefer that lossless audio if it's 16 bit and if they could fit a 24bit lossy track in the same amount of space.

The goal of lossy codecs is not to throw away useful information, it's to get rid of unnecessary information. Lossless codecs just keep all information that's scanned. If you have a 24bit master audio track from the studio, but you create a "lossless" 16 bit soundtrack from it, you "should" have an inferior sounding soundtrack than if you created it using 24 bit DD+ or DTS-HD.

I know that I've compared hd dvds that have both a truehd track and a dd+ track and preferred the truehd track. Just felt like it had more range to it with deeper bass, though that may have been because I "expected" it to sound better. The problem with this comparison is, did they maximize the lossy encode? If they're putting a truehd track on the disc, why bother doing anything more than a 640kb/s dd+ encode?

I'd like to see a sample disc with the Pearl harbor attack sequence on it with:

16/48 dd+ 1.5mb/s
24/48 dd+ 1.5mb/s
16/48 truehd
24/48 truehd
16/48 dts-hd
24/48 dts-hd
16/48 dts-hd ma
24/48 dts-hd ma
16/48 pcm
24/48 pcm

Off the top of my head, I can't think of any other soundtracks that should have as much going on at one time.

+! Great post.... I agree completely. Too bad so many don't..

+! Great post.... I agree completely. Too bad so many don't..

Good, you can finally answer the question. Most HD DVDs and BDs are from 16 bit masters. Knowing this, which would you prefer?

A 16 bit TrueHD/PCM or a 24 bit DD+ at 1.5 MB? (Remember your "less than ideal" statement? Most of your BDs are "less than ideal" because they've got 16 bits going in...so...if you please...)

Any bets on whether or not we get an answer this time? ;)

From all the titles I've seen so far, 48/16 DD+ is at 640kbps. There are no 48/16 DD+ titles at 1.5kbps. I really like to know if there is an exception because that would be one disc I would definitely like to try.

I know that I've compared hd dvds that have both a truehd track and a dd+ track and preferred the truehd track. Just felt like it had more range to it with deeper bass, though that may have been because I "expected" it to sound better.

Again, were these 1.5m or 640k tracks vs. the truehd tracks?

Good, you can finally answer the question. Most HD DVDs and BDs are from 16 bit masters. Knowing this, which would you prefer?

A 16 bit TrueHD/PCM or a 24 bit DD+ at 1.5 MB? (Remember your "less than ideal" statement? Most of your BDs are "less than ideal" because they've got 16 bits going in...so...if you please...)

Any bets on whether or not we get an answer this time? ;)

I have to take the 5th...

It has been a long time since I tried TRUE HD vs DD+ as I gave up on the analog outs on my Toshiba and BD players. My processor has only been recently updated to accept LPCM over HDMI. SO, now I can try both out and bypass the poor DACS in my XA2 and Panny BD player.

However, I don't expect my newly upgraded processor to be delivered for a couple weeks...

I will be sure to report when I get it!;)

Good, you can finally answer the question. Most HD DVDs and BDs are from 16 bit masters. Knowing this, which would you prefer?

A 16 bit TrueHD/PCM or a 24 bit DD+ at 1.5 MB? (Remember your "less than ideal" statement? Most of your BDs are "less than ideal" because they've got 16 bits going in...so...if you please...)

Any bets on whether or not we get an answer this time? ;)

Wait -- if most masters are 16 bits, what does using a 24 bit lossy encode do? And anyone have a source for the bitrate on blu-ray movies?

I have to take the 5th...

It has been a long time since I tried TRUE HD vs DD+ as I gave up on the analog outs on my Toshiba and BD players. My processor has only been recently updated to accept LPCM over HDMI. SO, now I can try both out and bypass the poor DACS in my XA2 and Panny BD player.

However, I don't expect my newly upgraded processor to be delivered for a couple weeks...

I will be sure to report when I get it!;)

But you've been spec whoring droning on and on about how lossless should always be provided, and no one should "settle" for 1.5 MB DD+. And yet, now, you're saying you can't decide.

Hmmmm....interesting.

And even more interesting, you claim to "only want the best," and yet, all this time you weren't even using your analog outs, and you didn't even have an HDMI receiver...so, "Mr. I only want the best"...are you telling us, that you've been going toslink into your receiver from BD and HD DVD, and screaming about lossless vs lossy all this time?

Seriously?

Wait -- if most masters are 16 bits, what does using a 24 bit lossy encode do? And anyone have a source for the bitrate on blu-ray movies?

It's the age old "do you want a lossless version of something less, or a lossy version of something more" argument. It flummoxes many a spec-spewer. But many of us know which we'd prefer.

;)

It's the age old "do you want a lossless version of something less, or a lossy version of something more" argument. It flummoxes many a spec-spewer. But many of us know which we'd prefer.

;)

Why not a lossless 24 bit encode then?

But still -- what difference will a 24 bit lossy make if the master is 16 bits? You can't add bits, can you?

Why not a lossless 24 bit encode then?

But still -- what difference will a 24 bit lossy make if the master is 16 bits? You can't add bits, can you?

You need to do a search, this has been discussed ad nauseum. A 24 bit master, or 24 bit master dithered down, or otherwise, to 16 bit before encoding even takes place.

But you've been spec whoring droning on and on about how lossless should always be provided, and no one should "settle" for 1.5 MB DD+. And yet, now, you're saying you can't decide.

Hmmmm....interesting.

And even more interesting, you claim to "only want the best," and yet, all this time you weren't even using your analog outs, and you didn't even have an HDMI receiver...so, "Mr. I only want the best"...are you telling us, that you've been going toslink into your receiver from BD and HD DVD, and screaming about lossless vs lossy all this time?

Seriously?

Exactly, yes.

The poor DACs and lack of proper time alignment, etc on my XA2 and Panny made TRUE HD nice, but flawed. I await the other overlays that are found on my Halcro processor. I listened to TRUE HD and DD+ for sometime before I gave up on it using the analog outs (not to mention the subwoofer issues on the HD DVD players).

Lossless is the best and yes I want it.

You can call it spec whoring but the facts are lossless is better than compressed / lossy.

I look forward to presenting TRUE HD, DD+ by bypassing my XA2 DACs in the next couple of weeks... I expect great sound.

Exactly, yes.

No further questions.

Regardless of your view on lossy vs lossless, if you care about audio quality, you should not buy Warner titles that do not have lossless, because all you will have is half DD+.

Well, since we are in court.....


A recess your honor until the new Halcro per/pro is delivered.... The cheapy DACS, lack of time alignment, and lack of PL IIx overlays on the XA2 and Panny BD player made listening to lossless tracks somewhat less than ideal and make them more of a liability...

Agreed!


Return in 2 weeks for a new hearing!!.........err, I mean 'listening session'.


:D

Regardless of your view on lossy vs lossless, if you care about audio quality, you should not buy Warner titles that do not have lossless, because all you will have is half DD+.

Huh? What is half DD+? And please don't say 640 kbps on a 48/16 audio track is half DD+.

And define what lossless is to you in sampling rate and bit depth.

Huh? What is half DD+? And please don't say 640 kbps on a 48/16 audio track is half DD+.


My apologies. Warner's 640Kbps DD+ compared to 1.5Mbps, is less than half.

Now I can't wait for people to say that the 640Kbps DD+ is just as good as lossless!

Regardless of your view on lossy vs lossless, if you care about audio quality, you should not buy Warner titles that do not have lossless, because all you will have is half DD+.

I made the mistake of buying Troy:DC on Blu-ray, which meant I was stuck with a 448kbps DD track (I don't have a system that's lossless-friendly). At least with the HD DVD the TrueHD track would have been decoded into a 1.5mbps DTS stream. Ah well. I'm probably in the minority of AVS, but it's worth noting that a 640k DD track + uncompressed PCM doesn't necessarily equate to audio bliss for everyone.

I made the mistake of buying Troy:DC on Blu-ray, which meant I was stuck with a 448kbps DD track (I don't have a system that's lossless-friendly). At least with the HD DVD the TrueHD track would have been decoded into a 1.5mbps DTS stream. Ah well. I'm probably in the minority of AVS, but it's worth noting that a 640k DD track + uncompressed PCM doesn't necessarily equate to audio bliss for everyone.

I'm not sure the DD+ track on Troy is 1.5 megabits -- most Warner titles include only 640K bitrates, and I think the review from HighDef backs me up:

http://hddvd.highdefdigest.com/977/troy_dc.html

So, Blu-ray or HD DVD, without lossless capability, you're stuck with 640K.

At least with the HD DVD the TrueHD track would have been decoded into a 1.5mbps DTS stream.Archangle37: MrXpress meant that the TrueHD is converted to 1.5mbps DTS for those of us using the optical output on an A1 or A2.

I'm not sure the DD+ track on Troy is 1.5 megabits -- most Warner titles include only 640K bitrates, and I think the review from HighDef backs me up:

http://hddvd.highdefdigest.com/977/troy_dc.html

So, Blu-ray or HD DVD, without lossless capability, you're stuck with 640K.

It's not. I was saying that if I had had the HD DVD, the TrueHD stream would have been decoded by the HD-A2 into a 1.5mbps DTS stream, which is obviously preferably to the 640k DD track on the disc. The PS3 doesn't do anything to the uncompressed PCM stream on the Blu-ray over optical other than pass it as a 2ch PCM, so I'm stuck with the DD, which is actually 448kbps on the BR at least (or so the PS3's display says). Titles with DTS-MA should help, with the core DTS stream and all, but on BR's with uncompressed PCM tracks I'm pretty much stuck with 640k DD tracks on Blu-ray until I can afford to upgrade my receiver.

Archangle37: MrXpress meant that the TrueHD is converted to 1.5mbps DTS for those of us using the optical output on an A1 or A2.

Ah ha! That definitely sounds like a good reason to choose the HD DVD if you don't have lossless.

It's not. I was saying that if I had had the HD DVD, the TrueHD stream would have been decoded by the HD-A2 into a 1.5mbps DTS stream, which is obviously preferably to the 640k DD track on the disc. The PS3 doesn't do anything to the uncompressed PCM stream on the Blu-ray over optical other than pass it as a 2ch PCM, so I'm stuck with the DD, which is actually 448kbps on the BR at least (or so the PS3's display says). Titles with DTS-MA should help, with the core DTS stream and all, but on BR's with uncompressed PCM tracks I'm pretty much stuck with 640k DD tracks on Blu-ray until I can afford to upgrade my receiver.

My apologies for my ignorance! :o

When you do decide to upgrade, I might suggest the Onkyo 605. Not out of this world expensive and it does a lot.

Well I have had a partial change of heart.

After buying an HD-A1 (Burr-Brown DACs) and finding an older Sony receiver that I had forgotten about which has 5.1 analog inputs, I then had a friend who is an acoustical engineer come over with his gear and calibrate the audio setup.

After all that, the difference in a standard DD track and lossless is not only noticeable but stunning.

The clarity of the lossless audio coming off my (relatively) inexpensive Mirage speakers is utterly amazing.

In comparison, the DD tracks seem flat and muddy.

So as far as my personal tastes go, I have to admit that even on my extreme budget sound system, the difference between lossless and DD is quite clear.

However, as to DD+ vs. lossless...

This is quite a bit harder to determine as some DD+ tracks sound truly fantastic (Transformers for one) and this seems to prove out the claims that at least for some audio setups, the difference between a High Quality DD+ track and TrueHD could be very hard to hear.

Of course, I had a professional from the sound industry spend three hours in the room calibrating the sound levels and making adjustments to the audio equipment which is something the average consumer will not be able to duplicate and this has probably biased the results accordingly.

However, no matter my personal feeling, I still stand by my initial statement (the one that this whole thread is based upon) that the CE and Film industries are not concerned with marketing "lossless" to the general public (at least not for the time being).

My apologies. Warner's 640Kbps DD+ compared to 1.5Mbps, is less than half.

Now I can't wait for people to say that the 640Kbps DD+ is just as good as lossless!

ROFLMAO. Well, I'll be the first. One caveat though please. I am using the sticky from the HD DVD software section. If it's wrong, then apologies all around.

Specifically by title: Happy Feet.

It has TrueHD track. And a DD+ track at a reported 640kbps. To me, they are identical. Try it for yourself and report back. No Spdif or Toslnk allowed. Analogs or HDMI PCM only. HD DVD only.

BTW: It is a 48/16 title. Makes a HUGE difference. It appears that the studio are use 1.5mbps for 48/24 (harder to encode, requires a higher bitrate) and 640kbps for 48/16, a lot easier to encode and requires a much lower bitrate.


PS. Nothing personal. Just feeling my oats right now. PLS forgive me for the ROFLMAO.

Well, I just (finally!) took the HD media plunge, bought a Samsung BD-P1400 for $341 on Amazon. :D So, coupled with my Onkyo 605, and a slew of titles I just bought on a BOGO sale, I'm excited to FINALLY get a chance to compare audio myself.

The question is, what movies do you all suggest I try?

Archangle37: MrXpress meant that the TrueHD is converted to 1.5mbps DTS for those of us using the optical output on an A1 or A2.

You can't turn a TrueHD track into its competitor DTS lol. You can turn a DTS-HD MA track into its core 1.5 DTS track. TrueHD is Dolby not DTS.

Um.... did you miss the 320 per channel part?
Indeed, Micker did...so caught up in his lossless dream world apparently, he missed that I was referring to per channel bitrate, nothing more (with 5 channels of 320 kbps equaling ~1.5 mbps). :)

You can't turn a TrueHD track into its competitor DTS lol. You can turn a DTS-HD MA track into its core 1.5 DTS track. TrueHD is Dolby not DTS.

I'm assuming you've never used or read about a Toshiba player, because that's exactly what they do.

http://www.ultimateavmag.com/features/506hdreport/index1.html

In the case of Dolby Digital Plus on the new Toshiba HD DVD players, the way the backward compatible SPDIF output is derived is more than a little odd. Inside each player the DD Plus and TrueHD tracks are converted to PCM, and then transcoded to DTS at 1.5Mbps and then sent over SPDIF. Yes, you read that right: the Toshiba HD DVD players convert Dolby Digital Plus first to multichannel hi-res PCM, and then to DTS.

The average consumer doesn't care one bit about lossless audio.

I wonder how many ipods are being sold as I type this.

The average consumer doesn't care one bit about lossless audio.

I wonder how many ipods are being sold as I type this.

You know, there may be no difference at all between HQ lossy and HQ lossless -- but if I hear this argument made one more time....well...I'll just make it look silly again, but in a slightly more huffy way each time. ;)

The average consumer doesn't care about HD media one bit either -- does that mean we shouldn't have HD media?

The average consumer doesn't care about 5.1 surround sound -- does that mean we shouldn't have 5.1 SS?

The average consumer couldn't care less about internet extras -- does that mean we shouldn't have them at all?

You get the idea -- HD products and features shouldn't be determined by what the average consumer finds adequate or cares about. Period.

You know, there may be no difference at all between HQ lossy and HQ lossless -- but if I hear this argument made one more time....well...I'll just make it look silly again, but in a slightly more huffy way each time. ;)

The average consumer doesn't care about HD media one bit either -- does that mean we shouldn't have HD media?

The average consumer doesn't care about 5.1 surround sound -- does that mean we shouldn't have 5.1 SS?

The average consumer couldn't care less about internet extras -- does that mean we shouldn't have them at all?

You get the idea -- HD products and features shouldn't be determined by what the average consumer finds adequate or cares about. Period.

I don't see any problem in having it, but it will never be mainstream, especially concerning lossless audio. HD video is easier for people to understand the jump in quality, all for the reasonable price of a good HDTV. Sound wise its a whole other game. I know people who are perfectly happy listening to the sound off their HDTVs. It's seem silly, but thats just how it is. People seem to be impressed by my home theater system, when it is a joke compared to what folks have here. It can't really show me the difference in AQ.

Pushing those advanced sound formats is not going to exponentially increase your consumers base. But sure, be happy they exist if you are one the FEW that can take advantage.

I don't see any problem in having it, but it will never be mainstream, especially concerning lossless audio. HD video is easier for people to understand the jump in quality, all for the reasonable price of a good HDTV. Sound wise its a whole other game. I know people who are perfectly happy listening to the sound off their HDTVs. It's seem silly, but thats just how it is. People seem to be impressed by my home theater system, when it is a joke compared to what folks have here. It can't really show me the difference in AQ.

Pushing those advanced sound formats is not going to exponentially increase your consumers base. But sure, be happy they exist if you are one the FEW that can take advantage.

I take issue with it never being mainstream -- there's no reason it won't be as mainstream as HT systems in general as HTiB's with lossless capabilities start coming down the pipeline.

But for one, I never said lossless audio will be mainstream in the sense that the average consumer will ask for it in droves. But the same thing can be said for HD video -- there are PLENTY of people who are perfectly happy with their upscaling players and Vizio LCDs. Much more so than those who are dying for HD media.

Of course lossless audio will never exponentially increase the consumer base -- but honestly, neither will HD video -- it's failed thus far to do so. What WILL exponentially increase the consumer base are player prices that match upscaling players, cheap dual format players, and media that costs no more than normal DVDs.

That's great -- but including lossless won't slow down this process, and some enthusiasts do clamor for it, especially those enthusiasts who make up a much greater percentage of the HD market right now.

You get the idea -- HD products and features shouldn't be determined by what the average consumer finds adequate or cares about. Period.

The market will decide what becomes the 'norm'. Right now, the market not only doesn't care about your points, but they don't really care about HDM either! :D

I take issue with it never being mainstream -- there's no reason it won't be as mainstream as HT systems in general as HTiB's with lossless capabilities start coming down the pipeline.

But for one, I never said lossless audio will be mainstream in the sense that the average consumer will ask for it in droves. But the same thing can be said for HD video -- there are PLENTY of people who are perfectly happy with their upscaling players and Vizio LCDs. Much more so than those who are dying for HD media.

Of course lossless audio will never exponentially increase the consumer base -- but honestly, neither will HD video -- it's failed thus far to do so. What WILL exponentially increase the consumer base are player prices that match upscaling players, cheap dual format players, and media that costs no more than normal DVDs.

That's great -- but including lossless won't slow down this process, and some enthusiasts do clamor for it, especially those enthusiasts who make up a much greater percentage of the HD market right now.

Ok maybe never is a strong word, but it will be very slow. Drop in prices for Tv and players will be great. But as such, I do believe HD video will increase far faster than HiDef audio. In droves, maybe not, but I think it has far more potential to get out there than the audio side.

It's far cheaper to see the HD pictures results, than the audio.

I'm wondering what someone thinks the base price to be able to take advantage of hidef audio is. 10,000 bucks? How far can the prices drop on receivers, amps, and speakers to a point that it can still let you hear the difference.

I realize that it does not hurt to include those options, but people far overestimate their importance for sure.

The market will decide what becomes the 'norm'. Right now, the market not only doesn't care about your points, but they don't really care about HDM either! :D

You misread my point! I wasn't trying to get into an argument over what will or will not become the norm. I was discussing what things SHOULDN'T be used by studios or CE companies to determine what HD video and audio consists of. That and vocal, enthusiastic buyers can help steer that market.

My point was your last point -- that the average consumer doesn't care about HD media right now. But we shouldn't base HD media audio and video on what the average consumer cares about -- otherwise, we would never have HD video, 5.1 surround, fancy extras, etc.

The capability to get better picture quality is always more quickly adopted than the capability to play better audio quality. That's because of the added expense of a HT receiver, speakers, etc. That should be a given. However, strictly speaking, what you're arguing doesn't makes sense: "HD video will increase far faster than HiDef audio." That's not true, because thankfully, the two are linked -- as more people buy HD movies, more people will get HD audio.

It almost seems that some people are making the following argument: 1) Most People don't care about lossless audio; 2) lossless audio doesn't matter because most people don't care about it; 3) therefore, we shouldn't include lossless audio.

Most rationale people won't go as far as 3, but they seem fine with 1 and 2. While I agree with 1, I disagree with 2. And strongly disagree with 3.

The base price for a system capable of hiDef audio is any HD player and any audio receiver with analog inputs or 1.1 or better HDMI and a basic set of 5.1 speakers. Onkyo is going to release a 5.1 system capable of lossless audio for less than $900. And you can get a cheap receiver with analog inputs and a basic 5.1 system for less than that, no doubt. A far cry from 10K!

People overestimate the importance of HD video too -- but again, we shouldn't give up on it because of that!

Ok maybe never is a strong word, but it will be very slow. Drop in prices for Tv and players will be great. But as such, I do believe HD video will increase far faster than HiDef audio. In droves, maybe not, but I think it has far more potential to get out there than the audio side.

It's far cheaper to see the HD pictures results, than the audio.

I'm wondering what someone thinks the base price to be able to take advantage of hidef audio is. 10,000 bucks? How far can the prices drop on receivers, amps, and speakers to a point that it can still let you hear the difference.

I realize that it does not hurt to include those options, but people far overestimate their importance for sure.

The capability to get better picture quality is always more quickly adopted than the capability to play better audio quality. That's because of the added expense of a HT receiver, speakers, etc. That should be a given. However, strictly speaking, what you're arguing doesn't makes sense: "HD video will increase far faster than HiDef audio." That's not true, because thankfully, the two are linked -- as more people buy HD movies, more people will get HD audio.

It almost seems that some people are making the following argument: 1) Most People don't care about lossless audio; 2) lossless audio doesn't matter because most people don't care about it; 3) therefore, we shouldn't include lossless audio.

Most rationale people won't go as far as 3, but they seem fine with 1 and 2. While I agree with 1, I disagree with 2. And strongly disagree with 3.

The base price for a system capable of hiDef audio is any HD player and any audio receiver with analog inputs or 1.1 or better HDMI and a basic set of 5.1 speakers. Onkyo is going to release a 5.1 system capable of lossless audio for less than $900. And you can get a cheap receiver with analog inputs and a basic 5.1 system for less than that, no doubt. A far cry from 10K!

People overestimate the importance of HD video too -- but again, we shouldn't give up on it because of that!

Everything I have read in the forum says to take advantage of lossless audio you need a REAL home theater system. I was thinking about getting an hd dvd with 5.1 analogue out to get uncompressed sound, but people have said its only worth it if you have a super high end home system. So screw it, I"m just gonna stick with spdif and not waste the money.

Sure, you can get 5.1 for little money nowadays. But is that system (the onkyo) gonna let you tell the difference between Dolby digital 5.1 and uncompressed 5.1 LCPM, with an average speaker set up?
I figure no. And thats why I think lossless audio is not that important because it far too cost prohibitive to even take true advantage of it.

Exactly, yes.

The poor DACs and lack of proper time alignment, etc on my XA2 and Panny made TRUE HD nice, but flawed. I await the other overlays that are found on my Halcro processor. I listened to TRUE HD and DD+ for sometime before I gave up on it using the analog outs (not to mention the subwoofer issues on the HD DVD players).

Lossless is the best and yes I want it.

You can call it spec whoring but the facts are lossless is better than compressed / lossy.

I look forward to presenting TRUE HD, DD+ by bypassing my XA2 DACs in the next couple of weeks... I expect great sound.

While I haven't tried the XA2, my HD-A1 has great DACs. There is a slight loss of immediacy and clarity on music (through a separate stereo pre - not my pre/pro), but it is actually quite nice sound. Definitely listenable. On movies it rocks.

It is always better to have fewer things in the chain, so the Halcro might be a better choice for the DA conversion -- but with my Anthem D1, the analog outs of the player sound awesome, even when redigitized for time alignment, THX processing, etc. I haven't tried listening without the pre/pro THX, but come on -- the analog outs are very nice, thanks!

Everything I have read in the forum says to take advantage of lossless audio you need a REAL home theater system. I was thinking about getting an hd dvd with 5.1 analogue out to get uncompressed sound, but people have said its only worth it if you have a super high end home system. So screw it, I"m just gonna stick with spdif and not waste the money.

Sure, you can get 5.1 for little money nowadays. But is that system gonna let you tell the difference between Dolby digital 5.1 and uncompressed 5.1 LCPM?
I figure no. And thats why I think lossless audio is not that important because it far too cost prohibitive to even take true advantage of it.

It's important to us who already have the capability to support it. Why deprive us of it if the format has the capability to support it (one format more consistently than the other) ?

And you need to think to the future. Next time you buy a Receiver, it may already be capable of supporting lossless audio via HDMI and/or analog; it won't be that hard for CE manufacturers to already include it. Same with the players. Think how many of the early DVD players actually had DTS capability; can you even buy one now that doesn't include it ?

And maybe you have a cheap 5.1 speaker setup now, but that doesn't mean you won't eventually upgrade to something better. (Heck, you might already be able to tell the difference with your current setup already, you just don't know it yet). Wouldn't you want your existing HD media selection to be able to already support lossless audio effectively ?

The capability to get better picture quality is always more quickly adopted than the capability to play better audio quality. That's because of the added expense of a HT receiver, speakers, etc. That should be a given. However, strictly speaking, what you're arguing doesn't makes sense: "HD video will increase far faster than HiDef audio." That's not true, because thankfully, the two are linked -- as more people buy HD movies, more people will get HD audio.

It almost seems that some people are making the following argument: 1) Most People don't care about lossless audio; 2) lossless audio doesn't matter because most people don't care about it; 3) therefore, we shouldn't include lossless audio.

Most rationale people won't go as far as 3, but they seem fine with 1 and 2. While I agree with 1, I disagree with 2. And strongly disagree with 3.

The base price for a system capable of hiDef audio is any HD player and any audio receiver with analog inputs or 1.1 or better HDMI and a basic set of 5.1 speakers. Onkyo is going to release a 5.1 system capable of lossless audio for less than $900. And you can get a cheap receiver with analog inputs and a basic 5.1 system for less than that, no doubt. A far cry from 10K!

People overestimate the importance of HD video too -- but again, we shouldn't give up on it because of that!

A number of posts above you thebland stated that 'cheapy dacs' really don't allow you to get lossless the way you should. Since these dacs reside in most low to mid-range receivers I'm wondering if maybe the base price to really 'get' lossless is higher than what you state. Do you agree with what he states ?

But is that system gonna let you tell the difference between Dolby digital 5.1 and uncompressed 5.1 LCPM?
I figure no. And thats why I think lossless audio is not that important because it far too cost prohibitive to even take true advantage of it.
As far as I know, SPDIF/Toslink doesn't support DD+. I agree with you that lossless is going overboard in most all cases, especially when the perceptual difference between lossless and DD+ hasn't been scientifically established, only subjectively claimed.

It's important to us who already have the capability to support it. Why deprive us of it if the format has the capability to support it (one format more consistently than the other) ?

And you need to think to the future. Next time you buy a Receiver, it may already be capable of supporting lossless audio via HDMI and/or analog; it won't be that hard for CE manufacturers to already include it. Same with the players. Think how many of the early DVD players actually had DTS capability; can you even buy one now that doesn't include it ?

And maybe you have a cheap 5.1 speaker setup now, but that doesn't mean you won't eventually upgrade to something better. (Heck, you might already be able to tell the difference with your current setup already, you just don't know it yet). Wouldn't you want your existing HD media selection to be able to already support lossless audio effectively ?

I mean it's not super cheap, I have dedicated speakers, but the way some people talk around here it makes to seem like I picked it up at radio shack. True I MIGHT be able to tell the difference, but not knowing for sure makes me hesitant. I dont know how long I will hold out before it reasonable affordable for me to try. I'll tell you, if it sounds the same with a new receiver, I'll be very disappointed.

As far as I know, SPDIF/Toslink doesn't support DD+. I agree with you that lossless is going overboard in most all cases, especially when the perceptual difference between lossless and DD+ hasn't been scientifically established, only subjectively claimed.

well I was referring to the $900 receiver he mentioned by Onkyo. Saying that it can support uncompressed sound. (I know spdif is limited but it gets the job done for now.)

What I meant was, having that ONKYO receiver, and having average speakers... would someone be able to tell the difference between dolby digital 5.1 and uncompressed LPCM.

As far as I know, SPDIF/Toslink doesn't support DD+...

Of course it does. Your reciever may then need to support DD+ though.

Of course it does. Your reciever may then need to support DD+ though.

could you elaborate?

I know my 360 converts dd+ to dts 5.1, but I figure that not the same thing.

"Dolby Digital Plus
What it is: DD+ is the base standard audio format for HD DVD. Unlike its application on Blu-ray, DD+ on HD DVD does not utilize a core+extension configuration. The format can be encoded at bit rates of 640 kb/s (considered equivalent to Blu-ray's use of standard Dolby Digital at that same rate) or 1509 kb/s. However, note that although the latter version of DD+ shares the same bit rate as standard DTS, this does not mean that these two are equivalent to one another. DD+ uses better encoding and more efficient compression to provide improved quality at the same rate. At least one professional Hollywood sound mixer has described Dolby Digital Plus at 1509 kb/s as audibly transparent to the studio master."

The following applies more to HD DVD than BD. BD has a higher bitrate and can bypass these problems with greater ease.

After much research, I have come to the conclusion that for soundtracks at 48/24* lossless tracks may not be the best solution. First, let me say I was supporting DD+ long before I found out some of this stuff. It did not bias me in any way.

Here are some facts:

1) HD DVD caps out at 29mbps for video and audio. Raw data rate is 36mbps.

2) 48/24 LPCM 5.1 takes ~7mbps

3) TrueHD, although based on MLP, can only support the same sampling rate and bit depth for all tracks, you can't mix and match.

4) Random noise can't be compressed.

5) Audio takes precedence over video. In other words, max mbps for audio must be subtracted from the available bit rate. The rest can go to video.

Opinions:

1) If there is no audible difference between two encodes, they are the same. You can choose either one.

2) VC-1 and AVC** encodes look best above 20mbps and 25mbps and you are fully into the point of diminishing returns or even no returns at all above that rate.

3) It would not be wise to max out bitrate to max specs. It would be wise to leave some overhead.

Conjecture using 48/24 audio, no extras such as PIP:

Lets say you always wanted to be 1 mbps under max bitrate.

1) With LPCM you get 29 - 1 - 7 = 21 mbps for video. PQ may suffer.

2) Determining bitrate "demand" for TrueHD (or even DTS HD MA) cannot be found by dividing files size / time. It's a VBR encode and as the sound becomes more complex the bit rate starts to go up. Individual movie tracks have different needs. You could theoretically have a bitrate peak that matches the PCM bitrate peak. But let's not take worse case. Not atypical, a TrueHD max bitrate will go to 5 mbps.

So for TrueHD you get 29 - 1 - 5 = 23 for video. Better, but again PQ may suffer.

3) Finally we have DD+. The studios can assign any bitrate they want
all the way up to 3.0 mbps but typically they use 1.5mbps. Anyone who has heard the Transformers DD+ soundtrack knows how good that can sound.

So for DD+ you get 29 - 1 - 1.5 = 26.5 for video. PQ is about as good as you're going to get. You even have some room to strip off some of that bitrate for extras.

So, for all of those who support HD DVD you really ought to be supporting DD+ unless you truly believe lossless is a better then DD+ and no DD+ track can stand up to lossless. If that's what you believe, then go to the Blu ray side. They don't have these problems due to greater bitrates. That's why Sony can afford to put LPCM on all their titles.

* IMO, if the master is at 48/24 then the soundtrack should be at 48/24. Dithering down to 48/16 for space, bitrate, etc. shold be a no no. I'm thinking that is exactly what some studio do for some TrueHD titles just so they can claim a lossless track.

** AVC may be a superior compression and actually require less bandwidth. To be fair though, I have no proof of this.

I mean it's not super cheap, I have dedicated speakers, but the way some people talk around here it makes to seem like I picked it up at radio shack. True I MIGHT be able to tell the difference, but not knowing for sure makes me hesitant. I dont know how long I will hold out before it reasonable affordable for me to try. I'll tell you, if it sounds the same with a new receiver, I'll be very disappointed.

I wouldn't be in the market for a new Receiver just to play back lossless; I'd have to have other reasons to upgrade the Receiver. But while I'm waiting, I can make sure the HD player and HD software can support it for when the time comes. Similar situation if I'm upgrading the Receiver but don't have an HD player yet; I'd at least want my new Receiver to support HDMI 1.3 and/or 6 channel analog bypass.

E.g. I'm buying up DTS HD MA-capable movies, I may not be able to take advantage of DTS HD MA today but at least I can play the DTS 1.5m core (which can sound very good BTW) until I do upgrade the hardware.

Another example. I'm thinking about an HDMI 1.3-compliant Preamp/Processor. At a minimum, I'd want it to support DTS HD MA decoding even though I don't have the player (yet) which supports it.

could you elaborate?

I know my 360 converts dd+ to dts 5.1, but I figure that not the same thing.

"Dolby Digital Plus
What it is: DD+ is the base standard audio format for HD DVD. Unlike its application on Blu-ray, DD+ on HD DVD does not utilize a core+extension configuration. The format can be encoded at bit rates of 640 kb/s (considered equivalent to Blu-ray's use of standard Dolby Digital at that same rate) or 1509 kb/s. However, note that although the latter version of DD+ shares the same bit rate as standard DTS, this does not mean that these two are equivalent to one another. DD+ uses better encoding and more efficient compression to provide improved quality at the same rate. At least one professional Hollywood sound mixer has described Dolby Digital Plus at 1509 kb/s as audibly transparent to the studio master."

Can you output Bitstream on the 360? That is the still encoded audio stream. Your receiver could then process it...that is if you have a receiver that supports DD+. If your 360 converts to DTS then you will lose a little bit of audio quality but still soun dpretty darn good.

Ignore most of what you read here. You need to have some really nice speakers and a very good reciever to be able to notice a difference between DD, DTS, DD+, and lossless. Even then most of the time you still won't notice.

Xbox 360 does not output "bitstream" for advanced codecs... it's limited to what SPDIF/Toslink can transport (traditional Dolby Digital, DTS & WMA Pro), even in it's HDMI version.

DD+ is not supported on SPDIF/Toslink and will be converted to one of the supported codecs.

Can you output Bitstream on the 360? That is the still encoded audio stream. Your receiver could then process it...that is if you have a receiver that supports DD+. If your 360 converts to DTS then you will lose a little bit of audio quality but still soun dpretty darn good.

Ignore most of what you read here. You need to have some really nice speakers and a very good reciever to be able to notice a difference between DD, DTS, DD+, and lossless. Even then most of the time you still won't notice.

The difference between DD and lossless should be obvious even on mediocre systems. I'll withhold judgement on how good a system you need to discern the differences between DTS/DD+ 1.5mbs soundtracks and lossless. My experience so far is the differences are still pretty obvious. YMMV.

I wouldn't be in the market for a new Receiver just to play back lossless; I'd have to have other reasons to upgrade the Receiver. But while I'm waiting, I can make sure the HD player and HD software can support it for when the time comes. Similar situation if I'm upgrading the Receiver but don't have an HD player yet; I'd at least want my new Receiver to support HDMI 1.3 and/or 6 channel analog bypass.

E.g. I'm buying up DTS HD MA-capable movies, I may not be able to take advantage of DTS HD MA today but at least I can play the DTS 1.5m core (which can sound very good BTW) until I do upgrade the hardware.

Another example. I'm thinking about an HDMI 1.3-compliant Preamp/Processor. At a minimum, I'd want it to support DTS HD MA decoding even though I don't have the player (yet) which supports it.

Yup, lots to think about. One good reason for upgrading to a new receiver though would be the ability to input multiple Hi-Def video sources through HDMI, along with upconversion from olders ones. If I did buy this I would make sure it was 1.3a compliant, and supported ALL dolby and DTS audio codecs. I might never have any true use for them, but might as well. I want it to be good for a looong time.

Everything I have read in the forum says to take advantage of lossless audio you need a REAL home theater system. I was thinking about getting an hd dvd with 5.1 analogue out to get uncompressed sound, but people have said its only worth it if you have a super high end home system. So screw it, I"m just gonna stick with spdif and not waste the money.

Sure, you can get 5.1 for little money nowadays. But is that system (the onkyo) gonna let you tell the difference between Dolby digital 5.1 and uncompressed 5.1 LCPM, with an average speaker set up?
I figure no. And thats why I think lossless audio is not that important because it far too cost prohibitive to even take true advantage of it.

Well, I there a couple schools of thought regarding lossless v. lossy: 1) lossy can be every good as lossless, and on HD DVD, may actually be better than lossless; 2) lossless is noticeably better, even on less than 100K hardware.

But when I was referring to Hidef audio, I wasn't only referring to lossless, which is a bit of a misnomer, but also to high bitrate lossy codecs like DTS HD and DD+. And I like to think that most people who have access to DD+ or DTS HD consider it quite an improvement over normal DD or DTS even on moderate HT systems.

Onkyo HTiB are famously well-performing systems -- I can't imagine why you won't be able to tell the difference between normal DD or DTS (what you get from the optical outs) and DD+/DTS HD or PCM/TrueHD/DTS HD MA.

A number of posts above you thebland stated that 'cheapy dacs' really don't allow you to get lossless the way you should. Since these dacs reside in most low to mid-range receivers I'm wondering if maybe the base price to really 'get' lossless is higher than what you state. Do you agree with what he states ?

I don't have any points of comparison -- I've yet to make a judgment on lossless v. lossy on any particular track because I just recently bought a Samsung 1400 that I won't be able to set up until Sunday night.

If I can get a friend over, we can do a simple blind A/B test and see how we do -- and my system is an Onkyo HT 6.1 system through and through.

2) VC-1 and AVC** encodes look best above 20mbps and 25mbps and you are fully into the point of diminishing returns or even no returns at all above that rate.

3) It would not be wise to max out bitrate to max specs. It would be wise to leave some overhead.


For #1 - Are you speaking of avg or peak?

For #2 - Why?

The difference between DD and lossless should be obvious even on mediocre systems. I'll withhold judgement on how good a system you need to discern the differences between DTS/DD+ 1.5mbs soundtracks and lossless. My experience so far is the differences are still pretty obvious. YMMV.

Can you explain your comparison methodology for this?

Well, I there a couple schools of thought regarding lossless v. lossy: 1) lossy can be every good as lossless, and on HD DVD, may actually be better than lossless; 2) lossless is noticeably better, even on less than 100K hardware.

But when I was referring to Hidef audio, I wasn't only referring to lossless, which is a bit of a misnomer, but also to high bitrate lossy codecs like DTS HD and DD+. And I like to think that most people who have access to DD+ or DTS HD consider it quite an improvement over normal DD or DTS even on moderate HT systems.

Onkyo HTiB are famously well-performing systems -- I can't imagine why you won't be able to tell the difference between normal DD or DTS (what you get from the optical outs) and DD+/DTS HD or PCM/TrueHD/DTS HD MA.

I guess I would have to spend some money to find out.

I guess I would have to spend some money to find out.

What kind of equipment do yo have?

For #1 - Are you speaking of avg or peak?

For #2 - Why?

!) Peak. And it really doen't take much to reach peak rates. Like adudio, once you allocate the peak rate allowed, you have to allow for it in final presentation.

2) That's just the engineer in me. Never, ever stress equipment a maximum rates. More likely than not you'll find some equipment that just can't handle it. I did pick 1mbps oout of my arse, you may be able to do better. However, I did you a reference, nature's Journey where R&B Fils used a CBR video encode at 26mps and a 96/24 DTS HD CBR at 1.5 mbps. At least thats what I remeber. He was 1.5 mps under max. Doing this from memory though so hopefully I got the number correct.

The difference between DD and lossless should be obvious even on mediocre systems. I'll withhold judgement on how good a system you need to discern the differences between DTS/DD+ 1.5mbs soundtracks and lossless. My experience so far is the differences are still pretty obvious. YMMV.

The problem with these discussions is that there are so many vague definitions that we use. For example mediocre systems,average systems,high end etc. I'm not sure how we can put any science to any of this with this kind of terminology. Not picking on you specifically Oscar, I do it too. It seems like it just boils down to personal taste and opinion and not a lot of science. My 2 cents.

The problem with these discussions is that there are so many vague definitions that we use. For example mediocre systems,average systems,high end etc. I'm not sure how we can put any science to any of this with this kind of terminology. Not picking on you specifically Oscar, I do it too. It seems like it just boils down to personal taste and opinion and not a lot of science. My 2 cents.

Agreed. I'm too busy watching movies than worrying about the "Science". Just call me a subjectivist. When I get access to movies containing both 1.5Mbs lossy and lossless tracks and the hardware to play them on, I might get a couple of friends to engage in some quasi-objective blind testing. In the meantime, I'm left with comparisons of "general impressions" of how different movies sound in all formats.

The following applies more to HD DVD than BD. BD has a higher bitrate and can bypass these problems with greater ease.

After much research, I have come to the conclusion that for soundtracks at 48/24* lossless tracks may not be the best solution. First, let me say I was supporting DD+ long before I found out some of this stuff. It did not bias me in any way.

Here are some facts:

1) HD DVD caps out at 29mbps for video and audio. Raw data rate is 36mbps.

2) 48/24 LPCM 5.1 takes ~7mbps

3) TrueHD, although based on MLP, can only support the same sampling rate and bit depth for all tracks, you can't mix and match.

4) Random noise can't be compressed.

5) Audio takes precedence over video. In other words, max mbps for audio must be subtracted from the available bit rate. The rest can go to video.

Opinions:

1) If there is no audible difference between two encodes, they are the same. You can choose either one.

2) VC-1 and AVC** encodes look best above 20mbps and 25mbps and you are fully into the point of diminishing returns or even no returns at all above that rate.

3) It would not be wise to max out bitrate to max specs. It would be wise to leave some overhead.

Conjecture using 48/24 audio, no extras such as PIP:

Lets say you always wanted to be 1 mbps under max bitrate.

1) With LPCM you get 29 - 1 - 7 = 21 mbps for video. PQ may suffer.

2) Determining bitrate "demand" for TrueHD (or even DTS HD MA) cannot be found by dividing files size / time. It's a VBR encode and as the sound becomes more complex the bit rate starts to go up. Individual movie tracks have different needs. You could theoretically have a bitrate peak that matches the PCM bitrate peak. But let's not take worse case. Not atypical, a TrueHD max bitrate will go to 5 mbps.

So for TrueHD you get 29 - 1 - 5 = 23 for video. Better, but again PQ may suffer.

3) Finally we have DD+. The studios can assign any bitrate they want
all the way up to 3.0 mbps but typically they use 1.5mbps. Anyone who has heard the Transformers DD+ soundtrack knows how good that can sound.

So for DD+ you get 29 - 1 - 1.5 = 26.5 for video. PQ is about as good as you're going to get. You even have some room to strip off some of that bitrate for extras.

So, for all of those who support HD DVD you really ought to be supporting DD+ unless you truly believe lossless is a better then DD+ and no DD+ track can stand up to lossless. If that's what you believe, then go to the Blu ray side. They don't have these problems due to greater bitrates. That's why Sony can afford to put LPCM on all their titles.

* IMO, if the master is at 48/24 then the soundtrack should be at 48/24. Dithering down to 48/16 for space, bitrate, etc. shold be a no no. I'm thinking that is exactly what some studio do for some TrueHD titles just so they can claim a lossless track.

** AVC may be a superior compression and actually require less bandwidth. To be fair though, I have no proof of this.

How did you come to that conclusion.
Those video peak rates seem a bit high.

How did you come to that conclusion.
Those peak rates seem a bit high.

There are quite a few titles have bitrates in this range. There's a sticky in the HD DVD software section that has the specs. In addition, I've been in many threads where amateurs like me and insiders were discussing this kind of stuff. I learned a lot from them. One thread in particular about Nature's Journey had many posts on the merits of different video bitrates.

I can't point you to any specific trustworthy source to back up the 20-25mbps statement, it is a conclusion I came to after time. It's a "rough" statement.

There are quite a few titles have bitrates in this range. There's a sticky in the HD DVD software section that has the specs. In addition, I've been in many threads where amateurs like me and insiders were discussing this kind of stuff. I learned a lot from them. One thread in particular about Nature's Journey had many posts on the merits of different video bitrates.
I can't point you to any specific trustworthy source to back up the 20-25mbps statement, it is a conclusion I came to after time. It's a "rough" statement.

Just wondering because on the Xbox 360 specs it sates,,

Q: What exactly does the Xbox 360 support for WMV (VC-1)?

A: Xbox 360 supports the following for WMV:

* File Extensions: .wmv
* Containers: asf
* Video Profiles: WMV7 (WMV1), WMV8 (WMV2), WMV9 (WMV3), VC-1 (WVC1 or WMVA) in simple, main, and advanced up to Level 3
* Video Bitrate: 15 Mbps with resolutions of 1920 x 1080 at 30fps. See the question about max bit rate, resolution, and frames per second.
* Audio Profiles: WMA7/8, WMA 9 Pro (stereo and 5.1), WMA lossless
* Audio Max Bitrate: No restrictions. See the question about max bit rate, resolution, a

In addition, with my adobe premiere pro 2 software, I can only author Vc1 video at a max of 10 mbits per second.

I realize that is nothing compared to the tools uber professionals use in holloywood, but it seemed to me that those data rates are way too high.

When I watch ps3 movies encoded in mpeg2, THOSE use 20-25..or less.

Anyhow, I dont see how that is possible. Perhaps it's how superbit was to dvd.

Just wondering because on the Xbox 360 specs it sates,,

Q: What exactly does the Xbox 360 support for WMV (VC-1)?

A: Xbox 360 supports the following for WMV:

* File Extensions: .wmv
* Containers: asf
* Video Profiles: WMV7 (WMV1), WMV8 (WMV2), WMV9 (WMV3), VC-1 (WVC1 or WMVA) in simple, main, and advanced up to Level 3
* Video Bitrate: 15 Mbps with resolutions of 1920 x 1080 at 30fps. See the question about max bit rate, resolution, and frames per second.
* Audio Profiles: WMA7/8, WMA 9 Pro (stereo and 5.1), WMA lossless
* Audio Max Bitrate: No restrictions. See the question about max bit rate, resolution, a

In addition, with my adobe premiere pro 2 software, I can only author Vc1 video at a max of 10 mbits per second.

I realize that is nothing compared to the tools uber professionals use in holloywood, but it seemed to me that those data rates are way too high.

When I watch ps3 movies encoded in mpeg2, THOSE use 20-25..or less.

Anyhow, I dont see how that is possible. Perhaps it's how superbit was to dvd.

Don't really know what to say. As I mentioned there is a sticky with title specs in BOTH the BD and HD DVD software sections. Natures Journey was encoded at 26mbps on HD DVD and 36?mbps on BD. These numbers come directly from Richard Casey at R&B Films who made this title. This was a title that maxed out the video bitrates.

Looking through the stickys you'll see many titles >= 20mbps. Some are lower, but I don't think there are any at 10mbps.

Well, I there a couple schools of thought regarding lossless v. lossy: 1) lossy can be every good as lossless, and on HD DVD, may actually be better than lossless
:eek:
wait, who's saying THAT? show me a thread, i'd like to laugh at them. DD+ is very, very good, but anyone saying lossy sounds BETTER than lossless needs to have their logic circuits checked. it's unpossible, to quote ralph.

Don't really know what to say. As I mentioned there is a sticky with title specs in BOTH the BD and HD DVD software sections. Natures Journey was encoded at 26mbps on HD DVD and 36?mbps on BD. These numbers come directly from Richard Casey at R&B Films who made this title. This was a title that maxed out the video bitrates.

Looking through the stickys you'll see many titles >= 20mbps. Some are lower, but I don't think there are any at 10mbps.

Now that I think about it, I think the 10mbs cap is to fit wmv hd video on dvd.

But wow... 26 mbs. I wonder if its because it needed to be that way, or just because they could.

Now that I think about it, I think the 10mbs cap is to fit wmv hd video on dvd.

But wow... 26 mbs. I wonder if its because it needed to be that way, or just because they could.

Just because they could. ;) It really isn't necessary. Even Richard admitted that they were not looking for the most efficient bitrate, they wanted to max it out. The 36mbps encode had no appreciable increase in quality. People were taking magnifying glasses to find differences that IMO didn't mount to a hill of beans.

For Nature's Journey, check out Xylon's BD/HD DVD image test thread... it's pretty amusing: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=925595 James is correct; no 'real' differences and overkill encoding.

:eek:
wait, who's saying THAT? show me a thread, i'd like to laugh at them. DD+ is very, very good, but anyone saying lossy sounds BETTER than lossless needs to have their logic circuits checked. it's unpossible, to quote ralph.

James, on this thread, made an argument of it because of the preference for 24/48 5.1. With DD+, you can crank up the video bit rate, but (so the argument goes), because of the high peaks with lossless, you may not be able to always do 24/48 5.1 and therefore "dumb it down" to 16/48 5.1.

But James, of course, can feel free to correct me!

James, on this thread, made an argument of it because of the preference for 24/48 5.1. With DD+, you can crank up the video bit rate, but (so the argument goes), because of the high peaks with lossless, you may not be able to always do 24/48 5.1 and therefore "dumb it down" to 16/48 5.1.

But James, of course, can feel free to correct me!

That is correct. I suspect that is one of the reasons we see so many 16/48 TrueHd tracks. One thing though, there may be very little difference in a 16/48 lossless track and a 24/48 lossless track. 24 bit depth is really getting into the noise range of the dacs. You really only need 20bits for transparency. You'll even see a few titles at 20bit depth. Plus, when down depthing, dithering, if done properly, can create a very good match to the original.

I used to say that I would prefer a DD+ track at 24/48 over a 16/48 lossless track but that was based on pure specs, not the science. Logically it makes sense, but then all I've really done is fall into the same trap that others claim when they say lossy cannot ever sound as good as lossless. As you know archangel37 I have done A/B comparisons to the best of my ability and can find no difference in like lossly and lossless encodes.

I have not found a title where I can do a DD+ at 24/48 and Lossless at 16/48. I think it (DD+) would sound better but not to the degree I once thought it would be only because the 16/48 lossless would also sound very good.

That is correct. I suspect that is one of the reasons we see so many 16/48 TrueHd tracks. One thing though, there may be very little difference in a 16/48 lossless track and a 24/48 lossless track. 24 bit depth is really getting into the noise range of the dacs. You really only need 20bits for transparency. You'll even see a few titles at 20bit depth. Plus, when down depthing, dithering, if done properly, can create a very good match to the original.

I used to say that I would prefer a DD+ track at 24/48 over a 16/48 lossless track but that was based on pure specs, not the science. Logically it makes sense, but then all I've really done is fall into the same trap that others claim when they say lossy cannot ever sound as good as lossless. As you know archangel37 I have done A/B comparisons to the best of my ability and can find no difference in like lossly and lossless encodes.

I have not found a title where I can do a DD+ at 24/48 and Lossless at 16/48. I think it (DD+) would sound better but not to the degree I once thought it would be only because the 16/48 lossless would also sound very good.

Utter tripe. In every test I've seen and in my own vast experience with recording, 24 bit sounds markedly different than 16 bit, and dithering ha zero effect on it.

Utter tripe. In every test I've seen and in my own vast experience with recording, 24 bit sounds markedly different than 16 bit, and dithering ha zero effect on it.

What tests have you done and on what discs?

Utter tripe. In every test I've seen and in my own vast experience with recording, 24 bit sounds markedly different than 16 bit, and dithering ha zero effect on it.

And you're an expert because?....

BTW: Hear it for yourself.

http://www.sounddevices.com/tech/24-bit.htm

The point of this exercise that 24 bit and 16 bit can both sound very good, but if you are recording using 16 bits you have to be a lot more accurate, 24 bits allows you has more room to play with, i.e, recording 40db below normal, you can still get a good signal after normaliztion. With 16 bits, not so much.

The point is, recording at 24 bits is indeed a better way to go but down rezing 24 bits to 16 bits may not be as big a hit as one might expect.

What tests have you done and on what discs?
I don't have to rely on discs.;)

And you're an expert because?....

BTW: Hear it for yourself.

http://www.sounddevices.com/tech/24-bit.htm

The point of this exercise that 24 bit and 16 bit can both sound very good, but if you are recording using 16 bits you have to be a lot more accurate, 24 bits allows you has more room to play with, i.e, recording 40db below normal, you can still get a good signal after normaliztion. With 16 bits, not so much.

The point is, recording at 24 bits is indeed a better way to go but down rezing 24 bits to 16 bits may not be as big a hit as one might expect.

I'm supposed to tell what with 128 kbps mp3s?

I'm supposed to tell what with 128 kbps mp3s?

The example I included was to demonstrate that 24 bits and 16 bits can sound very much alike. The only real advantage to 24 bits is in the recording/mastering stage. As far as playback goes, 24 bits doesn't really buy you anything. You can't hear 24 bits.

To back this up, I asked this on the insiders thread. The following are my questions followed by answers from Roger Dressler of Dolby Labs.




I'm trying to make sure I have a fairly good understanding of 24 bitdepth vs 16 bitdepth as it applies to playback. I understand that there are varying
viewpoints on this but I would like to know if I am in the ball park with the
following.

BTW: For arguments sake, sampling rate doen't matter but let's set it at 48khz

1) 24 bits is really only needed for recording and mostly because it allows for
for more headroom in mixing. In other words, one can correct for deficiencies (i.e recording at an improper level such as -20db). I would think there are other reasons but this is not where I am going (yet) and I don't know what they would be.


Yes. And yes, there are other reasons besides correcting mix levels, such as
insuring sufficient margin for accumulated signal processing stages.



2) 24 bits is has a theoretical dynamic range well above 140db which is well
above human hearing.


And it's also beyond the limits of analog circuitry to reproduce--thermal
noise.


3) A more realistic bit depth is 20 bits. The other 4 bits are really just noise.
It would be difficult to tell the difference in either.


Not difficult, but impossible, all else being equal.


4) 24 bits properly dithered to 16 bits produces a signal that is aurally closer
to 18-19 bits.


It is true that dithering allows the carriage of signals much smaller than the
LSB. Let ma also add that we should never entertain any digital audio system that lacks proper dither, regardless of the wordlength. It's improper usage of the medium.


Following this logic, I would say it is posssible to take the end result of a
fully mixed 24bit sound track, dither it to 16 bits, and play it back with very
little loss (as applied to human hearing). Obviously you can measure the
difference but I contend that all but the most discerning ears would not hear a difference especially as it applies to real sounds, not test tones. Apply the 5
channels to the mix, and I would say it would be very difficult to correctly pick out the 16bit tracks from the 24 bit tracks over consumer grade and perhaps even professional grade equipment.


I agree with your assessment.


Does this hold water? I know not all insiders would agree with this but I assume this is still open to debate.

Thanks.


I would only add that delivered 16-bit sources usually encounter further
post-processing after delivery, and even if that is done in a 24+ bit
environment, any slight residual degradation can become audible. The 20-bit
solution seems to strike an optimal balance of perfectionist sound, with some 10 dB of safelty margin for downstream processing, without excessive waste in the payload.
__________________
Roger
Dolby Laboratories Insider



Utter tripe? I think not. It is logical to conclude that 24 bit sound is yet another meaningless marketing point and even though it seems counter intuitive, 16 bit sound is still very, very good.

Hey Slim. Didn't I read somewhere that you are involved with recording/mixing/etc audio in a professional capacity?

AQ is more important than PQ to me
this may change when I own a FP and 100"+ screen.

Whoa.... thats crazy. What good is a PCM track if the picture is flat, lifeless, washed out, and lacking detail? YUK!

You dont need a 100" screen to appreciate video quality, trust me.

I'll take 24 bit...

I'll take 24 bit...

Not surprising Jeff. You are one of our Apex Members.

You need to remember that probably 80% of folks who own the new plasma/lcd etc HDTV's are either:

* Listening to ONLY their TV speakers
* Bought a HTiB and love it

These folks who everyone here is so eager to win over into the hi-def DVD world must realize the average consumer has NO plan to upgrade their audio to what it would take to even hear a lossless soundtrack...they are content with what they have.


I'll use my first post to quote this reply and say, quite simply, bingo.

Btw, My name is Pat, I have lurked here for many months and finally decided to come out of the shadows and introduce myself, so hello to all of you. :)

That said, I quote this post because the first half describes myself and my family, with the second half still applying to my family.

A bit of history:

Last year we had a 10 year old 32" tube TV, basic cable, etc. We did hop aboard the DVD bandwagon earlier than most, but I digress, it was through no actions we could call our own, but rather a gift to the family.

I finally became quite intrigued with the home theatre scene, and 1 year later, our setup includes:

42" Hitatchi HDS69
Motorola HD-DVR
Onkyo 605
Toshiba HD-A2
Onkyo HTiB 6.1 speakers

An entry level HD setup in the eyes of everyone here, and unfortunately because of reading these and other forums, entry level to myself, as well.

But the point you made was very accurate, I feel. Despite the vast improvements I can make in my HT setup, the fact remains it blows my previous setup out of the water, and is just leaps and bounds ahead of it in immersiveness.

Using myself as an example, the casual person is in the same boat as me. We buy all this stuff to replace our fossil tube TV, and in one fell swoop, we are introduced to recordable telivision, OTA HD broadcast, HD DVD, Fully immersive surround sound, etc.

Thats a HUGE upgrade compared to what we come from, and even if all the components that make up the HT in question are lackluster at best, the reality is they still SMOKE what you are used to and because you became so accustomed to that old tech, all these new toys and features seem godlike.

However, I do digress: While the family is happy with the current setup, and in comparrison to what we came from, so am I, I do find myself wanting more. I am constantly looking at high end bookshelf speakers, subs, and displays with wishful eyes.

Reality is though, I caught the "best I can possibly have" bug from places like this who drive the point into my head that with higher end components, I will see/hear what was meant to be seen/heard in all its glory.

For the casual like myself with a HD display, decent HTIB, and HD-DVD player, who Isnt being influenced by places like this and other forums. What they have in their eyes is a great system.

In a sense, I wish I was as uninformed and oblivious as them, just to save the money. But alas, you ****heads came along and tainted me. DAMN YOU!

Anyway, Ill end this long and somewhat pointless post. Look foward to talking to all of you in the future.

My buddy bought a PS3 and the Onkyo SP-908 HTIB (Onkyo 605 receiver + 7.1 speaker setup). First movie we watched after getting everything setup was 300. I was seriously not blown away by the audio, it sounded flat and not very intense like i expected it to. Thats when i pressed select and saw i was on the 640kb DD 5.1 track. Pressed the Audio button on the remote, it switched to the TrueHD track and BAM, every single person in the room was blown away, asking what i did to make such a HUGE difference in the audio. Anyone saying that Lossy = Lossless should not be on AVS Forums. Ive experienced it first hand and witnessed peoples reactions to the difference. Lossless is the only way to watch movies. End of story. No more discussion.

Lossless Audio will be like IME and IF/WE. Another "talking point" that makes HDM better and more enjoyable than DVD.

Lossless Audio will be like IME and IF/WE. Another "talking point" that makes HDM better and more enjoyable than DVD.

For me it's a "listening point". :D Give me TrueHD 16bit on HD DVD and LPCM 24bit on BD and I will be happy. Also I couldn't care less about IEM or most extras.

For me it's a "listening point". :D Give me TrueHD 16bit on HD DVD and LPCM 24bit on BD and I will be happy. Also I couldn't care less about IEM or most extras.

Well LD had DD5.1 in an age of only Pro Logic. That didn't turn out too well did it?

My apologies. Warner's 640Kbps DD+ compared to 1.5Mbps, is less than half.

Now I can't wait for people to say that the 640Kbps DD+ is just as good as lossless!

What?

has nothing to do with that!

has to do with the AMOUNT of information those 640k or 1.5mpbs transmit

@ 640k DD is basically the full six blocks of data transmission (x byte/block)
@ 1.5 mpbs the data transmission is now 3 blocks. ( (x/3 bytes)/block)

the serial transmission speed is not an indication of the amount of data that is being sent.

See TCP/IP sliding window for the same premise in the computer world.

My buddy bought a PS3 and the Onkyo SP-908 HTIB (Onkyo 605 receiver + 7.1 speaker setup). First movie we watched after getting everything setup was 300. I was seriously not blown away by the audio, it sounded flat and not very intense like i expected it to. Thats when i pressed select and saw i was on the 640kb DD 5.1 track. Pressed the Audio button on the remote, it switched to the TrueHD track and BAM, every single person in the room was blown away, asking what i did to make such a HUGE difference in the audio. Anyone saying that Lossy = Lossless should not be on AVS Forums. Ive experienced it first hand and witnessed peoples reactions to the difference. Lossless is the only way to watch movies. End of story. No more discussion.

You haven't heard DD+, a lossy format. Nor will you ever hear it on your PS3 since it doesn't decode it. Not all lossy formats are the same. DD+ is far superior to the DD5.1 you were listening to.

You haven't heard DD+, a lossy format. Nor will you ever hear it on your PS3 since it doesn't decode it. Not all lossy formats are the same. DD+ is far superior to the DD5.1 you were listening to.
Amen to this, it's too bad some entities won't ever admit to it.

You haven't heard DD+, a lossy format. Nor will you ever hear it on your PS3 since it doesn't decode it. Not all lossy formats are the same. DD+ is far superior to the DD5.1 you were listening to.

Fortunately, BD is lossless all around.