The fact that 32% of AV enthusiasts are choosing lossy audio over bit for bit transparent Master recordings speaks volumes to the spin job Microsoft and Co. have acheived here.

reminds me of Spongebob's movie:

"All hail plankton!" ;)

The fact that 32% of AV enthusiasts are choosing lossy audio over bit for bit transparent Master recordings speaks volumes to the spin job Microsoft and Co. have acheived here.

reminds me of Spongebob's movie:

"All hail plankton!" ;)

It means at least 32% of AVS "enthusiasts" have a monetary interest and/or investment in HD DVD.

Wow, people are amazing. If the post said do you want lossless if it added cost, then I could see people saying no. Why, besides being completely pig headed, would you want a lossy track, that has no chance of sounding better then a lossless track, that many say sound much better??

This isn't even a question and anyone who voted lossy, you should get help, because that is perhaphs the dumbest, most stubborn thing I have heard.

Wow, people are amazing. If the post said do you want lossless if it added cost, then I could see people saying no. Why, besides being completely pig headed, would you want a lossy track, that has no chance of sounding better then a lossless track, that many say sound much better??

This isn't even a question and anyone who voted lossy, you should get help, because that is perhaphs the dumbest, most stubborn thing I have heard.
Actually, it's the other way around. It's weird that people accept that losing 96% of a movie is fine, but losing 50% of a audio file (most of which we can't ever hear) is a giant problem. Hell, digital recording on it's own is "lossy". I guess people fear what they don't understand.

Wow, people are amazing. If the post said do you want lossless if it added cost, then I could see people saying no. Why, besides being completely pig headed, would you want a lossy track, that has no chance of sounding better then a lossless track, that many say sound much better??


Because the bits are needed for video far more, and because lossless audio is a total waste of time - the video is compressed to 1/60th of its original size, the audio with dd+ 1.5mbit is around 1/5th.

Because it takes trained golden ears like Amir with $16,000 headphones to spot the difference between lossless and 96kbit/channel, and yet DD+ is more than 3 times that bitrate (and the equivalent of far more because of the ability to spread bits on demand among more channels). That's way, way, way, way beyond the point of any noticeable difference.


As for majorities, I'll just point again how many buy multi-hundred-dollar HDMI cables, when they could get a bit-identical picture with a $5 job off ebay.

, I'll just point again how many buy multi-hundred-dollar HDMI cables, when they could get a bit-identical picture with a $5 job off ebay.

You need to go over to the $20,000 plus forum where thousand dollar power cords plugged into $.02 romex results in a immediate orgasmic experience compared to the component's supplied cord.:D

Art

Yes, I want "The look and sound of perfect".

You need to go over to the $20,000 plus forum where thousand dollar power cords plugged into $.02 romex results in a immediate orgasmic experience compared to the component's supplied cord.:D

Art

+1


Good Job Art...:D

You need to go over to the $20,000 plus forum where thousand dollar power cords plugged into $.02 romex results in a immediate orgasmic experience compared to the component's supplied cord.:D

Art

I call bullshark!!!!
Romex is $.22.:p

You need to go over to the $20,000 plus forum where thousand dollar power cords plugged into $.02 romex results in a immediate orgasmic experience compared to the component's supplied cord.:D

Art

:D Amazing how all those high falutin' cables somehow clean up juice that's been buggered up by flowing through miles of low-bid copper wire.

You need to go over to the $20,000 plus forum where thousand dollar power cords plugged into $.02 romex results in a immediate orgasmic experience compared to the component's supplied cord.:D

Art

:D Amazing how all those high falutin' cables somehow clean up juice that's been buggered up by flowing through miles of low-bid copper wire.

Come on guys - to equate the desire for lossless sound with this kind of ignorance is absurd.

Has it ever occurred to any of you that maybe you're just among the ones who can't hear the difference, or are maybe just less sensitive to it?

Most are not even voting here because of what the bland is trying to do.Enjoy the movies

it's also funny that more people have stopped in to say how loaded and childish the poll is than have actually voted in it.

Go to the original HD A1 / ZA1 threads on the day TRUE HD was enabled... THe posts weren't, "...ahh TRUE HD....it's barely better than DD+".... They were more like, "audio nirvana"...!

But now that the big titles and limitations of the format do not allow for such, many HD DVD supporters are singing a different tune. Only 10% of HD DVD is lossless.... THey need that 51 gb disc and fast!

so when I asked "can you name any of these people specifically?" your answer is to ignore that. I'll assume that means "no".

Until you can link to some posts that support your story, can you stop saying things like:

These same folks here that are telling us how great lossy is were the same folks that gushed in a 1000 post thread on how awesome lossless was compared to DD+ when Toshiba enabled True HD. Now they sing a different tune because HD DVD is barely even using lossless. Complete hypocrisy.

I'm working on that at the moment.


Are you really upset that a 2:1 ratio of memb ers here want lossless regardless of how subtle the improvements (even if the improvements are only apparent 1% of the time)?? Or are you bummed that HD DVD simply has run out of space to do so...?:o

It's ironic that you really don't care about HD-DVD given the choice but you really want to show your concern of why lossless should be present in HD-DVD. You should be glad that Blu-Ray has lossless and it is great due to no space restrictions etc.


... and you should put in your pre-order for a Profile 1.1 player as November 01, 2007 approaches fast. :D Obviously, all the features should be utilized so a new player is imperative to reap the benefits. Why settle for less eh? :D

For the life of me I can't understand why supposed enthusiast are so militantly against lossess audio to the point of almost hating it. I understand that many of you can't hear, won't hear, don't believe anyone can hear, don't have the equipment,.... but why are you dead set against it being included when it has NO effect on you or your life?

With a lossless and a lossy DD+ track you can:
1) Watch the same film in the same High Def.
2) Listen to your beloved lossy track.
3) Still have popcorn with your movie.
4) Still go out and play Bingo or Bungee jump.
5) Most importantly: It DOSN'T effect the price of tea in China.

So why oppose it when there is no reson to?:confused:

who are you speaking to here? can you please point to one post where someone was "so militantly against lossless audio to the point of almost hating it"? If not, can you please drop this straw-man argument?


- max

How do explain that the expert, FILMMIXER, failed it? Flawed test or FILMMIXER'S abilities??? I say the former..

but you don't know if it was flawed because YOU DIDN'T PARTICIPATE. please stop criticizing others based on unfounded speculation.

Detecting a flawed design is pretty simple when you examine the experiment itself.....C'mon, I know you're young but certainly you should know this..

For the pro-lossless people, this is the summary for pro-lossy:

HD DVD total bandwidth (sound and video) is 30.4mb/s. Video cannot exceed 29.4mb/s. So any audio that peaks over 1mb/s is potentially eating into the video stream bandwidth. This could be potentially be reducing the video quality. That is why its important to not be wasteful. We should use a lossy format that is nearly imperceptable from lossless. Lets not reduce video quality because it is already much more compressed than audio.

Does this make sense now?

FYI, Blu-Ray is different. Max bandwidth combined is 50mb/s. Video is 40mb/s. The peak audio bandwidth would have to rise above 10mb/s to affect the video stream quality, so adding lossless tracks is free for all intents and purposes.

Detecting a flawed design is pretty simple when you examine the experiment itself.....C'mon, I know you're young but certainly you should know this..

and you're old. hopefully your ears arent as such. :p

;)

...Lets not reduce video quality because it is already much more compressed than audio.

Does this make sense now?

FYI, Blu-Ray is different. Max bandwidth combined is 50mb/s. Video is 40mb/s. The peak audio bandwidth would have to rise above 10mb/s to affect the video stream quality, so adding lossless tracks is free for all intents and purposes.
Just a slight correction BD is 48Mbs with 8Mbps reserved for audio. But still a HUGE advantage for audio making lossless "free".

However I still feel that you can get an almost equal (or equal) picture on HD DVD with lossless sound even with it's limited bandwidth. Why Toshiba picked 30.2Mbps as the max is unknown other than it was a compromise that is causing problems.

HD DVD does have over 6Mbps in overhead (used for error correction?). Could some of this be devoted to audio? If so could current players be firmware updated to read it?

If this 6Mbps (or some of it) could be used put HD DVD back in the audio game and eliminate the need to compromise.

Detecting a flawed design is pretty simple when you examine the experiment itself.....C'mon, I know you're young but certainly you should know this..

So says the gentleman who created this fatally flawed poll that is so biased and loaded that more people object to its flaws than vote for one of its choices.

You are a walking contradiction, if ever there was one.

Just a slight correction BD is 48Mbs with 8Mbps reserved for audio. But still a HUGE advantage for audio making lossless "free".

However I still feel that you can get an almost equal (or equal) picture on HD DVD with lossless sound even with it's limited bandwidth. Why Toshiba picked 30.2Mbps as the max is unknown other than it was a compromise that is causing problems.

HD DVD does have over 6Mbps in overhead (used for error correction?). Could some of this be devoted to audio? If so could current players be firmware updated to read it?

If this 6Mbps (or some of it) could be used put HD DVD back in the audio game and eliminate the need to compromise.

I'm sure Toshiba had it's technical reasons for the limits; if they could use the bandwidth, don't you think they would have tried ? Just use Blu-ray; the only compression needed is in the video.

I didn't find them easy to discern. And the test was using 96kpbs/ch and using an audio codec, WMA which we invented!

It would be hell trying to find differences in 300 kbps/ch DD+ (1.5 mbit/sec for 5.1) on movie soundtracks. Trust me. It will not be easy whatsoever.

For your sake, and the reputation of the rest of us :), let's pray Steve doesn't come up with a movie double blind test because there will be so many people flunking that it won't even be funny....
Well, Bland...time to take everything back that you previously said about Amir's test results. 96 kbps is no DOUBT possible to discern. 320 kbps, I'm still awaiting the day.

I'm willing to bet that if someone took a DD+ track and called it "DD+" and then took that same track, raised the db a few notches and then called it "TrueHD" that many would swear the "TrueHD" sounded better than the DD+.
Truer words seldom spoken. ;)

I'm sure Toshiba had it's technical reasons for the limits; if they could use the bandwidth, don't you think they would have tried ? Just use Blu-ray; the only compression needed is in the video.

You mean the only thing that BD throws away 96% of is the thing I actually bought a movie for?

I couldn't care less, just give me lossless audio since it takes no chicken out of your pot.
I see you sticking your hands in your ears and your tongue wagging at us all. "Who cares if it's perceptually transparent and not needed, I WANT IT ANYWAY!"

You mean the only thing that BD throws away 96% of is the thing I actually bought a movie for?

I'd prefer 0% lossless compression on video but the format which supports this isn't available yet. Until then, I'll accept the format available today which allows the least compression.

I see you sticking your hands in your ears...

Hands IN the ear?:eek:

I'd prefer 0% lossless compression on video but the format which supports this isn't available yet. Until then, I'll accept the format available today which allows the least compression.

Slim loves to invent a format that has 4000 lines of resolution, just let him go.

I'm sure Toshiba had it's technical reasons for the limits; if they could use the bandwidth, don't you think they would have tried ? Just use Blu-ray; the only compression needed is in the video.

I do use BD but I don't want to limit my software options based on the hardware format. ;)

That spec vs reality commentary was great.

Pretty much reflects what I feel. It's all about the end result at the end of the day.

Slim loves to invent a format that has 4000 lines of resolution, just let him go.

Actually in 15 to 25 years we will have that or more.;)

This poll is now over 2-1 for lossless incase anyone just voted and missed it. ;)


It is good to see that for all of the posturing and arguments that lossless doesnt matter, the people at an AVS forum actually do largely prefer the best a soundtrack has to offer.

Actually in 15 to 25 years we will have that or more.;)

Of course we will.

Come on guys - to equate the desire for lossless sound with this kind of ignorance is absurd.

Has it ever occurred to any of you that maybe you're just among the ones who can't hear the difference, or are maybe just less sensitive to it?

I never said a thing against lossless audio.. don't put me in that group. My comment was about power cords and expensive HDMI cables only.


Art

I'd rather have 24 bit DD+ at 1.5 than losses 16 bit.

Could someone explain how Batman Begins which is 140 minutes long has a lossless sound track and looks better then Transformers which is 144 minutes long and doesn't have lossless fit on a HD-DVD? Is it the bit rate peaks a lot on Transformers or they just chose to not include it?

Hands IN the ear?:eek:
fingers; early morning, not fully awake posts for the lose. ;)

Could someone explain how Batman Begins which is 140 minutes long has a lossless sound track and looks better then Transformers which is 144 minutes long and doesn't have lossless fit on a HD-DVD? Is it the bit rate peaks a lot on Transformers or they just chose to not include it?

I've seen a file readout (I'm guessing from someone who cracked the hd dvd on their pc), and I believe it was pretty close to the 30GB limit of hd dvd. IMO in this case, the limit itself might be the actual file size rather than the bitrate. Although if the movie did have very high video bitrates, that could have meant they had to go with dd+ to avoid compromising the visuals as well. I'm not sure why the file size itself was so close to 30GB. Were some extras on the movie disk as well as the 2nd extras disk?

I can't remember off the top of my head exactly what the file space used was. I think it was like 27.5GB (1028 OS calc). 30GB (1000 manufacturer spec) = 27.9GB OS

I'd rather have 24 bit DD+ at 1.5 than losses 16 bit.

Have you ever heard a 24 bit DD+ track and a 16 bit lossless track on the same movie? If not, how could you know what you'd rather have?

Detecting a flawed design is pretty simple when you examine the experiment itself.....C'mon, I know you're young but certainly you should know this..

hubris doesn't impress me.

and why do you keep implying that you know my age? is it because I asked you a question you couldn't answer, so now you have to overcompensate by projecting your own insecurities onto me?

Have you ever heard a 24 bit DD+ track and a 16 bit lossless track on the same movie? If not, how could you know what you'd rather have?

What looks better a 720x480 picture uncompressed or a 1920x1080 picture compressed using jpeg?

I never said a thing against lossless audio.. don't put me in that group. My comment was about power cords and expensive HDMI cables only.


Art

Art, You have a setup most can only dream. I believe you have both formats but you seem to lean HD-DVD. Just curious, whats your opinion regarding the audio?

What looks better a 720x480 picture uncompressed or a 1920x1080 picture compressed using jpeg?

What sounds better, an honest question, or an analogy waiting for a point?

In any case, I'd say the 1080 compressed with JPEG based on my experiment. :D

You need to go over to the $20,000 plus forum where thousand dollar power cords plugged into $.02 romex results in a immediate orgasmic experience compared to the component's supplied cord.:D


I presume the orgasmic experience results from a direct physical connection to the power cord? PRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRZZAP. Oooo.

Would certainly explain why blind tests completely destroy most of the gibberish bandied around there. Of course, "high-end" manufacturers usually never let their products actually get near such tests for that very reason.....

I presume the orgasmic experience results from a direct physical connection to the power cord? PRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRZZAP. Oooo.

Would certainly explain why blind tests completely destroy most of the gibberish bandied around there. Of course, "high-end" manufacturers usually never let their products actually get near such tests for that very reason.....

I knew a couple of skepticle engineer buddies who did some blind testing on $500 power cords vs Stock vs. "lesser" esoteric power cords (PCs). Yes, they did indeed pick up which cables were better. One of them wound up buying three (3) PCs for his HT system.

While I'd normally say I'd prefer lossless over lossy, this is one of the worst polls I've ever seen on this forum and I'm thus abstaining from voting.

After reading this thread, I see why many folks are saying that the BD and HD DVD formats themselves don't turn people away, but rather the fanatical supporters from both camps.

I think the HD DVD studios have gotten the message and majority of upcoming releases will have lossless audio on them. I think the main reason Paramount's Transformers and Universal's Evan Almighty didn't have lossless is that these were encoded and finalized before studio's decision to include lossless whenever possible. I think most of Paramount's and Universal's upcoming releases include TrueHD (possible exceptions being big titles already encoded and sitting for release dates).

You need to go over to the $20,000 plus forum where thousand dollar power cords plugged into $.02 romex results in a immediate orgasmic experience compared to the component's supplied cord.:D

Art

Good point. As an engineer, the weakest link in your overall sound delivery is your limiting factor, and that certainly isn't your DD+ source. There is much more variability present in speakers and room acoustics than any wire, amplifier, or audio codecs. However having said that, if you could include lossless audio in your release, that takes away another talking point away from HD DVD critics. Of course, then there will be those who talk of digital jitter being superior on Blu-ray, but this will hold much lower sway compared to lack of lossless talking point.

What I've gotten out of this and various other threads (including Josh Z's article) is that encoding is still very much an art, not a science. And the encoders for both PQ and AQ are getting better and better at what they do.

Consider the average PQ/AQ of HDM material released a year ago to today's. For those of you who think Batman Begins looks "soft", what if the same team tackled it again today with more experience under their belts?

I think people in this forum may be giving too much weight to the technology. It's the carpenter, not the tools. And I don't think we've seen the best of what either format is capable yet.

I think the HD DVD studios have gotten the message and majority of upcoming releases will have lossless audio on them.

If that is in fact the case, then if compromises have to be made on a particular title to get the lossless, it must be with the elimination of special features and interactivity, and not picture quality.

I think people in this forum may be giving too much weight to the technology. It's the carpenter, not the tools. And I don't think we've seen the best of what either format is capable yet.

I think I disagree to some extent. You need to refine the process/tools so regardless of the "carpenter", you will still get outstanding PQ and AQ. Otherwise it is hit or miss. It reminds me of the early days of programming where optimization was important and the best programmers spend weeks trying to make a program a few Kbytes smaller. Today that is not even a consideration.

As a technology matures, the quality of the "carpenter" generally become less and less important.

30% satisfied with "good enough" at an enthusiast site like this one is a bit disturbing, I'm happy to see an overwhelming preference for lossless...

Bunch of pikers. Why not the ultimate? The next generation HDM should have analog-only :rolleyes:

30% satisfied with "good enough" at an enthusiast site like this one is a bit disturbing, I'm happy to see an overwhelming preference for lossless...

What is more disturbing is the number of people who would believe a spec sheet than their eyes and ears.

"Darn it, it says lossless on the label. I should be hearing the bestest possible version then !! Ooh, look at the pretty bit rate meter spike. :cool:"

Where's the I don't care option? The DD+ track on Transfomers to me sounds EXACTLY as it did when I saw it in the theater.


"EXACTLY", interesting. I'm curious as to what audio gear/accoustical treatments the theater you watched Tranformers in has and also what audio gear/accoustical treatments you used when viewing the HD DVD version.

For me, using the exact same gear in two different rooms even sound different.

No.

It is good to see folks want closest to the master.

I'm willing to bet that if someone took a DD+ track and called it "DD+" and then took that same track, raised the db a few notches and then called it "TrueHD" that many would swear the "TrueHD" sounded better than the DD+.

That's ridiculous. You don't have to change the db levels, just call the duplicate track TrueHD and many if not most will "prefer" the TrueHD track. :)

Increase the sound by a db or so and probably just about everybody would prefer the TrueHD track.

Originally Posted by MidnightWatcher
I'm willing to bet that if someone took a DD+ track and called it "DD+" and then took that same track, raised the db a few notches and then called it "TrueHD" that many would swear the "TrueHD" sounded better than the DD+.

Sure, playing on a 360/HD DVD add-on. No doubt it will sound exactly like it did in the theater. ;)


I'm sure you can make an iPod 128kb sound just as good as DD+ 24bit after level matching as well for the "good enough" crowd. :)

edit: ah screw it, why level match it for the "good enough" crowd. would be time wasted. Just turn the bass and treble all the way up on your tv settings and play it the way it was "meant" to be played.

Here's something to think about bland.

Most of these beloved "lossless" tracks are actually lossy. Studio masters are 24bit/48khz. Most of the BD PCM tracks downcovert the bit-resolution to 16-bit, losing information and SNR as well. Hence, though these tracks may be billed as "lossless," they are still truly not lossless.

In the end, I don't think it matters much when you compare high bitrate lossy to lossless anyway - just like a 256kbps WMA is nearly impossible to tell apart from the original CD when you do a double blind test. It's more mental than anything else.

In the end, I don't think it matters much when you compare high bitrate lossy to lossless anyway - just like a 256kbps WMA is nearly impossible to tell apart from the original CD when you do a double blind test. It's more mental than anything else.

But would you buy a music CD containing only 256kbps WMA tracks?

On second thought, I don't want to know - that's more or less what people pay a buck per song for at itunes!! :eek:

What is more disturbing is the number of people who would believe a spec sheet than their eyes and ears.


Not nearly as disturbing as the idea that someone would jump to such an absurd conclusion. All a lossless track lets you do is take the compressionist(s)/encode/equipment off the list of suspects for why a track would suck or not, as well as supercede the whole Dolby versus DTS tribalism silliness. You could still blame your own gear, your own room, and your own mark I human ear. At least 2 out of those 3, though, are something an enthusiast can do something about. ;)

Not so much with a crappy encode, a compressionist doing his job on Monday versus Wednesday versus Friday, nor his possibly malfunctioning/mis/un-maintained gear, etc...

But would you buy a music CD containing only 256kbps WMA tracks?

On second thought, I don't want to know - that's more or less what people pay a buck per song for at itunes!! :eek:
I have just a tad less the 400GB of 98%+ lossless music in my iTunes library (I do download the lossy freebies most weeks to check out, then buy the CD if I like). I only allow lossless in my iPhone, iPod, or Nano and I only want lossless for my HD DVD/BD"s also.;)

No.

It is good to see folks want closest to the master.
What the hell does "closest to master" mean. It either is the same or it isn't.

It was probably peak bandwidth issues which prevented them from putting lossless on "Transformers".

I just decrypted it and checked, and it was partly because of this, and partly a production decision. The Euro version has a dd+ 1.5mbit english track, a french 768kbit dd+, a spanish dd+ 768k, and two more 192k tracks, for a total of 3.5mbit. I guess any encode made these days must assume multiple foreign language soundtracks in the bitrate calculations, since they're not going to re-encode the video for Europe/Asia (and besides, who wants dubbed???). There's space there for lossless, but not if they insist on having 5 soundtracks.

Anyway, video is AVC, at around 21mbit ABR, pretty high for a HD disc these days (more than several Bluray discs, inc PotC) - but then this is a movie where almost every scene is pure action. It's mostly almost constant around 20-22, with a few dips to 16mbit. Highest I can see is 29.1mbit, which must be a point where the vbvbuffer helps out to increase the peaks a little. Nice looking pic, although not quite perfect - the demanding action scenes are all great, with terrific detail, but surprisingly some of the darker, more static scenes are a bit ropey. Titles like Matrix2 get both right, and in much lower bitrate too (15mbit abr, peak to 23ish).

ps this is one awful movie, despite the great picture quality. Once I'm bored checking the encode it's straight on ebay.

What the hell does "closest to master" mean. It either is the same or it isn't.

not sure if youre serious or not, but 16bit 48khz is a little 'closer to master' than 8 bit 22khz! a tin can and a bit of string would be further from the master also.

maybe dunking you head in a cold bucket of water will clear up those neurons :p

Won't vote, because the question should be "Lossless audio has the POTENTIAL to be better..."

It doesn't mean it always is.

Won't vote, because the question should be "Lossless audio has the POTENTIAL to be better..."

It doesn't mean it always is.

Actually you have it backwards. Lossy has the POTENTIAL to be nearly as good (of course it CAN'T be better).;)

Actually lossless is ALWAYS better than lossy relative to most closely matching the master. That is fact. Now whether you can hear it in your individual system is a whole other, different question.

OMG. What if BD loses? :eek::eek::eek:

OMG. What if BD loses? :eek::eek::eek:

Be positive. Blu-ray can't lose. Sony will never give up on it. I doubt Disney and Fox would either. Their current encodes won't fit on an HD DVD disc so they would be loath to even try.

If by some miracle HD DVD "wins", you'll be settling into a world of non-HD lossy audio and too much mediocrity in picture quality. You can also kiss the idea of high def music videos with 5.1 24/96 lossless audio soundtracks good buy and that would be tragedy.

You really believe that

Actually lossless is ALWAYS better than lossy relative to most closely matching the master. That is fact.

Actually, that is complete BS. If you losslessly encode an 8bit 22khz downconversion from the 24bit/48khz master, is it considered lossless? It is obviously going to sound much worse than a lossy 24bit/48khz lossy encode of the master. So which encode is better, the 8bit/22khz lossless encode or the 24bit/48khz lossy encode of a 24bit/48khz master?

Most "lossless" tracks on both BD and HD DVD are 16bit/48khz. The studio master is generally 24bit/48khz - therefore if you did not consider the 8bit/22khz example above lossless, you cannot consider 16bit/48khz tracks lossless either; and, if you do consider 8bit/22khz lossless, then the designation lossless is worthless as it means nothing in terms of final audio quality. DD+ 1.5mbps is 24bit/48khz. Most lossless tracks trade off SNR & bit resolution for their "lossless" name, but in doing so they obviously lose information from the master. So they are not truly lossless, and thus it is debatable whether a "lossless" 16bit/48khz track downconverted from the 24bit/48khz master sounds better or worse than a 24bit/48khz DD+ 1.5mbps track where no downconversion was performed.

On top of all this, professional mixers who have access to the masters themselves in this very forum have stated they feel DD+ 1.5mbps is perceptually lossless (indistinguishable from the master audibly), Now, does it matter for the consumer if it is mathematically lossless or not if it sounds identical and is thus perceptually lossless? Of course not, unless you are trying to prop up a format where mathematically lossless needs to matter, like you are doing with Blu-Ray bland :)

Not to mention that you are championing "lossless" when it isnt really lossless, as most of the time it is losing bit resolution/information from the original master in a 24bit -> 16bit downconversion.

Double blind tests have told us a lot with lossy 2.0 codecs, namely that high bitrate (256kbps or better) lossy 2.0 codecs sound the same as lossless/uncompressed 2.0 codecs. Why should it be any different for 5.1 codecs, where you are more distracted due to the visuals and have a larger bitpool as all 5.1 channels arent usually full blast active at the same time as in a 2.0 setup? It shouldn't be, and it isn't - if highbitrate 2.0 codecs sound the same as lossless/uncompressed as proved by double blind tests on hydrogenaudio and elsewhere, then high bitrate 5.1 codecs will sound the same as lossless/uncompressed in the same manner - there is no magic involved, it is just encoding 3x the waveforms (2 vs. 6). And guess what, 256kbps x 3 = 768kbps, half the bitrate of what DD+ offers at 1.5mbps - therefore 1.5mbps should be more than enough space to provide the same audibly lossless sound as we see with high bitrate lossy codecs as its not only triple the threshold of what is determined perceptually lossless for stereo, but it has a larger bitpool to work with as well.

In the end though, I think it mentally makes some feel better to have lossless and hence they believe it sounds better which I can understand. But realize that this is mere placebo effect, and not based in real audible differences. Its also possible some have a bad taste in their mouth due to early poor MP3 encoders like Xing and poorly encoded P2P downloads; of course, there are quality encoders as well such as LAME (MP3), Windows Media Encoder (WMA), and iTunes (AAC). For movies, studios use reference quality Dolby and DTS encoders when doing lossy encodes, resulting high quality encodes, so you don't have to worry about artifacts you heard in those early crappy audio encoders or crappy sounding P2P downloads.

What it boils down to is that lossless really makes little difference even when you have a $15k audio system like my own. But when some have a format riding on things like this, they tend to make a mountain out of a molehill and disregard common sense.

Actually, that is complete BS. If you losslessly encode an 8bit 22khz downconversion from the 24bit/48khz master, is it considered lossless?

Do we actually have to spell things out every time? OK, here it goes. "Given the same sampling rate and same bit-depth as the master, a lossless is always better than lossy relative to most closely matching the master. That is fact."

In fact, if something is at a lower sampling rate or less bit-depth than the master, than it cannot be called lossless. My definition of a lossless is that it is identical to the master, except it is compressed, which after decompression is identical to the master.

Not to mention that you are championing "lossless" when it isnt really lossless, as most of the time it is losing bit resolution/information from the original master in a 24bit -> 16bit downconversion.


Proof please. How do you know for those lossless 48/16 titles, that the master isn't also 48/16?

Do we actually have to spell things out every time? OK, here it goes. "Given the same sampling rate and same bit-depth as the master, a lossless is always better than lossy relative to most closely matching the master. That is fact."

But the context of where we are using it, namely lossless on HD DVD/BD, the point you make here is irrelevant because lossless tracks on BD/HD DVD generally are often LOWER bit-resolution (16bit) than DD+ 1.5mbps lossy tracks on BD/HD DVD (24bit).

In fact, if something is at a lower sampling rate or less bit-depth than the master, than it cannot be called lossless. My definition of a lossless is that it is identical to the master, except it is compressed, which after decompression is identical to the master.

I agree with your first sentence here if you are referring to something being mathematically lossless (matching the master bit for bit on a scope). However in context of the formats we have, most lossless tracks DO have lesser bit-depth (16bit) than the master (24bit). And that is why the topic and its associated poll in reference to HDM is pointless.

But we must also consider the idea of perceptually lossless - i.e. humans can't hear over 20khz, what is the purpose of retaining frequencies 20khz-24khz? So the dog hears better sound? We are not mixers or producers where we need the original tracks that we may modify time and time again where lossless/uncompressed would be useful, we are merely listeners. And it has been proved with stereo bitrates using quality encoders that at high bitrates lossy sounds equal to lossless. There is no reason the same wouldn't apply to 5.1 audio. So again because of this, the whole notion of this argument for our purposes isn't useful.

Proof please. How do you know for those lossless 48/16 titles, that the master isn't also 48/16?

It's relatively common knowledge that the pro audio equipment used by hollywood studios uses 24bit/48khz as the defacto standard, and thus most masters for modern films should be 24bit/48khz in the vaults.

It is an oddity that so many Bluray tracks are 16bit. Given that 8 of Bluray's 48mbit max is reserved for audio, it makes no difference in peak bandwidth calculations whether it has a single 16bit or single 24bit track. Now if the disc has multiple LPCM tracks you could understand this - on a 120 min movie two 24/48 tracks take 12.4Gigabytes and almost 14mbit, really chewing into the peak video. However, afaik multiple LPCM tracks are relatively rare.

Similarly, I guess it makes sense on a BD25, with a typical main movie taking 18-22GB for the video then audio space will be constrained. 24bit over 16bit LPCM will take an additional gigabyte per hour. This is more an argument towards the stupidity of using uncompressed audio though - THD 24/48 takes half the space, and 16/48 is more like a third.


Personally I suspect we read too much into a lot of these studio choices - many are probably generalised policy decisions rather than encoding necessities based on the particular movie. In other words, a studio finds that giving some discs 24bit will cause space problems, and thus switches to 16bit for all discs.

Personally I suspect we read too much into a lot of these studio choices - many are probably generalised policy decisions rather than encoding necessities based on the particular movie. In other words, a studio finds that giving some discs 24bit will cause space problems, and thus switches to 16bit for all discs.

Yes encoding isnt a constant that forces U to use a certain bitrate. If they want they can encode Video after audio has getting its share.

Studio seems to have different preferences (wich in time will change, just look at DVD)

I Usually thinks Flags of our father shows how much its down to the studio.

Paramount BD = DD640
Paramount HD = DD+1,5
Warner BD = PCM 16/48
Warner HD = TrueHD 16/48

Do we actually have to spell things out every time? OK, here it goes. "Given the same sampling rate and same bit-depth as the master, a lossless is always better than lossy relative to most closely matching the master. That is fact."

In fact, if something is at a lower sampling rate or less bit-depth than the master, than it cannot be called lossless. My definition of a lossless is that it is identical to the master, except it is compressed, which after decompression is identical to the master.

My definition of lossless is that the "decoded", if required, result is identical to the master. That includes uncompressed PCM in addition to TrueHD and DTS HD MA. Much easier to lump them all together when engaged in fruitless discussions on lossless vs. lossy.

Actually, that is complete BS. If you losslessly encode an 8bit 22khz downconversion from the 24bit/48khz master, is it considered lossless?...

Yes it is lossless by the definition we use. It will not sound as good as the original because of the down-conversion. You are confused on the terms.

Lossy: Audio that has had perceptual coding applied.
Lossless: Audio that has not had perceptual coding applied.

Also it is my understanding that most Hollywood Masters up until recently are 16/48 and BD almost always uses the same.

There was a new article posted a couple days ago on the AllThingsHiDef website. It's an ineresting read with comments from both Microsoft Director Kevin Collins and Warner VP Dan Silverberg.

"A New Definition of Sound" (http://www.allthingshidef.com/ME2/dirmod.asp?sid=3C644C50F0DA47FDA581C56C5FDF5FC7&nm=&type=news&mod=News&mid=9A02E3B96F2A415ABC72CB5F516B4C10&tier=3&nid=F1400943F61D47EABBBB9B4BDA9BE0FD)

Yes it is lossless by the definition we use. It will not sound as good as the original because of the down-conversion. You are confused on the terms.

Lossy: Audio that has had perceptual coding applied.
Lossless: Audio that has not had perceptual coding applied.

Also it is my understanding that most Hollywood Masters up until recently are 16/48 and BD almost always uses the same.

To fairly compare two compression methods you must use the same source data.

In Blu-Ray and HD DVD the only common source data we have to compare to is the studio master (24bit or 16 bit).

TrueHD, DTS HD(MA) and PCM can only be declared lossless in a technical sense (marketing can say anthing they want) if they are the same bitrate and bitsize as the studio master.

I will go out on a limb and wager that there are many PCM tracks that are NOT a lossless copy of the source data. They are infact an intermediate lossy recording wrapped in a lossless ribbon :)