First Blu-Ray Disc To Get Neo:X-Optimized Soundtrack

jesus....

11.1 sounds awesome!. but, i dont have room for it lol.

I was reading a discussion last year about DTS Neo:X that was sourced with information from DTS and they said that the MINIMUM recommended room size is 20 feet x 30 feet by at least 9 feet tall. That is a MASSIVE room!

Imagine building a theater that had both DTS Neo:X and Dolby Atmos in mind. You would need some serious space, a lot of power, and a ton of speakers, but it would be awesome!

Our living room is 20x20x8 so I think thats close enough!

Too bad the bank account says hell no on a new receiver and speakers to make use of it. Best I can do at the moment is 7.2

That is a concern but isn't stopping me. Since I started my Hawaii Home theater construction thread ( http://www.avsforum.com/t/1406831/hawaii-home-theater-construction/120#post_22487672 ) I've added more equipment so that it will be complete at a 11.4 system. My room is large 26' x 19' x 9' but they are correct, it will be a tight squeeze to get everything in. I thought the first Expendables was a fair movie at best but I'll surely keep my eye out for Expendables II to hear all of it in its full glory. The problem I have is that I'm still waiting for someone to create a pre/pro that will do all 11 channels. Until then it will be a 9.4 system.

so Neo:X will not work on 5.1 systems?...do most 2012 receivers support this feature?

For the money, 5 good speakers with a bunch of subs or more speakers but less quality in each? I was looking at the Genelec 1034B but no way could I afford 11 of them. I'm sure that debate has been held. What was the outcome and does anyone have a link to the discussion on AVS?

that is freaking awesome, I dont have an 11.1 setup but one day I hope too and I will have a movie to test it with ^_^

They are doing whatever they can to get us to buy more more more. No thanks.

Cool!! Now I just need to buy 4 more speakers and a new receiver to enjoy expendables 2; NOT!!

Depends on your priorities. 5 bigger and/or better speakers can give you better fidelity than 11 cheaper speakers, but 11 speakers can do things that 5 speakers cannot. One pair of surrounds can't be in two locations at the same time (at your sides AND behind you simultaneously), so even 7 speakers have an advantage over 5 speakers. And if you want stable height imaging, that's not going to happen with 5 speakers spread around you. The simplest and most effective way of doing that is to use height speakers.

However, as you keep adding more speakers, you have to keep buying cheaper models to remain within the same budget. If you look at many speaker lines, you'll notice that their more expensive speakers aren't better, they just go lower (e.g., the cheaper bookshelf speaker has one 6.5 inch woofer that goes down to 65Hz while the more expensive tower speaker uses more or larger woofers to go lower to 38Hz). But if the low frequencies in your system are going to be handled by subwoofers, then you don't require large tower speakers that go deep into the bass range. So I'm not so convinced that you have to give up a lot of fidelity to buy more speakers.

To crystalize the debate in it's simplest possible terms, think of buying one speaker vs buying a pair of speakers, for the same budget. The single speaker, at twice the price of each speaker in the pair, can likely give you better fidelity when it comes to things like delicate vocals or subtle details. However, one speaker (no matter how good) cannot create a stereo soundstage the way a pair of cheaper (even inferior) speakers can. You have to decide which is more important to you in order to figure out where your balance is when it comes to number of speakers vs quality of speakers.

I had a 7.1 system and have always been longing for that 'overhead' effect with fly overs especially in the scifi movies.  Finally, wth DTS NeoX, in a few avrs, now able to engage sides/heights AND back surrounds, I've decided to upgrade to the Denon 4520.  I added the height speakers on the ceiling at 60 degrees from ear level and wides at about 30 degrees.  My room is only 19x14x8, but we only have two seating positions.

Since this Denon also has the SubEq for 2 subs I decided to add a  18"  JTR sealed sub to my orginal Velodyne DD15 set up.  I'm still waiting on the Denon but am really looking forward to Expendables 2, ( all my heroes on one movie :),  no,  acting ain't their strong suit, but the testosterone and over the top action scenes certainly makes for great escapist entertainment, and now in 11.x surround !

If the rental companies are getting stripped down sound tracks on rental BDs, Is it worth the investment to add more speakers when there is some uncertainty that this trend will continue or proliferate.

If you can invest the money required for a quality 11.1/11.2 system, you can spring for the cost of the media. The free ride is coming to an end.

I already have that fly over effect because I have in ceiling surrounds, lol. But seriously, how ridiculous will this get? Can you imagine the casual Home Theater purchaser getting a 11 speaker HTIB? I don't see a mass market for this although there will always be the nuts who spend time her on AVS.

whatever guys this is overkill.

Went to AMC theatres recently with 11.1 or 18.625 I forget which with ass shakers in the seats.

Nice in a big space like that it works.


In your average home you would have a speaker every 2.5 feet.

Be real.

even 7.1 is overkill for the average home so 11.1 will be for the super rich or super enthusiast...space being the biggest obstacle

I would say 9.1 would be my limit

what I would like to see as a standard is 8.2

Sub
FL FC FR
SL SR
RL RC RR
Sub

maybe 9.2 with a speaker directly over your head, I know this isnt an official layout but it would be nice I think

A typical Texas great room is at least 20x30x9 feet in a 3/2 starter house. The issue is having walls on the sides. The overhead (rear and front prescence) is easily accomplished by in-ceiling speakers.

I have a 20 x 34 great room (which means that I never saw 1080p until I upgraded my 57" to a 82" display). But, I have no sides to put this on. Moreover, my wife would kill me if I tried to move the couch into the middle of the room. This is main problem most people have with 7.1 setups. I cheated by using in-ceilings as my rear-surrounds. I'm not sure how I fudge an 11.1 this way.

On the receiver/Blu-ray side, I assume bitstreaming will have to be done since no Blu-ray player can decode and send an 11.1 PCM stream (much less have 11.1 analog connections in the back). Does anyone have a list of the receivers/pre-processors than can process and play an 11.1 DTS Neo stream?

well it would be sending out a 7.1 stream from the bluray player to the AVR and then the AVR will convert it to Neo X , they stated that is ia special 7.1 track that has been designed for neo x to pick up on certain things to mix it to 11.1

Thanks for the response. You are one of the more knowledgeable forum members so your opinion matters to me more than most. I was wondering if you could answer a related question. With heights, wides, and multiple surrounds spread around a large enough room, does it change the acoustic importance of using an AT screen?

I'm going to have a 13' wide scope screen on a 21 x 12 front wall. I could probably put every speaker but the center outside of the screen area. I'm not aware of a high brightness & high contrast projector available at any price, let alone what I can afford. So I am tempted to use a (non AT) HighPower screen with true 2.0 gain which would allow me to use a sub $50k projector and still have enough brightness for 3D. Traditionally a non-AT screen would be unthinkable, but I am curious if using many speakers diminish the importance of the one speaker behind the screen, making a non-AT screen something that could be considered.

I'm not responding for sdurani, but an AT screen main purpose is to permit your center channel to be identical to your FL and FR and at the same height behind the screen, so there are no timbre changes that can occur when you have a physically different type of speaker that most center channels are that are horizontal and placed below a non AT screen.  So having any number surrounds wouldn't really impact whether the front of the room has a non AT or AT screen with the front 3, or 5 if you place your heights above the FL and FR, behind the screen.

There always seems to be uprising when more channels are made possible.  I just put in a 11.2 system because I have a dedicated room that can accomodate it.  If my viewing area were a common living area, which is what I had prior to having a dedicated, I only had a FL/FR, and let Dolby matrix my center because that's all I could place there.  At that time I couldn't care less about how many more channels there could be because for me I was already maxed out, alright I probably could have squeezed in a real center and stuff a SW somewhere. Since most soundtracks now are 5.1, and a smattering of 7.1, any speaker arrangement beyond that it is pure fluff, especially since they are matrixed and not distinct soundtrack channels. But those of us who do add those speaker know full well that it's electronic wizardry filling them, but enjoy what that wizardry adds to the viewing experience. Obviously, purists would have nothing more than what the director intended, but my own approach for both audio and video and to have both systems calibrated to standard to reflect what the director intended and then begin to tweak both until what I see and hear actually becomes more enjoyable to me.

I have two 11.x systems in my house, but my current receivers are just 9.1. My next planned upgrade was to Onkyo NR3010 or NR5010 receivers, but it won't be for a while. I am glad these optimisations to movies are taking place now, but this movie doesn't do it for me. Sure, I'll watch it, but it will not be my first optimised 11.1 movie. Oh, my rooms are far smaller than DTS recommends. However, with Audessey DSX processing, they sound great.

I'll echo jlanzy's comments, since I agree with his reply to you, plus add a couple of points:

First, room size doesn't matter when it comes to number of speakers as much as seating location does. For example: you could be in a huge room, but if your seating is at or near the back wall then you're a poor candidate for a 7.1 set-up (no space behind you for the rear speakers). By comparison, my first 7.1 set-up was in a small 11' x 13.5' spare bedroom. My futon was 8 feet from the front wall with the side speakers in-line with the seating, which put me at least 5 feet away from the rear speakers on the back wall, and provided excellent rear-vs-side separation in the surround field. So don't worry about having a "large enough" room, as long as your seating is away from the back wall.

Second, as jlanzy already mentioned, having an AT screen has no bearing on the number of surrounds, wides and heights. However, one thing you can do to take advantage of an AT screen is put lots of thick absorbtion behind the screen. Even in this day and age of surround sound, the front soundstage remains critical; that's where your attention will be focused, whether watching a movie or listening to music. With your brain working to create phantom imaging between your front speakers, the last thing you need is reflections from that direction interfering with process and muddying up the soundstage. Absorbing reflections from your side, rear and wide speakers that are bouncing off your front wall can make it easier to hear the direct sound from your front speakers. Worth considering if you plan on using an AT screen.

BTW, how far are you planning on sitting from the screen?

Speaking of room acoustics, one thing that's been long overdue for my dedicated room is to add some sound diffusers.  I have mostly 2 inch Sonex absorbers everywhere as an overreaction to my first install that we couldn't clearly hear speech even though I juiced up the center channel.  Once I did this we could finally clearly hear speech/conversations but at the cost of deadening the room.  I'm planning on switching out some of the absorbers with DIY quadratic diffusers, but it actually it will be a sound scatterers since I'm not going all anal in the complex measurments needed for even diffusion.  One room acoustic calibrator told me in his theater room he got excellent results with a ( real) diffuser on his screen wall, I assume below and to the sides and he says he constantly is moving his absorbers and diffusers tweaking them with the software he uses professionally, he's an engineer by training and loves trying to improve on near perfection. Fortunately or unfortunately I'm too lazy to worry about perfection, good to pretty good I'm happy with.

Both the upcoming Marantz AV8801 and the Onkyo PR-SC5510 will go to 11...

BTW, nobody curious what "a soundtrack optimized for DTS Neo:X 11.1-channel surround" really means? How does it work? I know about Neo:x, but define "optimized" please!

One more thing: room size is irrelevant. Big room? Big speakers. Small room? That's right: small speakers! You don't even need amps. Check out Emotiva Pro airmotiv 4... combined with airmotiv 6 for L+R. They come in pairs, but maybe a single back surround will be fine if you don't want to waste one. In a small room, 10.1 is almost as good as 11.1 anyway

I want to be 1.2x screen width and only care about 1 row, maybe 2 if it doesn't force compromises to the main row.

Anything beyond 7.1 channels for home at the time being is only matrixed. Not interested.