Answers to HD-A1 and HD-XA1 Audio Questions - Page 8

The player will never be able to output DD+ over S/PDIF (optical or coax) because those connections don't have enough bandwidth. It can pass uncompressed PCM audio over HDMI and future players with HDMI 1.3/2.0 will be able to pass the raw bitstream.

If the disc isn't authored in advanced mode, then a regular DD stream can be pulled from the DD+ track and be output without re-encoding. But the advanced mode requires mixing together the film soundtrack with other audio so the audio must be decoded, mixed, and re-encoded. DTS at max bitrate is the best encoding you can use over optical and coaxial S/PDIF outputs (unless you just want 2-channel PCM).

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Steve

Just to reaffirm: DD+ and other new HD formats for audio can only be passed raw over HDMI. But they can also be decoded in player and passed over analog to the receiver, correct?

Hi All,

I am having the same issues as everyone else. I have a Denon 3803.

On the dolby website, there is a bunch of information about DD Plus, and here is a link to the FAQ PDF.

http://www.dolby.com/assets/pdf/tech...DDPlus_FAQ.pdf

Pay specific attention to #6 - #10.

It basically states that all devices that license DD Plus must downconvert to standard Dolby Digital and output it over the SPDIF/Optical.

I think that the Toshiba player doesn't adhere to the Dolby specs.

Personally, I think that if this is indeed the case, then Toshiba might have a battle on their hands with Dolby.

It's just hard to believe that this product has made it to market, if indeed it doesn't stand up to Dolby's specs. I sure hope this can be fixed with a firmware upgrade.

Anyway, I'm sure we will be hearing more in the next couple of days.

Apparently what you are reading only applies to HD-DVDs authored in "standard" mode. In "advanced" mode, everything gets decoded to PCM for internal processing and if there is any output at all on the SPDIF, it is being *re*encoded by the player and since reencoding is implementation dependent, wheter players send out DD or DTS isn't written in stone.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...&&#post7496986

I'm having trouble understanding why it is a big deal the player is sending DTS instead of DD, unless your receiver cannot decode DTS, but the people saying DTS is an issue all appear to have receivers which can decode DTS. Is DTS really noticeably inferior to DD? I thought DTS had higher bandwidth than DD and was an improvement?

At this point, I personally don't have a problem with the conversion to DTS instead of standard Dolby Digital. I'm sure Dolby does though, but that is their battle.

I think alot of people are having trouble with the volume of the first Warner titles. They are low in volume when compared to standard DVDs, and to HD broadcasts that have Dolby Digital 5.1 streams. I've definitely found this to be true.

I have The Last Samurai, Phantom of the Opera, and I also have Serenity from Universal.

The Serenity disc's audio levels are much higher than that of the Warner titles. It is very close to the levels of standard DVDs and HD broadcasts over Directv. I did some switching between Constantine which I have recorded on my HDTivo from HBO and the HD DVDs that I have and I didn't have to change the volume level of my Denon 3803 when switching between Serenity and Constantine. I did have to turn up the volume considerably when switching between Constantine and The Last Samurai HD DVD.

As for the bitrates, DTS can have a higher bitrate. DTS goes up to 1536 kbps, where standard Dolby Digital goes up to 640 kbps.

Another thing people have mentioned is that there is a difference in the Subwoofer level when comparing the DTS converted output to the 5.1 analog output. I think this has a lot to do with the way the receiver is set up. My Denon has an LFE mode and crossover, which is active when using the DD and DTS decoders. If if set the mode to LFE only, then the Sub levels are similar to the Sub levels when using the 5.1 analog inputs. If I use the LFE+Main mode, then the Sub is much louder when using the DD and DTS encoders.

I think it comes down to setup and Bass Management. At this point, I'm no expert on Bass Management, but I am learning.

Anyway, hope this makes sense and doesn't sound like I'm rambling.

My receiver can't decode DTS, nor does it have analog inputs for surround. I'm really struggling now with whether to pick up the player I ordered for in-store pickup tomorrow morning. Doesn't feel right to spend $500 to upgrade the picture while throttling back the sound to Dolby ProLogic

Then again, I bought my current receiver almost ten years ago to get Dolby Digital out of my brand new $500 DVD player, so I guess this is as good an excuse as any to upgrade to a DTS-capable receiver, right?

Either that or wait some more for the HDMI 1.3 input/output model with DD+/DTS-HD...kind of like trying to hit a moving target

Here is the one minute tutorial on HD DVD menu system/interactivity. There are two modes:

1. Standard. This your current DVD menu. If authored this way, the player should just send out the bitstreams as defined on disc.

2. Advanced. This is "iHD" subystem which all the US titles use (Japanese titles use #1). iHD allows for multiple audio streams/Picture-in-Picture. Each track can have its own encoding, sampling rate, etc. The player then is responsible to decode all and mix them. Now, if it does not compress them back, you have no way of sending multi-channel audio out of the S/PDIF connection as it is not fast enough for uncompressed (multi-channel). So Toshiba has chosen to use a DTS Encoder at maximum rate to preserve all the fidelity they can.

Hope this makes more sense now.

Amir

I apologize if this has been asked before, ( been reading these HD-A1 threads for days; great information) but can the player output 5.1 analog and optical out simultaniously, or do you have to toggle between them?

I have 2 displays and 2 audio systems sometimes running simultainiously, and i'm wondering if I can send analog to my 5.1 receiver and optical out to my 7.1 receiver at the same time. I'll be picking up my unit tomorrow (despite some of the confirmed issues with it). Thanks.

Of course it does... And what I hate is people speculating horrible things about the player because they just sit down in front of the player, do not even read and they do think they are experts.
I knew all this time that there is no bugs regarding this audio pseudo problems.
And I hope that from now on people are going to be more careful whenever they are going to post things...If you do not know please make questions but do not write things as if they are facts...
Thanks Amir

Its a little funny.

Hi Roger - I can't think of why the mixer would just get it wrong for the Warner titles, but yet suddenly behave right for the Universal titles.

At this point (not having any of the titles myself, yet) it just looks more likely to me that whoever did the encoding for the Warner titles has "goofed". The levels that the mixer is getting is too low, but the mixer just does it's thing and sends it back out.

A digital mixer has no need to drop the volume on a channel to mix it with another, like you would with analog. The process is different, no?

That the Universal titles are behaving properly would seem to make a strong case that it is not the mixer.

Thanks for the answer. I'm really looking forward to getting the HD-A1.

I'd seriously wait until the new receivers come out that can decode the DD+ etc streams. There will be alot of new audio equipment coming out as both players use the same audio formats at least.

Yes, it is..

Hi Neverman - You'll pretty much never get the DD+, DTruHD or DTS-HD streams directly out of these machines. All US content it seems, will be authored in "advanced" mode, which means no DD+ etc bitstream.

However, you may have meant to advise Dr Mal to wait for an AVR with HDMI 1.3. This would potentially give access to the streams, but Dolby still says this would not be possible if the discs are authored in "advanced" mode - which they pretty much all will be.

Besides an AVR with 1.3 HDMI will be much more than the $500 you spent before.

My recommendation is to go with an inexpensive AVR now, that gives you analog inputs, SPDIF inputs, and DTS decoding (if possible DTS ES).

IF 2nd and 3rd gen machines let you do something really different with the audio over 1.3 HDMI then you can consider another move later. Right now, given the "advanced" authoring rules, it looks unlikely that 1.3 HDMI will add any real audio features for "advanced" mode discs.

Hi All,

I think it might be a good idea to summarize everything that we now seem to know about this situation.

The DTS identification on your AVR does not appear to be a bug. Also, this "issue" seems to be unrelated to the "low volume" issue that is reported by some users.

Regarding the "DTS" issue:

For the sake of simplicity, I will only address "advanced" mode authoring, as this is what the US discs apparently will almost exclusively be released in - so forget about "standard" mode for this discussion.

The A1/XA1 units will decode DD+ on the HD DVD discs to PCM internally, where the audio is mixed with special features (such as button presses, messages, audio-visual commentary, etc).

This PCM (typically 96/24 5.1 audio) is then output to the DACS (digital to analog converters) in the player and output to the analog plugs (using this 96/24 5.1 PCM stream).

This PCM 96/24 5.1 stream can also be sent directly into an AVR via HDMI so that your AVR can use it's own DACS instead.

The analog plugs on the A1/XA1, and the HDMI/PCM transfer are the two best (i.e. highest quality) audio outputs you will get from these players. No reconversion of any sort will happen when running in these modes.

HOWEVER - for many users who use SPDIF (ie TOSlink optical, or coax) there needs to be this option also for getting the audio into their AVRs.

Because SPDIF cannot get anywhere near the bandwidth required for 5.1 96/24 full-stream audio, Toshiba has implemented a clever, and very elegant solution. It takes this 5.1 96/24 PCM stream and converts it in real-time to DTS audio and sends it over SPDIF to your AVR, for decoding.

We are assuming that they chose DTS over DD because DTS allows up to 1.5 megabits per second and would be considered the best option over SPDIF bandwidth. There are likely a few people who would disagree and state that DD (Dolby Digital) at 640 kilobits would be better. But I personally think Toshiba made the right choice here. If you choose to do PCM over SPDIF, you will get a two-channel (2.0) 96/24 stream instead.

So you have three choices for how to get the audio out of the A1/XA1. The way I view it is:

1) PCM over HDMI - Best (5.1 96/24)
2) Analog - Next Best (5.1 96/24 converted to analog)
3) SPDIF - Third Best (5.1 DTS)

I do not believe at this point that this system has caused any of the problems being reported with audio quality.

Also, while a couple of users reported hum from the analog ports, this turned out to be "ground feedback" caused other equipment that was connected in their setup, which they were able to isolate and correct.

Intriguingly, some users have reported observing 6.1 audio being sent to their AVR over this DTS link (I think from the Universal disc). I've seen a note somewhere that seems to confirm that this DTS real-time encoding *does* preserve the matrix information required for this, but I'll leave that one for Toshiba or DTS to confirm here.

EDIT: If so, you will also get this 6.1 matrix data over PCM also.
EDIT: I believe I recall that one analog user reported seeing a message indicating this in the thread, but I'm not certain how this would work with analog.

NOW - THE VOLUME ISSUE:

Users have reported that on Warner titles, the audio level is much lower than the audio from their other devices, or from regular DVDs in the same Toshiba players.

Interestingly, they have reported the audio to be at the same weak level (8 to 10 db below normal) whether they choose to use Analog, HDMI or SPDIF connections. This immediately rules out the DTS re-encoder as the cause - IMO.

Also, they report that the audio level is perfectly normal with releases from Universal - again, on all output ports. To me, this rules out the internal mixers in the Toshibas, and points the finger at the audio encoding on the Warner discs.

I believe that someone goofed when encoding the audio for the Warner titles that have exhibited the problem. We will have to wait for some industrious soul to confirm this with measurements, but I'm pretty sure that this is the case.

It is easy to see how someone may have seen all these new learning experiences all run together as a blur and link one to another as a bug, but it appears to be all OK - except for the Warner discs, of course.

Yes, it would have been useful to know before-hand what to expect when connecting the A1 to an AVR via SPDIF, to avoid all the confusion - but at least we understand now.

Yes - the A1 player will be decoding the full 5.1 DD+ and doing it's mixing, etc, then outputting DTS to your AVR over SPDIF. So you might think your AVR is decoding 5.1 DTS (and it is) but your player is still decoding the full 5.1 DD+ from the disc.

And you'll still get the full 96/24 5.1 PCM audio decoded from the DD+ stream, over analog and via PCM/HDMI.

This DTS issue is not a bug, and the audio does not seem to be adversely affected by the re-encoding at all.

Hope this has helped!

If the audio is low can't you turn the volume up to compensate? Isn't that what the volume control is for?

I smell a colaboration/consipracy with this DTS anomally. DD does the work and the tosihiba does its thing with the audio and we then read on our ssp/reciever DTS. They then take the credit.

Sort of like: I made the cake, you served it to the customer and took the credit for it being your creation

Ben

Yes....but it sound undynamic with weak bass...so no...this is not an option.
sd dvd sounds far better than that option.

With the Warner titles....I believe you need hdmi audio at this point...if you want anything resembling normal audio unfortunately.

Ditto,

I tried turning the audio up but all it did was add some his and the bass seamed left behind. MY processor is balanced to play at -0 (reference level), going to +10 is a problem for me but may not be as bad for someone who only turns his system up to -15 normally..

I am glad to see that the 'bug' at least has been explained. I'm not happy with it and wonder if the HD-AX1 will behave similarly?

If it's movies then getting a new dvd model won't change the volume. Return the movies and let Warner know the problem. The sooner they stop pressing more flawed dvds and reauthor all their movies the better.

It is an issue for those of us who don't have a DTS capable unit. I've got 3 HD zones in my house, the main theater and 2 other smaller rooms. I distribute digital audio and component video to them and use a MainstageHD device in the other 2 rooms for the audio. It doesn't do DTS, so it won't produce any sound. Not good .

Interesting thread. Does changing to the True-HD track on POO fix the low volume issue?

If it is Warner that made a mistake, will they recall the discs or silently release a revision 2 in a months time. If it is the discs I may take Universal titles only until its sorted out.

I tried the Tue-HD option on the disc and it told me the player didn't have a True-HD decoder in the player and no sound came out.

Dave

Given that the player only has 5.1 analog outputs, which would be connected to 5.1 inputs on a receiver, I don't see how the matrixing information could be carried over using the analog connections.

If I send audio over the digital coax, it will play matrixed DTS-ES. If it goes over analog, then it is strait PCM that is played over the Multichannel input with no processing done by my Onkyo 989.

Is this a deduction or does that actually happen ?

It's been pretty much confirmed that if the receiver/pre-pro does not decode DTS, then you won't get any sound as the re-encoded output for SPDIF and optical is in DTS.

I don't see how it could either, he might be thinking of the Anthem D2 which resamples the analog input and I think can add PLIIx style surround info to the signal.