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Post by B-613 Command on Mar 23, 2015 23:26:00 GMT -5
I apologize for sounding dumb and outdated. Maybe i'm too much of both. Help me understand something.
I have a 3.1 setup that I absolutely love. I've been listening to TV and movies with a sound stage spread out in front of me for almost 50 years now. As far as speakers to the side and behind me - let's just say I cannot miss something i've never had.
I've heard 7.2 systems with sound wrapped around me and although that was cool in a weird way until I have a picture wrapped around me I just don't get the need for sound like that - but that's beside the point. I understand why people may like that.
I just went down my queue in NetFlix. Out of the top 20 BluRay movies in my queue the sound formats are:
14 - Dolby Digital 5.1 5 - Dolby Digital 2.0 1 - DTS
I believe I have seen maybe 5 movies in the last few years (since I started looking) that were DTS. Everything else i've ever had was Dolby Digital.
My TiVo / cable TV is - all the channels are in Dolby Digital 5.1 or 2.0.
So when people look at me and say you need Dolby ATMOS I cannot help but ask - for what?
It does not surprise me that NetFlix has movies in Dolby Digital 5.1 - they're appealing to a broad audience.
How much content exists in all the other formats? If I wanted anything else - like Dolby TrueHD or whatever - i'd have to track down the movie and buy it instead of just renting it. I can listen to music over and over but I have no desire to watch movies over and over. Renting them makes more sense to me.
I have streamed movies before and honestly I think the soundtrack quality is horrible at best in that format. I cannot take it. Give me a disc please. So I would have to buy every movie I watch? What about TV shows? Are there any TV shows in anything but Dolby Digital 5.1 ?
I cannot help but feel that ATMOS is no different than 3D or the 4K televisions or Super Audio. It's just something to appeal to a narrow audience. There is no 4K material anywhere on Earth but yet some people feel they have to get 4K in their new TV (or 3D). I guess some people feel like they have to have ATMOS. The technology itself may have capability - like Super Audio - but with nobody doing anything with the technology what use is it to me in the end?
Am I being too practical or am I missing something?
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Post by Gary Cook on Mar 23, 2015 23:51:10 GMT -5
Dolby Atmos is I have no doubt a great system for sound engineers/mixers, it makes their job much easier, faster and more accurate. I suspect that DTS UHD and maybe Auro will be similarly object oriented. As a result more and more movies are going to be mixed using one or more of the 3 formats. I think that's inevitable, even if only for cost saving reasons, it's just a matter of time.
The good thing about Atmos (and I suspect the others) is that it's backwards compatible, a 7.1.4 layout isn't mandatory, it will work just fine on a 5.1 system for example.
As for surround sound versus surround video, I don't know about you but my ears work in the 3 dimensions, I can hear sounds behind me, beside me and above me as well as sounds that are in front of me. But, peripheral vision not withstanding, I can't see things behind me, beside me and above me anywhere near as well as things that are in front of me. In my life surround sound is perfectly natural, happens every minute of every day.
Cheers Gary
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Post by B-613 Command on Mar 24, 2015 7:15:51 GMT -5
You have a point. TV screens behind me would be rather pointless. Those new curved screens are looking cool.
So you are saying there are quite many movies in formats other than Dolby Digital? Im not seeing them because i'm renting everything from NetFlix?
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Post by Canuck_fr on Mar 24, 2015 7:47:21 GMT -5
That is correct. If you would have the Bluray, you would find DTS and all formats other than ATMOS. The problem with that is you can't rent Blurays anymore. Redbox is going out of business (already has in Canada) and soon we will be left with streaming only or purchasing Blurays.
its a sad sad era....
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Post by XTC on Mar 24, 2015 8:05:54 GMT -5
You don't sound dumb and outdated. Since the Sixties, with the adoption of stereo sound and color TV by the masses, there has been an ever increasing array of technological "advances" that are being offered to the public. Tubes vs. solid state, mono vs. stereo vs. multi-channel vs. Atmos, analog vs. digital, black & white vs. color vs. 3d, etc. I suspect it will all end when the "room" becomes the speaker with the walls, ceiling and floor vibrating to create a fully enveloping sound. Some people prefer what they know and enjoy the experience of music and movies as they're used to experiencing it. It is, after all, entertainment. No need to apologize for how you prefer to enjoy it.
When I was younger I was always an early adopter of the next new thing. As I've aged it's becoming "enough already." Last weekend I just added back speakers to my 5.1 system to make it 7.1 and I only did that because my Denon receiver died and I bought an XMC-1. Have the extra 2 speakers increased my enjoyment of my system? It's too early to say definitively but for now yes, but only marginally and it could just be the newness of it that I like. Will adding another 4 speakers for an Atmos setup increase my enjoyment even more? Probably, but I doubt I'll ever know. At least until my XMC-1 dies and I have to replace it. I've slowed down quite a bit from my early adopter status of yesteryear.
As for helping you understand Atmos...I read you comments as being more about what Atmos adds to a system as opposed to a technical explanation of how Atmos works. I cannot really help with a technical explanation of how it works. As for what it adds and is it worth it, that's up to you to try it and decide. Your comment about loving your 3.1 system and not really seeing the point of surround sound makes me think Atmos is not for you. If you're worried about content being available for Atmos you should be. With each iteration of technological improvement fewer and fewer people are seeing the point of upgrading and with few people having the necessary equipment to decode a format the less likely the studios are to invest in the format.
One final note, you might want to look into the streaming service you use. I use a cable box and the sound quality is excellent.
In the end it's the content that matters not the format it's delivered in. Would I prefer to watch Casablanca in black & white and mono in a 4:3 screen format or Guardians of the Galaxy in surround sound and in 2.35:1 format, my answer is a double feature.
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Post by wilburthegoose on Mar 24, 2015 8:35:06 GMT -5
To me, Atmos sounds like a what you'd hear in a Disney World attraction - gimmicky.
That is heresy to Atmos lovers, but I'll stick with my opinion that it's just another attempt at a money grab.
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Post by pletwals on Mar 24, 2015 8:36:07 GMT -5
To OP: let me point out one thing: do you have a car or do you still use a horse (some people do)? Some very intelligent folks don't even have televisions, they prefer to read books with big font inside... I have experienced 3D, Atmos and 4K. Don't care about 3D, but the Atmos sound was the best SQ I ever heard in a theatre and the Sony VW500/600ES projected the best image (upscaled to 4K, not even native) I ever saw in a (demo-) HT, hence I will install Atmos and save up for the Sony later. To each his own!
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Post by pletwals on Mar 24, 2015 8:40:21 GMT -5
That is heresy to Atmos lovers, but I'll stick with my opinion that it's just another attempt at a money grab. You are 100% correct. However, we are all trying to grab money. Maybe except people who hunt their own meat, grow their own food, chop their own wood for the stove... It's also called "the economy". Bill Clinton had that written above his bed, with the word "stupid" behind as a note to himself. It got him elected twice.
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Post by house72 on Mar 24, 2015 8:42:41 GMT -5
You should either be getting Blu Ray or have movie server like Kaleidescape to enjoy Atmos. I don't think Netflix is a good starting point.
Cheers
Raj
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Post by pletwals on Mar 24, 2015 8:47:00 GMT -5
If you're into movies like Woody Allen's (I mean talkies), then a front stage would probably do. But you can't enjoy a movie like "House of Flying Daggers" in full without proper surround sound. Action such as Gravity, LOTR, Harry Potter... has Atmos written all over it.
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Post by garbulky on Mar 24, 2015 9:23:28 GMT -5
For me it's the presence of height channels in music. Instead of a flat bubble, we can now hear a 3d bubble with height included. Hearing a choir on the risers. Having a guy strum a guitar and hear the guitar come from below his voice. The possibilities are huge. Unfortunately it's not happened yet But the architecture is finally here. So...will I jump into it? Probably not, I've got too many plans for my stereo rig to worry about surround! P.S.: Gravity is INCREDIBLE on surround sound.
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KeithL
Administrator
Posts: 9,966
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Post by KeithL on Mar 24, 2015 9:24:47 GMT -5
According to the latest stats I read (which was a while ago), DTS currently dominates the home disc market (a lot more discs give you DTS Master Audio than Dolby TrueHD). However, Dolby dominates the theatrical release market. Along with the benefits of using Atmos as a mastering platform, there is an obvious path for converting theatrical releases done in Atmos into home Atmos releases. Obviously Dolby hopes that this path will encourage everyone who releases a theatrical movie in Atmos to ALSO release the home version in Atmos.
It will be quite interesting to see how Atmos relates to DTS-X. Will it be easy to convert an Atmos theatrical release into a DTS-X home disc release, or a DTS theatrical release into an Atmos home disc release, or will it be difficult, or will it be virtually impossible? Will we see discs that offer both Atmos and DTS-X as choices? It seems pretty obvious that there won't be room on a disc for both, and that it will be difficult enough to convert between them effectively to discourage anyone from doing it. Also, while I've heard lots of talk about disc releases, I haven't heard any mention of how practical it would be to, for example, stream Netflix movies with Atmos sound tracks...
So far, from what I've seen, the choice of formats you get with streaming services is not very good; ditto for cable. (So, who cares if your movie was done in TrueHD 7.1/96k if all you can get from your cable box when you watch it is Dolby Digital 5.1/48k? And, will you be getting the same Dolby Digital 5.1 audio from your cable box when you watch a movie that was theatrically mastered in the latest Atmos flavor?) We seem to be facing a dilemma - where the audio quality available for Blu-Ray discs is improving, but the quality of audio you get with streaming services isn't - and streaming services are replacing discs as the most popular medium for distribution.)
(It's sort of like the way "portable audio" is replacing CDs, and the majority of that portable audio is being heard either from low quality MP3 or AAC (iTunes) files, or from streaming services who are using other equivalent lossy compression formats. You have to wonder if, in ten years, even though there are a whole slew of new and better lossless and high-res audio formats available, the only formats you'll be able to find your favorite group's new album in will be MP3 and iTunes.)
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Post by jmilton on Mar 24, 2015 9:25:00 GMT -5
"Gravity...on surround sound" ^ Wait till you hear Interstellar!!
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Post by pedrocols on Mar 24, 2015 9:30:44 GMT -5
So I think it will be appropriate to start thinking about placing speakers on the floor and on the seats and behind the seat and also behind or on top or under whatever...Just saying...
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Post by monkumonku on Mar 24, 2015 9:46:57 GMT -5
What we ought to have is a room in which the boundaries are also sound panels in which the basic unit from which the sound is generated is similar to a pixel in a video display. Millions or perhaps billions of these units would work in unison to present the audio portion of whatever you are listening to in a truly enveloping experience.
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Post by garbulky on Mar 24, 2015 9:55:13 GMT -5
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Post by thrillcat on Mar 24, 2015 9:57:36 GMT -5
Also, while I've heard lots of talk about disc releases, I haven't heard any mention of how practical it would be to, for example, stream Netflix movies with Atmos sound tracks... So far, from what I've seen, the choice of formats you get with streaming services is not very good; ditto for cable. Vudu offers 7.1 on a handful of titles, and they currently have a free bundle of Atmos demos. I've watched them. They sound good. But I don't care enough about Atmos to buy a new processor with it, so I have no idea if they're actually streaming Atmos or if they're streaming a 5.1 version of an Atmos mix. I've posted this note a few places, but it seems there aren't a lot of people who have jumped into Atmos yet who are willing to watch them and verify. I have dipole surrounds mounted on my ceiling out of sheer necessity, and dipole rears surrounds on the back wall. It sounds far better than you would imagine. I would guess it's kinda what Atmos sounds like. But I haven't taken a day to drive 3 hours to my nearest Atmos theater, so I've never experienced it at all. Not really chomping at the bit, either.
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Post by jmilton on Mar 24, 2015 9:58:07 GMT -5
What we ought to have is a room in which the boundaries are also sound panels in which the basic unit from which the sound is generated is similar to a pixel in a video display. Millions or perhaps billions of these units would work in unison to present the audio portion of whatever you are listening to in a truly enveloping experience. That's totally impractical and just plan silly. Now Atmos headphones on the other hand....
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Post by moovtune on Mar 24, 2015 10:07:14 GMT -5
Based on the statistics at Blu-raystats.com - on Blu-ray there are 339 Dolby Digital titles, about 6 Atmos titles, 652 Dolby True HD titles and about 2800 DTS-HD Master titles and about 44 DTS _HD High Resolution titles.
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Post by wilburthegoose on Mar 24, 2015 10:10:03 GMT -5
For me it's the presence of height channels in music. Instead of a flat bubble, we can now hear a 3d bubble with height included. Hearing a choir on the risers. Having a guy strum a guitar and hear the guitar come from below his voice. The possibilities are huge. Unfortunately it's not happened yet But the architecture is finally here. So...will I jump into it? Probably not, I've got too many plans for my stereo rig to worry about surround! P.S.: Gravity is INCREDIBLE on surround sound. When you go to a concert, do you hear the singer's guitar below his voice? Nope.
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