PCM Beats TrueHD with The Departed

[Josh]

Warner gave us the first chance to do a head to head comparison of TrueHD and PCM. The results are in:

Originally Posted by HighDefDigest

Out of the twenty comparisons (ten for him, ten for me), we could only detect differences on four scenes total. But of those four, we both always preferred the PCM track, if only a smidgeon.

http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/departed.html

[JTK]

...we both always preferred the PCM track, if only a smidgeon.

"Grrr...damnit, we had to give BD a begrudging bone as doing something better than HD-DVD."

Coming from these guys, I'm sure the actual reality is more than a "smidgen" of difference.

[Spankey]

Love this quote..

f nothing else, it made me realize that if all the studios dumped this dueling audio format business and went all-PCM, I can't say I would be likely to complain...

Now does anyone want to guess why?

[dobyblue]

Now, how do the PCM and TrueHD tracks compare? Given this historic opportunity, I decided to conduct a little experiment. I invited a friend over, who is a big movie and music buff, but not particularly technical. He knows good audio when he hears it, yet doesn't know a PCM from an RPM from R.E.M. In other words, he's Joe Six-Pack with a great ear. Anyway, together we conducted a "blind" audio test -- we select ten short sequences from the film, and listened to a compare of each. We took turns firing up each scene, and selecting which one sounded better, with no knowledge of which sample was the Blu-ray and which the HD DVD.

After writing down our answers on little scraps of paper (note that we didn't throw them into a hat -- we aren't that dorky), the results were interesting. Out of the twenty comparisons (ten for him, ten for me), we could only detect differences on four scenes total. But of those four, we both always preferred the PCM track, if only a smidgeon. For example, there is a scene in involving an attempted trade bust between the Costello character and a Chinese gang. There is a sound of a gun firing that we went back over a few times, and as silly as it sounds, the force and impact of the sounds was a shade more realistic in PCM. Also a beneficiary of the uncompressed mix is the music, as this is a film brimming with rock songs. The first scene we picked featured the Rolling Stone's "Gimme Shelter," and again the PCM track boasted a slightly more spacious feel to the music in all channels -- as if the very highest end of the frequency range was more palpable.

From Peter Bracke's review of both discs just now.


http://hddvd.highdefdigest.com/departed.html
http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/departed.html

[dialog_gvf]

^^^ Oh, the fanbois are going to go nuts.

[Longshot]

Bracke cannot say anything good about Bd without a "but". Dissapointing to hear the soundtrack overall is lacking and uninvolving.

[dialog_gvf]

I suspect Warner used the same LPCM on the BD as was pumped into the TrueHD encoder (which probably means they degraded the LPCM from the original). They are like that: Port the HD DVD limitations to BD.

My guess for the differences are due to the HD DVD players screwing up the pure LPCM in a mixing stage, while BD gives a pure output.

The HD DVD players are an audio disaster. So, it wouldn't surprise me at all if they couldn't even get TrueHD right.

Gary

[Spankey]

Gary, does dialnorm come into effect with Dolby True-HD?

[BostonHD22]

even thought pcm is better than dolby true hd, the hd dvd realease comes with some extra content on martin scorsese that was dropped from the high definition releases

[dialog_gvf]

Kris Deering posted a possibility. The Toshiba decks upsample the PCM to 96/24 before output to the HDMI. That may be the difference.

Gary

[HDTV1080P]

I remember back in the days when DVD first came out and I preferred the soundtrack of the 2.0 PCM Laserdisc over 2.0 Dolby Digital DVD when watching music videos. High bit rate PCM on BLU-RAY sounds good since it uses no digital compression. No data loss compression algorithms that restore the exact original audio back to the studio master should in theory sound just as good or slightly better then high bit PCM. Did that title have a higher bit rate then 24 bit 96khz for PCM? DTS HD might sound better then True Dolby.
One day hopefully some one will do a comparison between the quality of True Dolby, DTS HD, and high bit PCM. It would be interesting to see which one sounds better. Someone should create a master demo test disc using the exact same source material. Have 3 separate BLU-RAY 50GB discs with one labeled True Dolby, one labeled DTS HD, and one labeled PCM. Then on each of the 50GB discs you place the maximum bit rate each format is capable of and lets see who wins.

[LembasBread]

yeah, the fanbois are grasping at straws. Scratching their heads over how the possibility of a compressed "lossless" codec can sound different than an uncompressed, raw one. Am I the only one who's ever questioned the quality of MLP/TrueHD? I know it sounds fantastic - better than I've ever heard 5.1 audio with music and DVD-Audio discs are a real testament of that. But, until 5.1 uncompressed PCM was made available to consumers MLP was the only way consumers could hear multi-channel lossless audio and had nothing to compare it to. I'm glad we have other methods now and Dolby/MLP ain't quite the big kid on the block anymore.

I think they screwed MLP up when they revised it to TrueHD. They implemented their metadata techniques like dialogue normalization and the ability to have a core AC-3 DD track to be extracted from the TrueHD. They may have tinkered with it to the point that at the "lower" bit rates it plays at on HD DVD, something is different, which can be heard (according to HighDefDigest) on The Departed, a movie that isn't really too accoustically dynamic or aggressive.

[Rio]

TrueHD encoder has an optional "flag" to lower the peak bitrate. If this flag was set in the encoding process, output stream is no longer "lossless" at certain point where the peak was flattened.

[baccusboy]

"Smidgeon", "Shade", "Slightly..." in a few scenes out of the entire movie.

You do realize that 98% of the viewing public won't have a system capable of outputting the difference.

And it appears that they have to be listening for it in a side-by-side comparison to even tell the difference.

The difference in audio quality between Beta and VHS was huge. Look who won that.

You guys are kind of fighting over an issue that will make no difference. People want lower-priced players, lower-priced disks, and available media (of worthwhile quality). Studios want lower production costs. The format which can deliver on these listed criteria will be the clear winner.

So far its:

Lower production cost: HDDVD
Less expensive players: HDDVD
Lower-priced disks: HDDVD
More media: Bluray (some older titles of poor quality)


If bluray takes the lead in more categories, I will go with bluray. Sony being Sony, however, I have a feeling not much will change, and HDDVD will win out once studios see that there are enough HDDVD players out there to sell disks to. They will only stay exclusive to bluray or HDDVD for a certain period of time.

[blitz6speed]

Originally Posted by baccusboy

"Smidgeon", "Shade", "Slightly..." in a few scenes out of the entire movie.

You do realize that 98% of the viewing public won't have a system capable of outputting the difference.

And it appears that they have to be listening for it in a side-by-side comparison to even tell the difference.

The difference in audio quality between Beta and VHS was huge. Look who won that.

You guys are kind of fighting over an issue that will make no difference. People want lower-priced players, lower-priced disks, and available media (of worthwhile quality). Studios want lower production costs. The format which can deliver on these listed criteria will be the clear winner.

If i am paying $$$ for movies, i want the best possible quality. These formats ARE NOT FOR THE MASSES, not even close, yet. These are for the Home Theater Enthusiasts, and we demand the best we can get. Sorry if that doesnt make sense to you.

[phloyd]

Originally Posted by baccusboy

Lower production cost: HDDVD
Lower-priced disks: HDDVD

Can you show me where The Departed on HD DVD costs less than The Departed on Bluray Disc because I have not found that store yet...

While you are at it, perhaps some disc production costs?

Seems that none of your touted advantages apply to the title under discussion?

[baccusboy]

Guys, you're welcome to show some side-by-side stats to discount me. As I've stated before, if the price of a PS3 drops another $100 or more, I'll go out and buy one.

The prices I see on Amazon usually show HDDVD disks as cheaper.

You guys really need to cool down and look at things with a little less of a fanboy flair.

Here are some quotes about production pricing, which you've probably seen already.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060406-6544.html
http://www.hack247.co.uk/2007/01/07/...-a-comparison/

"HD-DVD players are initially cheaper than Blu-Ray units, although that will change in the near future. Both players look set to even out their prices to match each other. The cost of producing Blu-Ray discs is far more than HD-DVD but the titles that have been released seem to be of a similar price."

"...Both formats should be as durable as each other. Blu-Ray however requires an extra hard coating to protect thge data stored on it, this is because the first layer of data is only 0.1mm beneath the surface as opposed to HD-DVD’s 0.6mm. This means that Blu-Ray discs are more costly to produce..."

[bluearth]

Ah, the last feasible argument HD-DVD has left, the cheaper price of it's equipment.

Are you telling me HD-DVD should be the next format of choice because at the moment it is cheaper?

[hyperdine]

You're kidding, right???

Originally Posted by baccusboy

"Smidgeon", "Shade", "Slightly..." in a few scenes out of the entire movie.

You do realize that 98% of the viewing public won't have a system capable of outputting the difference.

That's kind of short-sighted. It won't always be the case. The fact is, for the 2% that do have they capability, they notice and it does matter. Early adopters are the trend setters...just a fact of life. Same thing happened with DVD.

And it appears that they have to be listening for it in a side-by-side comparison to even tell the difference.

The difference in audio quality between Beta and VHS was huge. Look who won that.

Not really a good analogy. Try DVD-A vs. SACD.

You guys are kind of fighting over an issue that will make no difference.

Nobody's fighting here...as far as I can tell. The reviewer just confirmed what we already knew to be true.

People want lower-priced players, lower-priced disks, and available media (of worthwhile quality). Studios want lower production costs. The format which can deliver on these listed criteria will be the clear winner.

Fair enough.

So far its:

Lower production cost: HDDVD
Less expensive players: HDDVD
Lower-priced disks: HDDVD
More media: Bluray (some older titles of poor quality)

I think most folks here will disagree with you on most of those points. The lower production cost and lower-priced discs myths have already been debunked. There are a few threads on the site that speak to this quite well. Remember, Blu-Ray does not have combo-discs.

If bluray takes the lead in more categories, I will go with bluray. Sony being Sony, however, I have a feeling not much will change, and HDDVD will win out once studios see that there are enough HDDVD players out there to sell disks to. They will only stay exclusive to bluray or HDDVD for a certain period of time.

Here's your other problem. You're equating Sony with Blu-Ray. That's a mistake. Blu-Ray does not equal Sony. This is Blu-Ray...



Bottom line is content and Blu-Ray has it. Cheap players does not a format make. Oh, and then there's that little thing called the PS3.

[dialog_gvf]

Originally Posted by baccusboy

"Smidgeon", "Shade", "Slightly..." in a few scenes out of the entire movie.

You do realize that 98% of the viewing public won't have a system capable of outputting the difference.

And it appears that they have to be listening for it in a side-by-side comparison to even tell the difference.

I'm surprised there is any difference. There shouldn't be. And if there is, what the heck is going on with HD DVD? It can manage to deliver the same LPCM even when lossless compressed?

All that has been proven is that lossless and LPCM are basically the same. This should have been the least people would accept!

The bottom line is that the capacity and bandwidth of BD have allowed MANY, MANY LPCM releases versus just a few TrueHD, and Warner finally gave us an LPCM . Whether it is cost of the TrueHD, or a lack of a capacity, or a lack of bandwidth, TrueHD isn't used much on HD DVD.

But, the real goal of Microsoft (and its many elves) is to get you to accept that 1.5Mbps DD+ is BETTER than lossless audio, and hence better than LPCM. This plays into the overall bandwidth reduction brainwashing they need to sell. They want to convince you to take less for the physical, and then convince you to take less again for downloads.

The issue is why shouldn't something that only 2% can hear right now, but others can move to attain, be on the discs for the future?

Gary