Uncompressed or Dolby Digital?

[PeterTHX]

Originally Posted by GoldenRedux

That's true, but I was referring to the compression algorithm itself, not dialnorm. DialNorm is an unfortunate 'feature' that never should have been allowed into a lossless format.

And that's why DTS adopted it into their HD formats, eh?

This is why I have always preferred dts, but they can never get their act together in a timely fashion. DTS-HD MA is definitely the better lossless codec (even though it takes up more space/bandwidth) but, it doesn't allow any of that mucky-muck, it's got the embedded 1.5Mb/s dts 'core', plus it can do 192/24 at 5.1 which TrueHD still doesn't do, if I'm not mistaken.

As I said, DTS has added DialNorm because the STUDIOS want it. If Dolby tracks have it it's because the studios used it. It's not Dolby's fault. They don't do the encoding, one reason why they're so widely adopted is because they provide the tools and studios can do what they want.

TrueHD can do 192/24, as can MLP (on which it's based). Look at the specs of some DVD-Audio discs and you'll see it's been doing it for a while.
All TrueHD tracks have a 5.1 core either at 448kbps or 640kbps, it's discrete and doesn't muck up the original lossless track. I'm wondering if the DTS method of embedding it contributes to its greater bandwidth and DSP power to extract all that information properly.

Of course all this is academic since DTS can't tell Consumer Electronics makers to build it in hardware to deliver it to the new receivers with the decoders (which already have high power DSPs built in).