Can you tell the difference between Lossless and compressed?

[Trekkie313]

Dialogue seems easier to hear on the lossy side.

[Bluyoda]

Originally Posted by krazeyeyez

Will you miss out if you have never heard it no. Assuming you have decent equipment and hearing is there a difference. Most definitely yes. Many of the early blu-rays defaulted to a lossy track and within 5 minutes i would know something did not sound right. Even on subtle tracks. Now is it worth investing to take advantage of just this feature... probably not but if your upgrading it would be nice capability to have.

I have had the same exact thing happen to me a few times, and each time I felt this wasn't the sound quality I was used to getting from BD, so I checked and voila, it was the lossy track.

To me lossless sounds fuller, more defined, more dynamic, tighter, punchier bass, clearer, but not harsher (a quality I disliked about DVD SQ), more detailed soundstage, and more effortless.

I was able to tell the difference between 16bit dithered and 24 bit dithered, when I was mastering my CD, so I think it's pretty easy to tell the difference. Of course, it sometimes depends on the content....

[BozQ]

Originally Posted by menaceuk

If I go to the MI4 menu it only has an english 5.1 lossless track. So 1.) I am never going to hear the compressed track and 2.) totally proves my point that most are default Lossless so accidental Compressed viewing isn't happening.


But I have transformers 3 So will give both a check tomorrow

Dude, it's there. Go plug in your TOSLINK Optical Cable, and you will get the core lossy track. No question about it.

[blu lover]

Is there much difference btw DTS HD MA and normal non-HD Dolby Digital?

[rpatt]

Your question was discussed in the thread below.

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=206816

[Johnny Vinyl]

Originally Posted by blu lover

Is there much difference btw DTS HD MA and normal non-HD Dolby Digital?

Merged!

Originally Posted by rpatt

Your question was discussed in the thread below.

https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=206816

Thanks Robert!

[Canada]

Unless there is a movie that is mostly dialogue the difference between lossy, and lossless/uncompressed is very apparent. Using lossless uncompressed on an action scene is night and day and if there is any LFE it can make it seem like you have a whole new subwoofer.

[Big Daddy]

Am I the only person who is bothered by the title of this thread? Do you guys realize that DTS HD-MA and Dolby TrueHD are also compressed? They are losslessly compressed to save space. They take less space than LPCM (the space hog).

Dolby Digital and DTS are also compressed, but in the process of compressing them, some of the redundant data is deleted to save even more space. They are called lossy data compressin codecs.

All of this stuff was explained in A Guide to Home Theater Audio CODECs about a century ago.

[rpatt]

Originally Posted by Big Daddy

Am I the only person who is bothered by the title of this thread? Do you guys realize that DTS HD-MA and Dolby TrueHD are also compressed? They are losslessly compressed to save space. They take less space than LPCM (the space hog).

Dolby Digital and DTS are also compressed, but in the process of compressing them, some of the redundant data is deleted to save even more space. They are called lossy data compressin codecs.

All of this stuff was explained in A Guide to Home Theater Audio CODECs about a century ago.

I didn't know you were that old BD.

[Johnny Vinyl]

Originally Posted by Big Daddy

Am I the only person who is bothered by the title of this thread? Do you guys realize that DTS HD-MA and Dolby TrueHD are also compressed? They are losslessly compressed to save space. They take less space than LPCM (the space hog).

Dolby Digital and DTS are also compressed, but in the process of compressing them, some of the redundant data is deleted to save even more space. They are called lossy data compressin codecs.

All of this stuff was explained in A Guide to Home Theater Audio CODECs about a century ago.

Yep!

[Tadji Malik]

Can I tell the difference between the two?

In a word: Yes.

However, that is when I have five or so minutes to really study the sound and I'm spending all my listening energy looking for flaws instead of enjoying it.

Otherwise, in real life situations I don't notice what it defaults to. And, while it's a sign of a lackluster transfer, not including a lossless track won't influence my decision to buy the disc. Matter of fact I'd rather they skimp on the sound if it would provide a better picture.

[Flatnate]

Yeah I can hear it. I'll say this though: "Crap in Crap out". When I first upgraded to lossless audio I was listening to a lot discs that had been mastered with a lossless sound track. When I switched back to my optical audio output the difference was negligible (but there). Then after some time I watched a DVD with a compressed audio track that also never received that kind of attention during the mastering process. Now there the difference was DRAMATIC. Way less mid-range detail, and punch. Recently, I was able to A/B the lossless "crazy high bit-rate" audio track on Akira to the regular lossy one, and again the difference was HUGE! So I know the attention given to the track in the source content is just as important (if not more so) than your set-up.

[DRC72]

The Matrix is another movie that defaults to lossy 5.1 Dolby Digital. I haven't really experimented with DD5.1, only Dolby True HD on this disc. Although when the movie starts plain old DD sounds awesome, but I quickly switch over to it's losseless counterpart. i might test it out just for haha's.

[Big Daddy]

Originally Posted by rpatt

I didn't know you were that old BD.

That thread was created in 2008. As far as Blu-ray technology is concerned, that is a century ago. Furthermore, I am a century old in knowledge and wisdom.

[BIslander]

Originally Posted by Canada

Unless there is a movie that is mostly dialogue the difference between lossy, and lossless/uncompressed is very apparent. Using lossless uncompressed on an action scene is night and day and if there is any LFE it can make it seem like you have a whole new subwoofer.

I doubt many will hear a difference between lossless and the high bitrate lossy codecs on Blu-ray, even on action films.

[Mark L.]

If your going through your TV speakers no. If your using a good set of Hi Fi speakers definitly yes Lossless sound is much better. Listen to the music in the movie and you can realy tell the difference.

[BIslander]

This is worth a read.

http://www.hemagazine.com/node/Dolby...compressed_PCM

EDIT: That link no longer works and it appears it is no longer possible to reach Home Entertainment Magazine online. The article describes field trips to listening rooms at Dolby and DTS to test whether listeners could tell the difference between PCM and losslessly compressed tracks. They could not. It turns out they could not even tell the difference between the lossless/PCM tracks and lossy versions in properly designed blind tests. This was not a rigorous study. But, it was testing done under considerably better circumstances than any of us can do at home.

[Gally]

Originally Posted by BozQ

What's more important is the quality of the source that's being encoded.
A 16-bit soundtrack is never going to sound as good as a 24-bit soundtrack. No matter which codec is being used. I believe a 640kbps Dolby Digital encoding is able to retain the 24-bit resolution, but not at 448kbps, which is the standard rate with DVDs.


Orchestra music would be much more evident.

That's just patently untrue. There are plenty of cases in movies where the bit depth of the soundtrack just ill not matter. Even professional sound engineers have a hard time distinguishing between the two unless the track is complicated. And the biggest difference will be heard in dynamic range.

[pagemaster]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Bro

Can you actually tell the difference between the DTS-HD/Dolby TrueHD/LPCM and the normal DTS and Dolby compressed formats?

Is it a huge difference?

Most of the time most people think they can hear the difference but they really can't. Generally the audio is way too loud to actually here the difference. Now, I have worked in the exhibition industry for more than 20 years, there are endless times where a movie's soundtrack was encoded in 5.1 DD but there was and error or damage and our Dolby processor reverted back to Dolby SR....NOBODY could tell the difference and we would play the film for weeks in SR because SRD would not engage.

[prerich]

Originally Posted by BIslander

I doubt many will hear a difference between lossless and the high bitrate lossy codecs on Blu-ray, even on action films.

I can tell it every time! I rented a bluray from redbox and without looking at my receiver I notice something was wrong! My wife thought I was going nuts, but I realized that the redbox BDs are crippled to only the high bit lossy tracks, I only watch a movie now if I buy it. Other than that, might as well wait for it to come on FX HD ! Lossless audio (compressed into a container or not) is what brought me over to BD. That's why I don't do Netflix, HD video is real cool but, I'm a sound guy...won't be going to 4k either.