audiophile/videophile Here To Stay discussion thread

[dobyblue]

Originally Posted by JTK

Is TrueHD really seeing that much support and implementation, in general?

Not on Blu-ray because most of the companies are either using lovely PCM or awesome DTS-HD MA.
Me thinks that TrueHD not being included in too many HD DVD releases is because of the lowly 1x speed that HD DVD is on right now.
Blu-ray can dedicate more speed to video content than HD DVD can dedicate to both video and audio combined with another 14.825 Mbps left over for lossless audio.
Blu is the future.

[JTK]

Originally Posted by dobyblue

Not on Blu-ray because most of the companies are either using lovely PCM or awesome DTS-HD MA.
Me thinks that TrueHD not being included in too many HD DVD releases is because of the lowly 1x speed that HD DVD is on right now.
Blu-ray can dedicate more speed to video content than HD DVD can dedicate to both video and audio combined with another 14.825 Mbps left over for lossless audio.

Blu is the future.

Of this I have no doubt.

I just was wondering about it because I feel like I haven't seen much TrueHD support at all, across both formats combined.

LPCM all the way for me, in any event.

[BTBuck1]

I kinda hope Blu Ray stays LPCM and DTSHDMA. we don't need anything else. Even DTSHDMA downsampled at 1.5mbps will do me just fine for life! and LPCM 5.1 4tw!!!

IMO dd 640kbps just aint cutting it, (Except mi3) which I don't know how they pulled that kinda sound outta 640kbps if it is indeed so!

JTK, ps3 shows bit rate no? do you have this film and can speak to that? If you don't own mi3 you need it in your life....NOW!!!

[JTK]

Originally Posted by Brian@BBY

I kinda hope Blu Ray stays LPCM and DTSHDMA. we don't need anything else. Even DTSHDMA downsampled at 1.5mbps will do me just fine for life! and LPCM 5.1 4tw!!!

IMO dd 640kbps just aint cutting it, (Except mi3) which I don't know how they pulled that kinda sound outta 640kbps if it is indeed so!

JTK, ps3 shows bit rate no? do you have this film and can speak to that? If you don't own mi3 you need it in your life....NOW!!!

Actually, it's either MI3 or Stargate that gets whipped out tonight.

The PS3 shows you everything. You just press the select button and you see all the bit rates, audio codecs, video codecs, all that tech stuff right there on the screen.

I wish I had a way to get past dd 640. I did get exposed to the higher end audio with HD-DVD over the multichannel analogs. If only the PS3 had someway I could plug it into multichannel analogs I'd be set right now.

[dobyblue]

Originally Posted by Brian@BBY

I kinda hope Blu Ray stays LPCM and DTSHDMA. we don't need anything else. Even DTSHDMA downsampled at 1.5mbps will do me just fine for life! and LPCM 5.1 4tw!!!

But what about 6.1 and 7.1 LPCM!

http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/descent.html
It's good to see Lionsgate getting into the lossless realm as their first handful of releases have only had DVD-Video quality audio.
Lossless 6.1 PCM and DTS-MA 6.1 should be terrific - come on HDMI 1.3 receivers!!

[GoldenRedux]

Let me just weigh in on this here - there should be absolutely no difference in sound quality between TrueHD, DTS-HD MA and LPCM. The former two are both lossless and are therefore identical when uncompressed to the latter, LPCM. In fact, if your ultimate goal is to achieve the best sound quality possible without sacrificing picture quality, then TrueHD or DTS-HD MA are the more desirable options over LPCM as they result in the dentical sound quality in less space and with less bandwidth.

Personally, I would prefer to see the Blu-ray studios abandon LPCM on all film releases in favour of either DTS-HD MA or TrueHD in order to optimise picture quality. For something like an audio-only Blu-ray release, then LPCM is perfectly acceptable.

[GoldenRedux]

Originally Posted by dobyblue

come on HDMI 1.3 receivers!!

Who needs them with the Panasonic firmware update?

[BTBuck1]

i'm not convinced, i know on paper it's suppossed to be transparent...but for some reason the implimentation seems better on LPCM.

as for 6.1/7.1 it's cool...my receievers are 7.1 I have 6.1 connected but it's not that earth shattering comming from 5.1, I guess you have to have a huge room to apprecciate it or something.

[Rob Tomlin]

Anyone happen to know the status of the Anthem D2 Statement pre/pro and what they might be doing with hdmi and the new hd audio formats? That's the ticket I'm waiting for!

[shamus]

Originally Posted by Brian@BBY

i'm not convinced, i know on paper it's suppossed to be transparent...but for some reason the implimentation seems better on LPCM.

I agree. You cant ignore the fact that owners of both formats are favoring PCM. I actually hope that PCM isnt better so like Golden says, that space can be used for video.

On another note... I just picked up the Panny and have its receiver brother, the SA-XR700, on order. My question is this... In my 7.1 setup, can the receiver(which has dolby IIx) take a 5.1 PCM track and process in a 7.1 track?

[JTK]

Originally Posted by Rob Tomlin

Anyone happen to know the status of the Anthem D2 Statement pre/pro and what they might be doing with hdmi and the new hd audio formats? That's the ticket I'm waiting for!

^^ Which kidney are you going to part ways to get that beast?



As for the rest of this discussion: I'm sticking with 5.1 for the forseeable future. I just haven't felt much need to go past that and current space considerations won't allow me to do it anyways.

[GoldenRedux]

Originally Posted by Brian@BBY

i'm not convinced, i know on paper it's suppossed to be transparent...but for some reason the implimentation seems better on LPCM.

Trust me, it's probably in your imagination. When you look at the raw data, it is bit for bit identical upon decoding, so there is no reason TrueHD or DTS-HD MA should sound any different than LPCM. I've done my own testing on this with MLP and been present for DBTs with MLP and FLAC and there is no difference between lossless and PCM.

Of course, they could be mastered differently which could account for any differences one might be hearing. I have to admit that, as it stands right now, I have no way of comparing TrueHD and DTS-HD MA to LPCM because I have no means of decoding them until my Panasonic receives its firmware update.

All I can tell you is that, I work with various resolutions of LPCM all the way up to 192/24 practically on a daily basis in my own home studio and I author DVD-As using either LPCM or MLP (Meridian Lossless Packing), or a combination of the two and there is no difference in sound quality between the two that I have ever detected. Take from that whatever you will.

[GoldenRedux]

Originally Posted by JTK

^^ Which kidney are you going to part ways to get that beast?



As for the rest of this discussion: I'm sticking with 5.1 for the forseeable future. I just haven't felt much need to go past that and current space considerations won't allow me to do it anyways.

I currently have a 6.1 setup, but for my Panasonic, there is no way to make the speaker settings for 6.1 using the analogue outs, it can only be set for 5.1 or 7.1. My receiver has two sets of analogue multichannel inputs, a 5.1 and a 7.1 and I use them both plus I have a Zektor analogue multichannel 5.1 3x1 switcher, but space considerations also keep me from using a 7.1 configuration. I wish Panasonic had allowed for a 6.1 setting.

[JTK]

Originally Posted by GoldenRedux

I currently have a 6.1 setup, but for my Panasonic, there is no way to make the speaker settings for 6.1 using the analogue outs, it can only be set for 5.1 or 7.1. My receiver has two sets of analogue multichannel inputs, a 5.1 and a 7.1 and I use them both plus I have a Zektor analogue multichannel 5.1 3x1 switcher, but space considerations also keep me from using a 7.1 configuration. I wish Panasonic had allowed for a 6.1 setting.

I just haven't felt a fire under my ass at all about 7.1. I don't feel like I've ever seen it even supported that much with regular DVD's.

I'll probably stick with 5.1 for a pretty long time.


I'm looking at this Anthem D2 that Rob was talking about. It's pretty impressive, although I see it's currently HDMI 1.1.

I see a lot of buzz about this thing. Is it upgradeable to HDMI 1.3 and the rest of it?

I see that it runs around $6500.

I see that it's basically a combined Gennum VXP video processor combined with a great pre/pro.

You can kill a lot of birds with one stone with this thing. Impressive, but probably overkill for a lot of us. If it's upgradeable to HDMI 1.3 and some other things, then it becomes that much more compelling.

[GoldenRedux]

Originally Posted by JTK

I just haven't felt a fire under my ass at all about 7.1. I don't feel like I've ever seen it even supported that much with regular DVD's.

I'll probably stick with 5.1 for a pretty long time.


I'm looking at this Anthem D2 that Rob was talking about. It's pretty impressive, although I see it's currently HDMI 1.1.

I see a lot of buzz about this thing. Is it upgradeable to HDMI 1.3 and the rest of it?

I see that it runs around $6500.

I see that it's basically a combined Gennum VXP video processor combined with a great pre/pro.

You can kill a lot of birds with one stone with this thing. Impressive, but probably overkill for a lot of us. If it's upgradeable to HDMI 1.3 and some other things, then it becomes that much more compelling.

Do you have a link to their web site?

[JTK]

Originally Posted by GoldenRedux

Do you have a link to their web site?

http://statement.anthemav.com/HTML/Products/D2/D2.html



We'll see if this goes anywhere:

http://boardsus.playstation.com/play...read.id=785075

[Rob Tomlin]

Originally Posted by JTK

I just haven't felt a fire under my ass at all about 7.1. I don't feel like I've ever seen it even supported that much with regular DVD's.

I'll probably stick with 5.1 for a pretty long time.

Virtually no DVD's support 7.1. Some do support 6.1 though (such as DTS ES Discrete) but even that is very rare (the SE Lord of the Ring DVD's support it). Most people use one of the settings on their receiver/pre/pro to make a 7.1 or 6.1 source out of the 5.1 recording (which is obviously not as good as if the soundtrack was 7.1 or 6.1 discrete).

I'm looking at this Anthem D2 that Rob was talking about. It's pretty impressive, although I see it's currently HDMI 1.1.


I see a lot of buzz about this thing. Is it upgradeable to HDMI 1.3 and the rest of it?

I see that it runs around $6500

Which is why I will have to sell one of those kidneys you were talking about!

Yes, it is 1.1 now, which is why I was asking about the upgrade status. One thing Anthem is known for is upgrades! But I don't know if 1.3 is something that can just easily be added. I will wait until it is available before I consider ordering one.

I see that it's basically a combined Gennum VXP video processor combined with a great pre/pro.

You can kill a lot of birds with one stone with this thing. Impressive, but probably overkill for a lot of us. If it's upgradeable to HDMI 1.3 and some other things, then it becomes that much more compelling.

This is exactly right, and why I am interested in it. Having a single box that acts not only as a audio processor, but VP as well is of great value, especially in my quickly shrinking equipment rack!!

I have in my rack now:

1) D-Theater deck
2) Charter HD DVR
3) Dwin Video Processor
4) Pioneer Elite 59avi
5) Xbox 360
6) Toshiba HD-A1
7) Parasound C2 Pre/Pro
8) Sherbourn 7x200 AMP

So my rack is completely full now, and I have a PS3 coming next week. Since I will probably want a VP with my new 1080p projector (on order), as well as a new pre/pro that does hdmi, the D2 makes a lot of sense, except for its price!

[Rob Tomlin]

I just read this from Greg Rogers (who I trust greatly) at AVS:

This is related to why it will take years to see any video benefit from HDMI 1.3. All HDMI versions can transmit 12-bit 4:2:2 YCbCr (or 8-bit RGB/4:4:4 YCbCr), but HDMI 1.3 adds Deep Color that allows up to 16-bit 4:4:4 RGB and 4:4:4 YCbCr. However, most current video processing chips in projectors use 10-bit 4:2:2 YCbCr processing. Only a few use 10-bit 4:4:4 YCbCr processing, and it will probably be years before any take advantage of the higher bit depth HDMI 1.3 Deep Color modes.

I don't think HDMI 1.3 is such a big deal at this time. And it doesn't do anything regarding audio that the current version doesn't do.

edited to say "that the current version doesN'T do".

[JTK]

Originally Posted by Rob Tomlin

I just read this from Greg Rogers (who I trust greatly) at AVS:



I don't think HDMI 1.3 is such a big deal at this time. And it doesn't do anything regarding audio that the current version does.

That makes my life easier.

Basically all I would need is HDM 1.1 switching of some kind.

Assuming that Sony can't/won't make some kind of adapter for the PS3 would allow for use of multichannel analogs.

Damn it, I just hate to even think about doing something like this. My Harman Kardon AVR635 is a nice receiver and has everything going for it except HDMI.

[Rob Tomlin]

Originally Posted by JTK

That makes my life easier.

Basically all I would need is HDM 1.1 switching of some kind.

Assuming that Sony can't/won't make some kind of adapter for the PS3 would allow for use of multichannel analogs.

Damn it, I just hate to even think about doing something like this. My Harman Kardon AVR635 is a nice receiver and has everything going for it except HDMI.

Believe me, I know exactly how you feel! My Parasound C2 has been great! Excellent sound, no issues etc. But, no hdmi!