Selecting Dolby Digital but receiver says DTS??

[bigbassdave]

Just yesterday I noticed when playing an HD DVD on my Toshiba HD-A2 connected to my Onkyo receiver via optical cable that no matter which sound format I select in my disc menu the display on the front of my Onkyo reads DTS. The movies still sound great and seem to be outputting discreet channels as they should. However, when I take the same disc into my living room and load it in my Toshiba HD-A30 connected to my Harman Kardon receiver, also via optical cable, the display reads the correct audio format. So when I choose Dolby Digital the display reads Dolby Digital. I'm not sure what is causing my Onkyo to display dts no matter which format i choose from the hd-a2. I have a ps3 and a cable box hooked to the Onkyo and they display correctly. I have searched through the menu on the hd player and i don't see anything that seems like it would fix my problem. Any thoughts? Thanks in advance. Also maybe worth noting both my hd players are running the final firmware.

 

[yepimonfire]

im just taking a wild guess here, but maybe your device only supports DTS? it's not really a big deal, i think DTS sounds better then DD anyways. or possibly the player has been hard-selected to output DTS (ive accidentally done this in the setup menu of the player before)

 

[bigbassdave]

yeah, DTS is always better than DD!

I agree but my concern is that even though my receiver is capable of decoding dts and DD it displays DTS regardless of which one i choose. So I can be playing an HD DVD that doesn't even offer DTS yet my receiver still says DTS.

 

[GlocksRock]

Loooks like your player is decoding the DD using it's DTS decoder, just double check all your players settings.

 

[sptrout]

I think the problem is in the player, not the AVR. The AVR can only decode what it receives (in this case DD) and it does not have the ability to choose which format the player sends to it.

Edit: On second thought I guess the display may always say one thing (DTS), but the decoder is actually doing something else (decoding DD).

BTW - - Since DD is the core requirement for DVDs, not DTS, any AVR would have to have DD capability, but there is no requirement for DTS capabilty. Most early models of DVD players and AVRs did not have DTS for this very reason, not mention that DTS came a little later than DD.

 

[bigbassdave]

Loooks like your player is decoding the DD using it's DTS decoder, just double check all your players settings.

Thanks that was my first thought however when I place a standard DVD in my HD player and select DD the receiver displays DD as it should. I guess its not that big a deal because it sounds like its working properly I just can't figure out why on hd dvds it always displays dts

 

[gonk]

The HD-A2 had a function whereby it decoded HD-DVD audio internally (TrueHD, DD+, etc.) and then re-encoded on the fly to high-bitrate DTS. This was done so that you could get the maximum effect from the new audio formats using coaxial or optical digital output (which can't carry multichannel PCM, DD+, or TrueHD). It didn't need to do it for DVD's because they use either Dolby Digital or DTS, and they can just be output as bitstreams over coax or optical.

 

[bigbassdave]

Thanks for that I had no idea but that certainly explains it.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Yeah, my Toshiba HD-XA1 does the exat same thing.

 

[gonk]

Yep - all of Toshiba's HD-DVD players did it, although I think the last generation (the HD-A3 and its siblings) switched from DTS to DD for some reason.

 

[Electone]

The HD-A1, HD-XA1, HD-A2 all did this. The HD-XA2 and the third gen players did not.