Dolby Digital V. DTS

[Blundaar]

I thought the HD-DVD would be using MLP - which seemed about as cool as there going to get for awhile.

Believe it or not I wasn't trying to start a religous war...

Don't sweat it. I was Mr. Stereo until about 6 years ago. My 1st surround system consisted of a pair of fronts and a pair of rears with a DD and DTS compatible receiver. The 1st DTS movie I ever played on my system was Disneys' Dionsaur. Nearly blew my brains through the wall, I was so impressed. From that point on, I tried to buy movies with DTS audio whenever possible.
PS- Dinosaur is also a great disk to test an audio system with.
PPS- Even the cheapest Wal-Mart receiver supports DTS these days. People can find out the differences for themselves (if a lot of them weren't so lazy, that is).

 

[annunaki]

The only extras I have ever watched on a DVD have been The Original Star Wars Trilogy, and National Treasure. That's it! I would love every disc to use, or at least offer DTS.

I do agree with others though, that it is really down to the mix and how well it was done.

 

[Cygnus]

Wow. How nice of you guys to attack me over my opinion on something!

I'm sure DTS does sound great. Yes I do know that pretty much every new receiver out there supports both formats. But come on! You don't need to be rude to me because of my personal preference and opinion on something.

 

[Cygnus]

Oh, and while im still here lets get this straight about me:


If more DVD's and new DVD's will have DTS tracks, sure ill use that. But for now i prefer to stick with Dolby Digital.

 

[MACCA350]

If you want some real info read this entire article, you'll find you cant simply compare the two with DVD releases. As stated before and in the article any difference you hear will be due to the mixing and the difference in mastered volumes(inc Dolby's Dialog Normalization) not in the encoding technologies.

cheers

 

[mtrycrafts]

I preffer DD over DTS because it seems like itll always be on my DVD's, and also because alot of the theatres use it.

DD is on DVDs, TV and movies because that is mandated by the standards
DTS is just a ride along sound track that is not a requirement.

 

[mtrycrafts]

That's got to be one of the lamest reasons I've ever heard.
Just because it's "everywhere", that doesn't make it better.
DTS audio does take up more space on a DVD than DD, sometimes requiring two DVD's compared to just one (gotta think about the bottom line $$). A few rare exceptions aside, DTS is clearly better.

I wonder why DD is the mandated standard on DVDs, 5.1 TV broadcast and movie sountracks? I think the technical team that made the selections had a good reason for DD, don't you think?

 

[korgoth]

BE NICE TO CYGNUS

I have heard quite a few movies in both DTS and DD. Quite frankly the quality the soundtrack and mixing is more important than what type of system is used. I've heard many soundtracks that are better on DD.

The real reason studios use DD over DTS on a DVD is the amount of disc space used for a DTS soundtrack. "Extras" are an important selling point with DVD's. A studio must sacrifice some of these extra features if they wish to add the DTS soundtrack. And as stated earlier, DTS is an option that the everyday consumer does not have. The studios MUST cater to the masses. Those of us that desire quality over quantity are in the minority. Which is why we pay more for what we want. I will gladly pay extra for a "director's cut" or a "special edition" to get the audio and video I'm looking for.

this is somewhat true, but its rare to find a dvd that uses the comlete 9 gigs. Most, are between 6-8. Plus, a DTS track even though bigger than DD, doesnt fill up that much. Definately less than a gig.. usually about ~550 mbs i believe. Compared to DD @ ~350mb.

But yeah, most people will find dts to be the better of the two, and id agree with that. I find the mixing, and quality of DTS to be better. The sound seems to spread across your speakers more with a DTS track.

 

[mtrycrafts]

I don't read that into his statement, whatsoever. What I'm attacking is the mentality of the "everybody has it, that's why I use it" mindset

So, you only like your kind of mentality then? Nothing different mentality?



(if everybody jumped off a cliff, blah, blah, blah).

Now that is a lame one. Everyone would not jump off of that bridge.


Star Wars episodes I & II are great examples of DD at its' best, but I still believe DTS is the better format.


Oh, so DD format can be great by your own admission then? Cannot have it both ways now, can we.

 

[mtrycrafts]

Don't mean to sound like I'm jumping on anyone, but if this is your reasoning for which soundtrack is preferrable, you SHOULD prefer 2.0 (stereo).

Illogocal conclusion. He didn't imply that he makes all his selections in life based on majority preferences, just his DD preference.


Not ALL dvds have a DD track.


Yes, some of the old movies don't have 5.1 but it is in DD 1.0 and up. DD doesn't mean 5.1. It means Dolby Digital, even if it is mono, 1.0

 

[MACCA350]

Obviously no-one read the article I posted. It will clear up some of the misconceptions.

cheers

 

[MDS]

Obviously no-one read the article I posted. It will clear up some of the misconceptions.

cheers

I read it (and thanks for the link). Another very good read is the series of whitepapers on the Dolby and DTS sites where each evaluated the others codecs.

 

[edwelly]

Obviously no-one read the article I posted. It will clear up some of the misconceptions.

cheers

I just read the article and yes, it does clear up a LOT of confusion. One of the things I have always noticed was a DTS track being louded than a DD. The article explains that as well. Honestly, it is probalby the best article I have read in some time. Easy to understand and it does make since why you can't really compare them both. I always thought of DTS being DD on crack, but not any more. THANKS!!!

 

[MACCA350]

Yes, I've read those evaluation white papers, interesting.

I've had some probs with the neighbors about the loudness of my sub, so we found an acceptable level when playing DD tracks on DVD's. Later I wanted to play the DTS track of 'The Day After tomorrow', so I played a part that had a simple moderate volume bass tone with virtually no higher Frequency information as a comparison for the two tracks. I then set the receiver to my normal listening volume and with my SPL meter in hand(set to show the MAX SPL(since this is what I wanted to limit)) I switched between the DD and DTS tracks and adjusted the DTS Sub-woofer trim(this only effects the subs volume for DTS encoded tracks and does not effect main volumes for other formats including DD) to bring the LFE of the DTS track in-line with the DD tracks volume.

What I ended up with was the DTS sub volume trimmed -7.0 (compared to the DD at 0.0). And even with the DTS sub down by 7.0 the SPL reading showed it was 2-3db louder than the DD track.

This little exercise showed me that DTS tracks are mixed louder than their DD counterparts, as everyone knows louder sounds better even if its not better, even the Dialog Norm feature cannot explain such a difference in volume as for that DVD the DD track had a -4 Diag Norm factor, and I had the DTS 3 under that and it was still 2-3db hotter.

Having said that I do like DTS tracks and tend to hold off purchasing DVD's for a version that has both formats

Enough said, cheers

 

[BeerMe]

I wonder why DD is the mandated standard on DVDs, 5.1 TV broadcast and movie sountracks? I think the technical team that made the selections had a good reason for DD, don't you think?

Yes they did have a good reason for choosing DD over DTS and it's mainly because of bandwidth in the broadcasting side of things and space on the disc for DVD's. The compression ratio is about 4:1 in DTS and about 12:1 for DD (don't quote me on those figures) hence if you have sound that is less compressed it generally sounds better than the original recording, depending how it's been mixed, blah,blah,blah.

It goes the same for mpg's over the original cd you convert, the mpg is so highly compressed it doesn't sound anywhere near as good as the original cd (on a quality stereo not an mpg player)..