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Switching sides and rear speakers on 3808ci

#1
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3/20/08 at 8:15am
  • Joined: May 2002
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Hello -

I just finished building and setting up my home theater room. I purchased a Denon 3808ci, and wired in all 7.1 speakers. The side surrounds are di-polars, which I thought would be a good choice for watching movies. However, when I was playing some older 5.1 concert DVD's, it was using these side surrounds as the rear channels. I would prefer to use the rears exclusively when watching music DVD's. Is there anyway to turn off the sides, and force just the rears on for a 5.1 DVD? It seems like the side surrounds are the primary instead of the rears.
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#2
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3/20/08 at 1:48pm
  • Joined: August 2002
  • Location: Mass
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Re: Switching sides and rear speakers on 3808ci

Quote:
Originally Posted by Michael Varacin
Hello -

I just finished building and setting up my home theater room. I purchased a Denon 3808ci, and wired in all 7.1 speakers. The side surrounds are di-polars, which I thought would be a good choice for watching movies. However, when I was playing some older 5.1 concert DVD's, it was using these side surrounds as the rear channels. I would prefer to use the rears exclusively when watching music DVD's. Is there anyway to turn off the sides, and force just the rears on for a 5.1 DVD? It seems like the side surrounds are the primary instead of the rears.

In a 7.1 setup, the sides are the primary surrounds and the rears are optional. The rears are only defined in a DD-EX or DTS-ES soundtrack, where they are present as a mono rear surround, or in an HDM (Blu-ray or HD DVD) where the are discreet L/R rears (Note there are very few HDM 7.1 disks). If you do as you wish, you will ruin the soundfield for any current DD-EX and DD-ES disks you own and any future HDM disks.

Instead, you have two options. You can simply convert to a 5.1 system, where the main surrounds can be placed in the rear, or you can use a rear surround matrix mode that will matrix 5.1 sources into 7.1. This is accomplished by enabling the Dolby Pro Logic IIx mode on your receiver. DPLIIx is an advanced DSP that attempts to steer rear surround infomation to the appropriate speakers in a 7.1 system. So instead of the sound panning SL->SR, DPLIIx will steer the the sound so the pan goes SL->RSL->RSR->SR.

SL = Surround Left
RSL - Rear Surround Left
SR = Surround Right
RSR - Rear Surround Right

PS - That Denon seems to have different modes for PLIIx, including one for music. Try each one with your music DVD's, you never know which one will be to your tastes.
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#3
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3/20/08 at 3:43pm
  • Joined: October 2007
  • Location: Middletown N.Y.
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Re: Switching sides and rear speakers on 3808ci

Check out you speaker options on your onscreen menu. On my processor you can turn speakers off.
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#4
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3/24/08 at 9:09am
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Re: Switching sides and rear speakers on 3808ci

What I would like to be able to do is choose when playing a 5.1 source whether the rears are used instead of the sides. If I go into the menu and turn off the sides, it assumes you don't have any rears. It seems there should be a way to use the rears in a 5.1 and not the sides without having to re-wire the speaker connections.

Also, last night I was watching a movie recorded in Dolby Digital. I could not get the receiver to switch to Dolby Pro Logic IIx in order to get 7.1. I had to use a simulated sound "widescreen."

Any ideas?
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#5
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3/24/08 at 9:53am
  • Joined: April 2004
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Re: Switching sides and rear speakers on 3808ci

Quote:
Originally Posted by Michael Varacin
Also, last night I was watching a movie recorded in Dolby Digital. I could not get the receiver to switch to Dolby Pro Logic IIx in order to get 7.1. I had to use a simulated sound "widescreen."

Any ideas?

Unless I'm hopelessly wrong, Dolby Digital is a true 5.1 channel recording sytem. Dolby Pro Logic is a "fake" way of getting 5 channels out of two. If a movie is recorded in 5.1, then you should jsut listen to it in 5.1, and ignore those back speakers.

Yes, the side channels are used more extensively than the back channels. A small but growing number of movies have more than 5 channels.

now, for switching the side signal over to the back for those quadraphonic CDs, take a look at this diagram, and just change some of the labels:

wiring swap

--ignore the man behind the curtain

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#6
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3/24/08 at 10:19am
  • Joined: August 2002
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Re: Switching sides and rear speakers on 3808ci

Instead of using the 'SIMU' button on your remote, use the 'PARA' button. 'SIMU' is for DSP's, 'PARA' is for surround parameters. The parameter you want to change is 'Mode' and you want to change it to PLIIx.


Chuck, PLIIx is a newer version of Pro-Logic that simulates 7.1 output from a DD 5.1 soundtrack. Both Pro-Logic and Pro-Logic II are used for analog stereo, but PLIIx is used for both analog and digital.
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#7
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3/24/08 at 1:21pm
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Re: Switching sides and rear speakers on 3808ci

Chuck -

Thanks for the diagrams. I'll take a look at them later when I have a few mintues to think about your solution.

Jeff -

I tried using the on-screen menu options every which way trying to get to PLIIx. But it would not give me the option under surround parameters. I don't understand why. I even followed along with the manual menu outlines, and where is said it showed that option should show up, it wasn't there. I'll try again tonight or tommorrow and post specifics as to what was showing up for options. All I remember is I tried every menu option and it was not an available choice.
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#8
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3/24/08 at 1:27pm
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Re: Switching sides and rear speakers on 3808ci

Quote:
Originally Posted by Jeff Gatie
Chuck, PLIIx is a newer version of Pro-Logic that simulates 7.1 output from a DD 5.1 soundtrack. Both Pro-Logic and Pro-Logic II are used for analog stereo, but PLIIx is used for both analog and digital.


Ah, very nice! thanks for the upgrade to my limited store of knowledge

--ignore the man behind the curtain

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#9
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3/26/08 at 8:23am
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Re: Switching sides and rear speakers on 3808ci

I figured out the problem of my reciever not letting me switch to PLIIx. I had it set to auto surround. After I removed that option, it opened up the possibility of PLIIx, with the various cinema, music, and game forms.

I still haven't found a way to make the 5.1 configuration use the rear surrounds instead of the sides.
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