Dolby Digital Plus question (1 Viewer)

[DavidDTS]

Here is a simple question for the HD folks out there:
Does my receiver have to HDMI inputs in order to get the DD+ or can this also come through with Optical Digital cable (from player to receiver) ?

 

[Mark Zimmer]

On the HD-A1, you have to have either HDMI, or 5.1 analog outputs to get DD+. Optical and Coax give you encoded DTS.

 

[Rob_HD]

You can get this sound via Analog inputs on your AV/R or HDMI. As Mark says, you can also get them via optical and coax, but these two connectors cannot transport the higher bandwidth that DD+ offers, so for optical and coax, the players convert the decoded DD+ audio into a 1.5 megabit DTS stream.

 

[DavidDTS]

Thank you both for the reply. So am I to assume you both prefer DD+ over the DTS encoding?

 

[Neil Joseph]

Then there is DD True HD and I have only seen 1 or maybe two HD-DVD's with that audio encoded, Pahntom Of The Opera being one of them.

 

[Rob_HD]

Getting the decoded DD+ as PCM is the ideal, as it will not be altered by recoding to DTS. So if you have an AVR with HDMI inputs, then this is the best solution. Any version of HDMI will do, you don't need HDMI 1.3 to pass this decoded DD+ PCM 5.1 (or even 7.1) audio.

But if you have to use optical, the DD+ recoded to 1.5 megabit DTS is still better than a regular DD soundtrack, so it's not a big problem. It's good to have the legacy support.

 

[Doug Schiller]

Well, Perfect Storm says it has a Dolby HD 5.1 track.

Does the Toshiba player decode the signal?
So, if I have analog inputs, am I getting the true signal?

 

[Dan Hitchman]

Only the left and right stereo channels of the Dolby TrueHD track can be decoded by the Toshiba.

Dumb!!

The Blu-Ray titles are the same resolution as the HD-DVD titles: 16 bit/48 kHz (basically downconverted CD quality, not high resolution from the archival masters) and are placed as uncompressed Linear PCM 5.1 tracks so far... so in layman's terms the same quality as the current Dolby TrueHD 5.1 lossless compressed tracks on HD-DVD.

Dan

 

[Reagan]

I agree. This is one of the strangest things about the Toshiba. I can't understand why it was done. Why not 5.1 channel analog? Anyone know?

-Reagan

 

[Doug Schiller]

I would guess the PC they have inside the Toshiba can't handle it. They probably would have had to put in a dedicated sound/codec card.
It still doesn't make sense. I guess it is like the first generation of SD DVD players that couldn't play DTS.
Remember that?

 

[Cees Alons]

Yes, but there was a different reason for that: DTS came too late with the official proposal and wasn't included in the first operative specs of the format. After a year, or so, it was agreed upon.


Cees

 

[Dave H]

Aren't most movie masters at 16/48?

 

[Paul Anthony]

Why is Toshiba advertising in their current HD-DVDs for 7.1 lossless sound if it's not available? Will a firmware upgrade do the trick?

 

[Rob_HD]

Uhhhh.... The HD DVD players DO IN FACT use hardware decoders for this, not the Intel CPU. There are four Analog Devices SHARC chips which handle this and two of them are flash-upgradable.

Word going around is that within 3 weeks there will be a firmware update which MAY support 5.1 TruHD decoding...

 

[Rob_HD]

It can handle L-PCM lossless audio as well...

 

[Rob_HD]

My guess is the code for the decoder chips wasn't ready in time.

There is a firmware update coming in the next three weeks which MAY add 5.1 TRU HD decoding...

 

[Lew Crippen]

Not a challenge Rob, but your source for this would be? …

 

[Dan Hitchman]

From what I've read from a sound mixer at Todd-AO most newer soundtracks are mixed at 24 bit/48 kHz and Warner Brothers is adding support for 24/96 soon.

From comments by Stacy Spears on AVS Forum it looks like they're downgrading to 16/48 in order to squeeze the bitrates. A 24/48 or 24/96 lossless compressed track can still require peaks of 6-8 Megabits/sec. This is based off of DVD-Audio lossless tracks, which use Meridian Lossless Packing (MLP). MLP is the backbone of Dolby TrueHD lossless with more channels and higher resolution than DVD-Audio music discs as a possibility.

Dan

 

[Rob_HD]

No probs - http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...&&#post7811638

To get the context, one should read through the build up to the post also.

 

[JohnS]

So, I would need one of these cables to hook up to my HD DVD player and my Denon reciever, to get DD+

Cable