Star Wars Trilogy DVD's with no LFE? (original 2004 anamorphic dvd's) (1 Viewer)

Ok, it's a history lesson I know. I have had these dvd's for a while, but I can't seem to coax any LFE signal from them. I try DD EX and I get nothing. I'm using the Empire Probe Droid landing, the walkers and the explosions on the opening of ANH as a reference, and the opening to SW. The only way I got the subwoofer to work was when I used my Yamaha dvd player with DPL II and multi-channel. Regular DD via digital cable doesn't seem to give me the thump from my subwoofer.

For comparison, the opening THX thingy on Empire gives me LFE and I tried The Matador and The Matrix both with LFE and they work the subwoofer fine with my receiver and sub, so I highly doubt it's their fault.

A couple of questions:

1) Could somebody give me examples of scenes (chapter etc) on the SW trilogy dvd's which have confirmed LFE?

2) Could I possibly have defective fluke dvd's with no LFE in the mix?

3) Do all these dvd's have no LFE?

I searched on this forum and couldn't find anything re problems with or lack of LFE on the SW dvd's.

thanx in advance for the help,



P.S. I'l keep trying more scenes, like the big explosions in SW - ANH and ROTJ and see what happens.

It sounds like an odd problem. I'm interested to hear what's caused it. I hope you get it sorted!

They all have LFE, just not as much as I and II due to the toned down lightsaber effects.

Ok, thanks. I'll check out those scene's at the end of chapter 26 of A New Hope. If somebody knows where there is LFE on the Empire DVD, that would be great. My subwoofer has auto shut-off and it stayed off for the entire Empire dvd. Now, I noticed that I may have had the volume a little low, but still, I suspect something weird is going on here.

In Empire I would check scenes with the At-At walkers. Empire is not a bass heavey movie, and of course the films had no LFE when first released. I have the 1997 Special Edition laserdiscs, and there is not much LFE on them either, so I just don't think they have much LFE to speak of.

Right. ZERO LFE in the AT-AT walker scenes. Will try again.

Though my system doesn't have a subwoofer, I do have an LFE display on my receiver, a little box with three line segments that light up on detection of an LFE signal.

On THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK SPECIAL EDITION - both the 2004 issue and the more recent two-disc set - the LFE lights up at any number of scenes. It first appears as the credit crawl is over and the Imperial fleet is seen. In fact, there are many chapter starts in the movie that begin with a shot of the Imperial fleet, with Vader's march playing, and ALL of them light up my LFE display.

I also see a pulsing LFE at the start of the AT-AT walker scene - when they're first viewed through the 'binoculars'.

Harry

The first three Star Wars were released in the 70mm Dolby Stereo format (which was one of the earliest, after Sensurround of course, to include discrete LFE effects) so yes they did have LFE originally.

As for Chris PC's problem, the only other idea I have is that he has some Bass Redirection feature on his system that he needs to turn on.

70mm would have been 6 track, not dolby stereo. Dolby Stereo came with the 35mm releases and was only 4 channel sound. Neither format had a dedicated LFE channel. Dolby stereo had center, left, right, and mono surround. 6 Track from 70mm was five channels up front and mono surrounds, so again, no LFE channel was ever present in the mix of these films until the 1997 Special edition release in 5.1.

Ummm, no.

In 1977 Dolby introduced their own 70mm format (which debuted with Star Wars BTW) that jettisoned two of the five front channels (left and right center to be exact) in favor of dedicated speakers designed to output only bass (this was before subwoofers, which became standard in the mid 80s). The system is known officially as Baby Boom and is a 4.1 format since the surrounds are still mono. When Superman came around a year later, the engineers at Dolby experimented in splitting the mono surround on a 70mm print into two separate discrete channels, thus creating the first true 5.1 mix for the 70mm version. The first film to publicly use the split surround format was Apocalypse Now in 1979, but the format didn't catch on until later, sadly missing ESB and ROTJ which both used the old Baby Boom format. The first LFL film to use the split surround AFAIK was Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom in 1984.

Umm, yes. Can you provide a link that specifically states that the original Star Wars film in 1977 had a dedicated LFE channel? I've provided a link below from an interivew with Ben Burrt, sound designer for Star Wars, that talks about a dolby stereo mix, a 70mm six track, and a mono mix. He also states that the 1997 tracks they were able to extend the low frequency since the theaters can play it now. I would appreciate seeing a link stating for fact that the star wars films originally projected in 1977-1983 had dedicated LFE channels, because everyting I've ever read or seen has never referenced this.

http://lavender.fortunecity.com/hawk...s-advanced.htm

Um, no....

Joel is correct. My local theatre was unable to secure a 70mm print for Star Wars, but it was able to do so for both Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. In the theatre, in 70mm, these two films had more bass than I had ever heard before (perhaps I should say "felt before") in a film. The only thing I would disagree about with Joel is the baby boom set up initially being a 4.1 configuration. It actually would be considered 4.2, with two tracks being used for bass.

If I recall correctly the LC/RC information on a Dolby are derived from the same low frequency information and are mono copies of each other, so it is in fact a 4.1 system, its just that the .1 is utilized by two speakers instead of one subwoofer.

Joel I think you're exactly right. In any case...........the bass was VERY impressive for the 70mm presentation of those films.

It is indeed. I saw Raiders of the Lost Ark in 70mm last year and the bass response was astounding.

You can have impressive bass through the main right and left channels, this does not mean there was a dedicated LFE channel, which is all I am saying. I still would like to see a link that states for fact that the original star wars mixes from 1977-1983 has dedicated .1 LFE channels. If you can find one I'm more than happy to be proven wrong. But just saying there was great bass response does not mean a dedicated LFE channel was employed.

Gregg, you are of course right about that. Perhaps what Joel and I haven't explained to you is how "common knowledge" the set up of the baby boom format was back then. Now I don't mean that your average casual film goer knew the set up for "Six Track Magnetic Dolby Stereo" as it was advertised, but for film nuts like all of us here at THTF, well yes, we all devoured the latest tech talk in places like American Film magazine. I remember being disappointed that the configuration of the Dolby version of 70mm sound was dropping left center and right center in favor of bass tracks. Then of course I heard it, and suffice to say I was no longer disappointed. And of course it is this format (as it was configured starting with "Superman", one bass track and stereo surrounds) that was the goal of digital surround. They were now able to create six track stereo but without the expensive 70mm film. When I have time I'll see if I can find some site that talks about the changes to 70mm sound starting in the 1970's.

Edit: Here's a bit of history here at
http://www.mtsu.edu/~smpte/timeline.html

Forgive my ignorance. What's LFE?

PatH

LFE stands for Low Frequency Effect. Its a term used to describe special low bass rumble produced by your subwoofer when a receiver detects sound frequencies lower than 120hz, with additional "oomph" for SFX like explosions or gunfire. The .1 in the term 5.1 stands for a mix with a discrete LFE channel (although additional low frequencies are extracted from the other five speakers as well and as a result even standard 2.0 stereo tracks have rumble if not as much).

Woooooo! You must have great ears and the best equipment out there...120khz? Supposed to be 120hz. Most humans cannot hear past 20-22khz.

Just doggin' ya.

Btw, have you had this fixed yet Chris? While playing the 5.1 on the dvd, double check you receiver to make sure you havent left the main channels on "LARGE".