10 Channel DTS (1 Viewer)

[Dave Moritz]

Watch out Sony (SDDS), Digital Theater Systems (DTS) has just come out with a 10 channel theater processor. Sony has enjoyed and bosted the most channels in the surround format in theaters for years. Sony's SDDS is capable of 8 channels of surround sound playback. But now DTS has just introduced the XD10 Cinima Media Player. Engineered to deliver 10 channels of the highest quality digital surround sound, plus enhanced video for alternate media, the XD10 Cinema Media Player is a full-featured media solution with networking and pre-show capability. The unit contains an internal hard drive capable of storing up to 30 feature film soundtracks.

I guess the question is what will be the first movie or program to show off the newest 10 channel format? I however conseed that with the reluctance to mix more 6.1 surround mixes. It is not likely that movies studio will want to mix very many 10 channel titles for the theater. Ultimatley it is up to the sound enginerers and the studios on weather or not we will see any movies in 10.1 in the near future? And although 10.1 sounds like a really cool idea for HT will many people want that many speakers in there room?

 

[Chris Atkins]

Let's hope DTS' new system goes into theaters where exhibitionists both know how to operate it and turn the daddgum volume up.

 

[Jordan_E]

The first DTS movie I saw/heard was JURASSIC PARK in a good theater and it damn near shook my teeth out! The next time I saw it at the same theater they had turned the sound way down. 10 channel? Too bad that theater no longer exists where I saw PARK!

 

[Chris Atkins]

The first DTS movie I saw/heard was JURASSIC PARK in a good theater and it damn near shook my teeth out! The next time I saw it at the same theater they had turned the sound way down.

Maybe it's just bad luck, but I haven't been in many theaters--in the past five years--where I though the sound quality was anywhere near that of my above average home theater system (I have good speakers....B&W special editions in the front, Velodyne sub, and some decent rears, but a sub-par receiver). This in both in volume and quality of sound, mind you.

 

[Tony-B]

What channel would each speaker be? I wonder what the first movie to take advantage of this will be. I really want to hear 10 channel DTS, but all the theaters around here suck and probably won't get it!

 

[Tim Glover]

Ep.III in 10 Channel dts! Sweeeeeeeeeeet!

 

[Dave Moritz]

I am willing to bet that one of the channels will be like SDDS. Where they have dual center channels and I have no idea how the other channels will factor in ??

Front L
Center L
Center R
Front R

Rear L
Rear R

Rear Center L
Rear Center R

mmmmm that would be 8.1 so where do you think the other 2 channels will be? Maybe in the middle of the theater in the ceiling ?? And what would be cool is they could play some 5.1 DTS music before the movie . There is a Edwards theater in Ontario, CA that has a room with 1200 seats. Alittle smaller than a IMAX room with a really big screen about the size of an IMAX screen. The surround speakers are dual 15" JBL's with horns. You should have heard JP3 and Saving Private Ryan in DTS on this system, WOW . SW3 in DTS 10.1 would be awsum but Lucus is involved with Dolby and is really good friends with Ray Dolby. But it would be nice to hear it in that format.

 

[Adam Barratt]

DTS have had an eight-channel variant for many years (DTS 70mm Special Venue); it uses the same configuration as SDDS-8.

Theatrical DTS itself has always been capable of reproducing many more than six audio channels (or ten, for that matter). Whether the additional two channels will ever be widely used is another matter, although I can see at least some experimentation with a discrete version of Dolby's 'Sonic Whole Overhead Sound' concept. Combined with an ES back-surround channel, this would use all ten channels.

Adam

 

[Dave Moritz]

Is Dolby;s Sonice Whole Overhead Sound Concept on there web site ? Wounder if there quality will improve? IMHO Dolby Digital lacks in certain areas but even though it is a nice improvement over Dolby Prologic. Dolby will have to make some improvements in center channel detail and better imaging. Before I will purchase DD movies instead of waiting for certain titles to come out in DTS. I have a few titles that where purchased in DD and as soon as the DTS ver comes out the DD copy sits and collects dust. This is just my preference in this regard and DTS for the most part gets top billing in my HT. Would not mind reading up on Dolbys new venture.

 

[Adam Barratt]

Dolby's press release can be read here.

Remember not to confuse what is presented on DVD with what is heard in theatres. The theatrical and domestic DTS formats are quite different animals (for the moment at least, the XD10 includes Coherent Acoustic processing capability). The variant of Dolby Digital found in theatres is also never used on DVD.

Adam

 

[Dave Moritz]

Very true Adam

I had a tour of a Edwards Theater recently and the mangaer told me about and showed me the DTS, Dolby and SDDS setups. One of the main complaints was that from time to time they had high error rates on the DD systems that would cause some distortion. And the SDDS if it failed would default to a mono soundtrack. Also the more the film was played the SDDS would somethimes become unsycroniced from the film. I am supprised that since DD is stored on the side of the film that it does not suffer from that problem as well? Even in theaters I prefer DTS and feel DD is compressed sounding. As does SDDS IMHO. SDDS and DD in the theater use aprox the same compression ratio or did the last time I saw the specs. I have heard a few impressive SDDS tracks though. Star Wars AOTC in SDDS I thought rivaled the DD version.

Oh by the way Adam nice system . I do have a question though? Is the Skyworth 1050D a multi region dvd player? If yes how nice is it? And if you dont mind me asking how much $$. I have a friend that wants to get a mnlti region dvd player. I really dont know if they are worth it or if the quality of them is as good as the other dvd players???

 

[SteveP]

Wish they would revert to the old Todd-AO format of having at least five screen channels-with DIRECTIONAL DIALOGUE!

 

[Adam Barratt]

Thanks, Dave. The Skyworth will play discs from any region, and the newer D model will also convert PAL to NTSC and vice versa. Picture quality is very good (PAL and NTSC progressive via Faroudja DCDi) through the VGA output and good through component, but the remote is terrible. Quite good value for $189, in my opinion.

Adam

 

[Lewis Besze]

There is a Edwards theater in Ontario, CA that has a room with 1200 seats. Alittle smaller than a IMAX room with a really big screen about the size of an IMAX screen. The surround speakers are dual 15" JBL's with horns. You should have heard JP3 and Saving Private Ryan in DTS on this system,

I ferquented that theatre complex for quiet sometime now,but I can't say I'm as enthusiastic about it as you.I've been in all the bigger screeners.

 

[Chad R]

[q]Front L
Center L
Center R
Front R

Rear L
Rear R

Rear Center L
Rear Center R
[q]

Well, SDDS has 5 front channels and two surround channels. They call it 8 channel but the eighth channel is the bass track I believe. so if DTS were to go 10 channel all they would need to add would be two rear center channels, RCL and RCR to make up the 10.

 

[Jesse Skeen]

Very few theaters with SDDS actually have the extra 2 screen channels.

 

[Chad R]

That's why its great to live in Orlando! Pleasure Island down at Disney has to have all the latest and greatest toys as per their contract with disney, so they have a DLP projector, two auditoriums that I know of capable of 8 channel SDDS, and now the silver screen for 3-D showings of 'Ghosts of the Abyss'!

 

[John Stockton]

The surround channel frequency in DTS only goes down to 80 Hz. Lets hope with the new system they have allowed all Surround channels to extend all the way down to 20 Hz.

 

[Chuck Stephens]

The theater i work at does but the bigger problem is that so few movies actually come in 8 channel SDDS. Most are in 6 channel so the extra speakers rarely get used. The studios have gotten better about releasing more 8 channel prints but 4-5 years ago it was a different story. Back then you were lucky if 10 prints in a year had 8 channel. It even prompted the company i work for to consider removing the extra 2 speakers out of that theater to use elsewhere because they felt they weren't getting their money's worth out of them. Only problem was that they would have had to cut holes in the screen to remove them.

Just my 2 cents worth of projectionist knowledge

 

[Claire Panke]

I have a friend who is a theater manager for a new AMC 18 screen multiplex. Prior to that, he was a manager for General Cinemas for several years.

He told me that his theaters have experienced numerous problems with SDDS: dropouts, distortion, out of sync issues.

Because of the SDDS problems, they've gone to DTS in all their auditoriums. The sound there is excellent, very clear and relatively transparent for a theater set up, with powerful LFs.

My friend cares about the quality of presentation, so the surround systems are checked regularly and balanced if needed.