Am I losing part of the music? (1 Viewer)

[Jereme D]

I think this is the right forum for this....

I have three DTS audio CD's. I prefer to listen to them in them in stereo as opposed to surround. When I set my receiver to stereo, what happens to the surround info? Are those channels just not played? Or, are all of the channels compressed down into stereo?

 

[Jeff D]

Whatcha got for a reciever? I think it might have to do with the DSP logic. Your manual may/should tell you what is going to happen.

It kind of strange because if your receiver had DTS decoder built in, you could maybe use the analog outs. Then the dvd player would be the one in control and maybe more flexability doing what you want.

How would 5.1 discrete mixed down to 2ch sound? I don't think it would be good. Nor do I think just the FL and FR channels would be correct either.

I'd skip doing this and listen in the mode it was mixed for.

 

[Jeff Keene]

I agree. What possible benefit is there in listening to dts CD's with only two channels? I'd think a regular CD would sound better for this purpose. What is the sampling rate / word length of a dts CD? Is it higher than a regular CD? If so, does this in your eyes (ears) make up for the lossy compression?

I don't mean to sound arguementative; these questions are sincere. But this struck me as an odd thing to want to do.

 

[Jereme D]

Whatcha got for a reciever? I think it might have to do with the DSP logic. Your manual may/should tell you what is going to happen.

It kind of strange because if your receiver had DTS decoder built in, you could maybe use the analog outs. Then the dvd player would be the one in control and maybe more flexability doing what you want.

How would 5.1 discrete mixed down to 2ch sound? I don't think it would be good. Nor do I think just the FL and FR channels would be correct either.

I have a Pioneer VSX-D850s. I checked the manual, and it doesn't mention what it does to multi-channel signals when you choose stereo mode.

As far as the sound is concerned..... All of the sounds that are present in the sourround mix are there in stereo mode, and the music carries the same intensity that I noted before.

 

[Rachael B]

Jeff, there are DTS CD's where the mix is so bad you'd want to mix it down to stereo. IMO, Edgar Winters' JASMINE NIGHTDREAMS is such a disc. I'm certainly glad my Marantz AV9000 will mix down. I just go down the list of surround modes on menu and pick stereo. BTW, I'm in auto-select mostly. I like the 5.1 mix DTS did on Boyz 2 Men and the 1999 Sampler, the only other DTS CD's I own. Edgar's album sounds disjointed with like a guitarist sitting with you and the rest of the band scattered about the room. It's the worst 5.1 material I've ever heard. It's the mixing, not the actual sound quality. That's why...

 

[Jeff Keene]

Rachael --

I guess what I'm confused about is that if that is the case (and it makes sense that it would be), would a 2-ch down mix be better than just a straight stereo CD? Does dts have added resolution that makes up for the lossy compression and make it superior to CD?

One thing that sticks in my head was Vince's puzzlement that people like the DD track on some DVD-A disc so much. He compared them to mp3's vs. CDs.

NP: Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

 

[Jeff Ulmer]

Vince's puzzlement that people like the DD track on some DVD-A disc so much. He compared them to mp3's vs. CDs.

Well maybe not as extreme, but the comparison is valid. Both mp3 and DD are compressed formats, so they both are eliminating some of the original content. The degree to which this is audible depends on a number of factors (encoding, and how well it is done, bitrate etc.) and the ability of the listener to tell the difference (which can also be masked by things other than the source). Nothing will match an uncompressed, wide bandwidth PCM encoding (all things assumed to be equal) in terms of translating the original recordings. As soon as you add a codec, you are changing the sound somehow, though if the mastering is done by a competant engineer, the differences may be too subtle for most people to perceive.