Digital vs. PCM (1 Viewer)

[MichaelM]

When should you use the setting "Digital--PCM" on your DVD Player vs. the straight-up "Digital" setting?

With ProLogic II on my receiver (from DVD's that are 2.0 or surround, but not 5.1) the sound is MUCH better when I switch my DVD player to "PCM".

Thanks!

 

[Michael Reuben]

If your receiver has Dolby Digital coding, you should never need the PCM setting. It's mostly designed for older receivers/decoders that could handle a PCM bitstream but not a DD bitstream.
I recognize that you are having particular problems with DD 2.0 output (as detailed here), but those seem to be peculiar to your setup. The fact that switching your player from bitstream to PCM changes how DD 2.0 sounds suggests that there's something odd in the way your receiver handles DD 2.0 bitstreams. I have a suggestion for dealing with it, but I'll post it in the other thread.
M.