530i SMG

i have the ELS dolby digital system in the TL, and love it. DVD audio really blows CD's outta the water. so much more enjoyable to listen to. they just don't make enough DVD audio disks yet.

mdsbuc

If I had purchased my car based on the sound system, it would have been an Acura. The DVD audio was the best stock sound system I have ever heard in a car. I'm not sure if DVD audio is going to make it though. I'm wondering if it is going to go the way of Laser Disks. Maybe some of you true audiophiles know more about that.

UUronL

Well, both formats are on pretty shaky ground. For the vast majority of people, CD is enough. If you really think about it, the marketplace is shifting to sub-CD quality with the proliferation of lossy-encoded music downloads.

I have owned both formats as a very early adopter. The rate at which content is being released that I'd want to listen to has been very very slow. It has really never taken off.

I would imagine that the Acura system sounds nearly as good without the benefit of DVD-Audio source material, just as an audiophile home system sounds amazing with redbook CD.


Lossless audio compression will get another go at it with the new HD-DVD and BluRay formats. It's optional though, so it remains to be seen how much of it we'll really see with movie releases. I can say that in the few theatrical releases that had uncompressed digital soundtracks (the closest thing I can compare), the difference in quality was striking and really added to the experience. If the inclusion of lossless audio in home video creates enough enthusiasm, it could potentially spark wider interest in lossless music formats.

mdsbuc

I tend to be an early adopter as well. I was a big loser, buying into laser disc at the time. I also bought into HDTV too early. Now, hopefully, I'll be a little slower to adopt, a little more cautious. I'll be waiting to see if either HD-DVD or BluRay takes off before I buy in. Do you have any recommendations for theatrical releases with uncompressed sound tracks? (I'm assuming you are talking about DVD format.) Thanks.

UUronL

Ah, upon reseaching for my response, I realized I wasn't completely right. It turns out that MLP lossless (I think it's called Dolby True HD now) is in fact mandatory for HD-DVD. The DTS HD spec is mandatory, but I believe it encompases more than just lossless, so it is likely that most titles will not use the lossless DTS (my speculation could be wrong though)

BluRay supports Dolby Digital "technology" and DTS-HD, but I do not see any reference to lossless Dolby True HD being a mandatory thing. Again, I don't believe that DTS-HD support requires that lossless be included.

Just as full bit-rate DTS for current DVD is quite rare (most are half bit-rate), I imagine that support for the lossless DTS codec will be quite rare.



So, to answer your question - I'd expect all HD-DVD titles to support 24 bit/96 kHz audio with up to 8 full-range channels over HDMI.


I can't tell from the specs if they're going to pass it over anything -but- HDMI, which is a bit worrysome. I'm not sure that most receivers/processors will do multi-channel in HDMI direct mode (if they support HDMI at all), and none of them can decode the new codecs. The easy solution initially would be to have the players decode, and send the audio with separate analog connectors per channel with the receiver in an EXT-IN mode, or in a "direct" mode across the HDMI as PCM 96/24.

That will all be "interesting". More reason to wait.

mdsbuc

Thanks!