Help! I am starting to see (in other forums, I hasten to state) a LOT of people seem to automatically assume 5.1 = AC3. Please, every time anyone sees this can you correct them! It's kind of important to me, and I think that these misperceptions really should be corrected. High Resolution is Audio over the standard CD rate of 16/44.1 - yes, there IS a difference - and not any of the lossy formats like Dolby Digital, DTS, MP3 or anything like that. If you want to see what I mean, pop over to the Adobe Encore DVD forums. The amount of people there who think that surround MUST be in Dolby Digital is scary. If the hires format(s) are going to succeed, we simply MUST educate people. Most just haven't got a clue and I believe this to be predominantly the fault of Salesmen who sell cheap DVD players with DTS/DD as being "DVD-Audio", when all they are is DVD-Video. Any comments, anyone?
yeah totally... i went into a shop a while ago and asked for a dvd-audio player. the salesperson quickly corrected me that I was actually just looking for an ordinary DVD player, and I will get amazing high quality sound because it uses a revolutionary technology called 5.1 I tried to suggest that I wanted to actually listen to the DVD-A part of my DVD-A discs but after a while he started looking at me like I was crazy or something. If salespeople don't even have the faintest idea what high definition audio means, you can hardly expect people to start buying into it.
Understood! This is a HUGE problem. The only way I can see around it at the moment is to actually take a DVDA disc into the shop, and make them try to play it. Also, take a DVDV disc in which has DTS, and another that only has Dolby Digital. It sounds like hassle, but whenever I go amp or speaker shopping I always take a whole bunch of stuff with me to listen to. If the shop won't let you, then they will be "box-shifters" and the after sales service will most likely be as shocking as their lack of knowledge. Hope you get some luck. For DVDA/DVDV/DD/DTS/MP3/JPEG/CDA/CD-R/W/DVD-R/W compatibility, try the Limit DVD9900SE. It's at richer sounds for around £150, and their website also tells you if a player is capable of DVDA/SACD as well.
Except... every DVD-A disc also contains some form of lossy 5.1 right? so they will stick it in some dvd-v player and point out the dolby digital symbol (or whatever) because this is what they think dvd-a is, and look at you with a big supercilious idiot-grin. £150 is quite cheap! what is wrong with it? i was hoping to find something local (New Zealand) so i get an easily accessible warranty, but that really is very cheap... tempting.
hi listen i have the LIMIT 9900se DVD player very pleased with it, great sound and picture, sexy looking as well. The only down side is the remote it has to point straight at the unit to function, plus there is no standbye on the remote you have to get up to turn of the unit. doh!!.
for Listen. No, every DVDA disc does NOT have lossy audio on it. DVDA does not contain any lossy audio at all, ever. That is the whole point. There are so-called "universal" discs, that do have a VTS as well as an ATS, but these will default to the ATS when put into a DVDA player. I totally get your point about the stupid grins on salesmen's faces too. Take a real DVDA with you, and make them play it in the store. Also, look around the back of the unit - if there are only digital outputs, then it's a DVDV player. DVDA needs 6 outputs at 24/96, which just doesn't go down a co-axial or TOSlink connection. They ain't got the bandwidth to do it. Time to start wiping some of those grins off of their faces. Dolby Digital is not, and never will be, High Resolution DVDA.
what is a disc that has only dvd-a?? all the ones i've seen in shops have dts or dd on them, which makes sense because people are more likely to buy them in anticipation of getting a dvd-a player someday if they can at least make some use of the disc in the meantime.
The main discs in the shop with video, dts or dd on them - do they carry the DVD-Video logo? If they do, then they are NOT DVD-Audio discs. There is a lot of confusion about this too.
I mean, for example... I have 'A Night At The Opera' on DVD-A. It says DVD Audio on it and is in one of those lovely little cases (and it was cheaper than the CD version too!!)... But it also contains a 5.1 DTS track and a 2.0 Dolby track of some form, for compatibility, so you can get at least something out it on a DVD-V player even if it's not the best content on the disc. This doesn't mean that it's not a DVD Audio disc though. It does have the 6-channel MLP track. I haven't come across any DVD-A discs with only MLP and no DVD-V compatible content... but if you know of one then I can buy a disc I have no hope of playing, just so I can take it into a shop and (try to) show them what DVD-A is. By the way, DVD-As are not at all expensive in New Zealand... they rarely cost more than the CD, and there are already (very good condition) 2nd hand ones around for the equivalent of probably $10US. I heard they cost a lot more in some countries.....?
Send me a blank DVD-R in the mail, and I'll be happy to make you a disc for those purposes. I've just found out how to author the discs you are talking about, so I now know a little more about them. The Idea is that if played in a DVDA player, or a Universal player that supports both, it will default to the High Resolution version if you have it set up to do so in the players menus. If put into a standard DVDV player, it will run in that too. As for menus, that varies on the Authoring. My universal discs have different menus. Some run from the same one. How does the MLP version sound? I've been wanting to hear this disc for a while now, and have heard contradictory things - what is your opinion please?
Well actually I've never heard it, sorry! But I heard the DTS version a (long) while ago, which is presumably the same apart from the lossy compression. Well basically I found the sound on many of the tracks to be quite muddy, for example the first track i had always liked on the CD but didn't really find it so good on this disc. But maybe it was the sound of the speakers that I didn't like, or perhaps it was the fault of the compression. Interestingly, I found that I liked 'the prophet's song' which is a song that I had always disliked quite strongly. Perhaps the extra channels make the panning less severe or something... anyway, it just seemed to make more sense. But no, I've got no idea about the MLP version. I just bought it because I thought 'well it's better than the CD in every way, and I don't already own the CD so I might as well buy this one'. Except I don't do that anymore because I don't like the sound of watermarking (don't take that literally).
The "sound" of watermarking? Shit, that's bad news! Can you tell me a bit more about what watermarking is used on this disc? FYI, DTS encoding throws away about 75% of the original Audio, and quality wise is not as good as CD.
The same watermarking system is used on every DVD Audio disc, but it's not public information how it works... I made another thread here http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/49040 that nobody is interested in. Yeah I know that DTS is not in the same leaugue quality-wise. Heh, perhaps I shouldn't have mentioned it, especially in this thread. Anyway... if you take in a burned DVD Audio with only MLP tracks and the shop people can't play it, they will just assume that it's the disc at fault, since it's not a commercial release. Hmm this is quite a puzzle. Maybe there is an album that says on the label 'this will ALSO play in DVD-V players, but for best results use a player displaying the DVD Audio logo', or something. I will keep looking...
I'm going to look into the watermarking thing, as part of the spec for DVDA says any copy protection MUST be inaudible. As for the other issue, it just goes to show how badly trained these shop assistants are. If a player will not play a burned DVDA with MLP tracks, then there can only be one of two things causing the error. 1/. the player does not read DVD-R discs, or 2/. it is, quite simply, not a DVDA player, or a universal player, but a DVDV player instead. (IMO, this is the most likely option)
