Audio on Blu-Ray

[Mickle]

Just recently got my Panasonic Blu-Ray player and have been having a fiddle with the audio settings. Just got a few questions that I hope people can answer for me.

Am I right in thinking that DD 5.1 on Blu-Ray is a higher bit-rate than on DVD? I was super chuffed listening to Casino Royale in PCM 5.1 thinking how good it sounds and decided to select the regular old dd 5.1 soundtrack to compare and it sounded pretty damned similiar to me. Switching to my DVD copy it was the plain old DD 5.1 I'm very familiar with (a little flat sounding tbh when compared). Switching back to the BR version and there is a definate improvement. I'm not knocking the PCM version at all but i'm just wondering if i'm missing something in the menus somewhere. It all seems to be set correctly. When I click display it seems to be decoding the correct soundtracks and it is outputting via analogues. Has anyone else noticed this?

This is the trouble with getting a new player, format and method of moving the sound around my system all in one go!

 

[kansashick]

Why are you using analog output instead of HDMI?

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

Just recently got my Panasonic Blu-Ray player and have been having a fiddle with the audio settings. Just got a few questions that I hope people can answer for me.

Am I right in thinking that DD 5.1 on Blu-Ray is a higher bit-rate than on DVD? I was super chuffed listening to Casino Royale in PCM 5.1 thinking how good it sounds and decided to select the regular old dd 5.1 soundtrack to compare and it sounded pretty damned similiar to me. Switching to my DVD copy it was the plain old DD 5.1 I'm very familiar with (a little flat sounding tbh when compared). Switching back to the BR version and there is a definate improvement. I'm not knocking the PCM version at all but i'm just wondering if i'm missing something in the menus somewhere. It all seems to be set correctly. When I click display it seems to be decoding the correct soundtracks and it is outputting via analogues. Has anyone else noticed this?

This is the trouble with getting a new player, format and method of moving the sound around my system all in one go!

Mickle>
BD disks apparently contain a core signal and the extended full HD version. The core signal is apparently a max bitrate DTS signal, which IIRC is about a 1.5:1 compression ratio, i.e. a LOT better than DD, which was 12:1.
That would explain why your BD player is getting more from the core signal than your old player.
As for why HD doesn't sound significantly better. I'd guess that the two options you have are:
1. Coax digital output to your AV amp of a core DTS signal, allowing your amp to do the decoding
2. Analogue outputs from the Panny BD player to your amp, allowing the Panny to do the decoding.
If the above is correct, you're comparing the ability of the Panny to decode a higher bandwidth signal, and it's clearly not doing a great job of it. For one thing, it's competing with a the decoding section from a pretty good hi-fi company.

Hope that explains it.

 

[Greggles]

Why are you using analog output instead of HDMI?

i) The Arcam AVR250 does not incorporate HDMI connectivity
ii) Those Arcam Amps/ Processors which have HDMI sockets (including the top of the range AV9) do not incorporate audio (they are video switches only).

 

[Mickle]

i) The Arcam AVR250 does not incorporate HDMI connectivity
ii) Those Arcam Amps/ Processors which have HDMI sockets (including the top of the range AV9) do not incorporate audio (they are video switches only).

Yeah they have yet to incorporate HDMI in anything other than DVD players. Isn't this down to Jitter using HDMI?

 

[Mickle]

Mickle>
BD disks apparently contain a core signal and the extended full HD version. The core signal is apparently a max bitrate DTS signal, which IIRC is about a 1.5:1 compression ratio, i.e. a LOT better than DD, which was 12:1.
That would explain why your BD player is getting more from the core signal than your old player.
As for why HD doesn't sound significantly better. I'd guess that the two options you have are:
1. Coax digital output to your AV amp of a core DTS signal, allowing your amp to do the decoding
2. Analogue outputs from the Panny BD player to your amp, allowing the Panny to do the decoding.
If the above is correct, you're comparing the ability of the Panny to decode a higher bandwidth signal, and it's clearly not doing a great job of it. For one thing, it's competing with a the decoding section from a pretty good hi-fi company.

Hope that explains it.

I had wondered about where the decoding is being done so did a few quick tests last night using optical to let the Amp do the decoding for the DD signal and that seemed the same quality wise as being DD being decoded and sent over analogues. Couldn't get much more testing done as it was a bit late and i'm running it loud to make sure i'm not missing anything. I think it'll be easier to gauge when I have a few more titles to choose from as well.

I have to say what i'm getting at the moment is fantastic quality and is what I expected from PCM 5.1 (when watching the club scene in Layer Cake it's like someone has a budget to mid-level Hi-Fi behind me playing the music). I was just surprised that the DD 5.1 sounds so good too.

 

[tony @ suffolk]

Hi guys.

I'm following this thread with interest because as I type this I'm looking out the window waiting for Mr Delivery-man to bring my BD10 along!

I ended up buying this player because it has 7.1 analogue outputs which I can feed into my processor. And I like Panasonic kit. I did understand that the latest firmware update allowed the decoding of True HD & the dts equivalent through these outs which I had assumed would be better than the bog standard stuff?

I'm encouraged that the compression on these DD/dts sources through digital outs is significantly less than with standard DVDs but will this apply to 7.1 stuff as well?

Another quickie - I've yet to actually get a Blu-Ray disc (shock, horror!) so I'm a bit unsure what sound formats they commonly carry. I guess the answer 's going to be "It depends"?

 

[Bald Monkey]

Another quickie - I've yet to actually get a Blu-Ray disc (shock, horror!) so I'm a bit unsure what sound formats they commonly carry. I guess the answer 's going to be "It depends"?

It's seems a simple rule of thumb is FOX BR's all have DTS-HD MA most others have eihter DD TrueHD if your lucky and/or the standard uncompressed PCM (as well as plain DD5.1).. although it's never that simple as I'm sure you know

 

[Mickle]

Another quickie - I've yet to actually get a Blu-Ray disc (shock, horror!) so I'm a bit unsure what sound formats they commonly carry. I guess the answer 's going to be "It depends"?

There are 7 formats for sound now rolleyes.

PCM 5.1 Uncompressed, Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD Master Audio (BD 10 cannot decode this one but will extract the 1.5Mb DTS Core. This sounds very good indeed so isn't a problem really)

DTS-HD (The Panasonic does decode this version), Dolby Digital Plus

DTS and Dolby Digital 5.1.

PCM 5.1 and DD 5.1 seem the most common formats on Blu-Ray but as Bald Monkey says Fox love DTS HD MA.

Still fiddling with different settings at the moment so let me know how you find the sound quality and we can compare. I'm sure i'm missing something with all the settings.

 

[Baseley09]

Its a bit annoying that some films seem to not have enough sound options and you have to cycle through the soundtracks once its started

 

[terryf]

Hi [email protected]
When did you order your DB10?
I ordered mine at end of October and I am still waiting. They tell me Panasonic have not sent any out for months.
Terryf

 

[Mickle]

Hi [email protected]
When did you order your DB10?
I ordered mine at end of October and I am still waiting. They tell me Panasonic have not sent any out for months.
Terryf

I picked mine up from in store at John Lewis mate. Could be worth you having a look mate if you have one local. I got it for £280.

 

[tony @ suffolk]

Hi [email protected]
When did you order your DB10?
I ordered mine at end of October and I am still waiting. They tell me Panasonic have not sent any out for months.
Terryf

Hi Terry.

I initially tried to get one yesterday from John Lewis at the price Mickle quotes, but JL no longer keep the model so they were selling it off cheap. I 'phoned the local Norwich store, who unfortunately didn't have any but the very kind lady there looked to see if any other stores had them. There was supposed to be one at Liverpool but it was their demo one & they didn't have all the bits. The only other store with one was Glasgow, might be worth giving 'em a call.

I then looked on the internet but none of the places I tried had them in stock. However, I managed to get an ex-demo one from Weymouth Hi-Fi for £320. Their last one unfortunately as they're now going exclusively for Pioneer. An excellent firm by the way. Pleasure to deal with!

The player arrived today & I'm very impressed - easy to set up, really excellent quality on upscaled DVDs. I just wish I had a Blu-Ray disc to try!

 

[Event Horizon]

hi!!
does this model allow for speaker distances to be set and cross over setting??
best regards
nick.

 

[Mickle]

hi!!
does this model allow for speaker distances to be set and cross over setting??
best regards
nick.

Speaker distances yes but in a slightly limited fashion. It considers the front 3 speakers the default and you can only adjust the distances on the rear 2- 4 speakers which will be a pain to anyone with a 7.1 setup with unequal distance between the left/right surround and left/right back surround. The crossover is set to 100Hz and you can't adjust it.

 

[tony @ suffolk]

Hi [email protected]
When did you order your DB10?
I ordered mine at end of October and I am still waiting. They tell me Panasonic have not sent any out for months.
Terryf

Oh, forgot to mention - Play.com have them in stock! And with a hefty discount!, Yes, just £1,050! A snip!!!

(That's seriously taking the p*ss, isn't it?)

 

[Event Horizon]

Oh, forgot to mention - Play.com have them in stock! And with a hefty discount!, Yes, just £1,050! A snip!!!

(That's seriously taking the p*ss, isn't it?)

lol
so £650 region A from movietyme is a good deal then...

best regards
nick.

 

[Johndm]

I'm running a BD10A (firmware 2.4) into a Sony VA555ES with coax and 7.1 analogue connections. 6 Mission floorstanders, Mission centre and Velodyne Sub. Speakers all set to small in the Panny menu.

My experiences so far, with my small but slowly growing BD collection.....

Spiderman 3. Uncompresed 5.1 track sounds best, using 7.1 analogue with manual adjustment of LFE channel to +9 on amplifier. (My amp allows easy boost/cut of any channel through analogue).

Die Hard 4. DTS-MA through coax sounds MUCH better than standard DTS, even though its the core I'm listening to.

More to follow....

 

[Mickle]

I've boosted my sub by 10db and had a bit of a fiddle in the player menus. it all sounds correct now without too much trouble.

Something i've definately noticed with PCM 5.1 is that the bass is soooo much tighter. I wasn't sure if there would be that much of a difference but there is without a shadow of a doubt.

The DTS Core at 1.5Mb sounds really good. I'm not too upset that this player doesnt decode DTS Master Audio as that sound very good in the interim.