OT - CD in 5.1 Dolby Digital

[Malcolm Crabbe]

Just seen an advert for Jean-Michell-Jar's (sp) new album which had been made entirly in Dolby Digital 5.1 suround sound. As far as I'm awear this is possibly the first commercialy made audio CD in 5.1 sound ??

[PaulD]

Hi
Only its not. A surround CD I mean. Apparantly that's on a DVD also included in the box...

[Unicorn]

Yeah, a 5.1 CD wouldn't do you much good since no CD player could play it smile.gif .

[mooblie]

So is this what is known as (but never yet appeared) a "DVD-audio"?

...with files in that AUDIO_TS folder we all create as empty?

[Torrent]

I have a DVD-Audio disk (and it's not a CD of any kind, but a DVD).

[harlequin]

i have a dvd-audio disk
i think it has files in both of the folders.
will look at it tonight and post folder contents

[JCR]

Originally posted by mooblie:
So is this what is known as (but never yet appeared) a "DVD-audio"?

...with files in that AUDIO_TS folder we all create as empty? No, the AUDIO_TS folder on this JMJ "Aero" DVD is empty. To all intents and purposes you get 5.1 AC3, 2.0 AC3 and DTS soundtracks which are linked to a video of a French Actress's Eyes listening to the music. This is a bog-standard DVD.

Regards

[Malcolm Crabbe]

Hey I only caught the tail end of the add and assumed it was a CD !

More info here http://www.jeanmicheljarre.com/movie.html

John, I take it you have the DVD then, how do you rate it ?

[JCR]

Originally posted by Malcolm Crabbe:
Hey I only caught the tail end of the add and assumed it was a CD !

More info here http://www.jeanmicheljarre.com/movie.html

John, I take it you have the DVD then, how do you rate it ? Malcolm, I have not actually played/watched it yet or should I say listened to it? I just stuck the DVD in my DVD Drive at work to look at the file structure. Hope to play both the CD and DVD at home over the weekend. I am told the CD is not too good as it is a downmix to stereo of the original 5.1 soundtracks.

That said, I am a JMJ fan anyway so it is a case of having it in the collection. It is being said that this is "groundbreaking" in having original tracks re-recorded in 5.1, but I am sure Mike Oldfield has already done this on some his original Tubular Bells tracks.

I'll let you know what I think in due course.

Regards

[harlequin]

from 'mike oldfield' 'tubular bells 2003' dvd-audio


dir K: /s
Volume in drive K is TUBULAR_BELLS
Volume Serial Number is 8D78-B6A6

Directory of K:\

07/11/2003 04:42 <DIR> VIDEO_TS
07/11/2003 04:42 <DIR> AUDIO_TS
0 File(s) 0 bytes

Directory of K:\VIDEO_TS

07/11/2003 04:42 <DIR> .
07/11/2003 04:42 <DIR> ..
07/11/2003 04:42 14,336 VIDEO_TS.BUP
07/11/2003 04:42 14,336 VIDEO_TS.IFO
07/11/2003 04:42 10,133,504 VIDEO_TS.VOB
07/11/2003 04:42 30,720 VTS_01_0.BUP
07/11/2003 04:42 30,720 VTS_01_0.IFO
07/11/2003 04:42 175,583,232 VTS_01_1.VOB
07/11/2003 04:42 30,720 VTS_02_0.BUP
07/11/2003 04:42 30,720 VTS_02_0.IFO
07/11/2003 04:42 736,301,056 VTS_02_1.VOB
07/11/2003 04:42 65,536 VTS_03_0.BUP
07/11/2003 04:42 65,536 VTS_03_0.IFO
07/11/2003 04:42 475,826,176 VTS_03_1.VOB
07/11/2003 04:42 18,432 VTS_04_0.BUP
07/11/2003 04:42 18,432 VTS_04_0.IFO
07/11/2003 04:42 628,291,584 VTS_04_1.VOB
07/11/2003 04:42 18,432 VTS_05_0.BUP
07/11/2003 04:42 18,432 VTS_05_0.IFO
07/11/2003 04:42 735,098,880 VTS_05_1.VOB
18 File(s) 2,761,590,784 bytes

Directory of K:\AUDIO_TS

07/11/2003 04:42 <DIR> .
07/11/2003 04:42 <DIR> ..
07/11/2003 04:42 6,144 ATS_01_0.BUP
07/11/2003 04:42 6,144 ATS_01_0.IFO
07/11/2003 04:42 1,073,709,056 ATS_01_1.AOB
07/11/2003 04:42 1,073,709,056 ATS_01_2.AOB
07/11/2003 04:42 23,726,080 ATS_01_3.AOB
07/11/2003 04:42 4,096 ATS_02_0.BUP
07/11/2003 04:42 4,096 ATS_02_0.IFO
07/11/2003 04:42 131,072 AUDIO_PP.IFO
07/11/2003 04:42 4,096 AUDIO_SV.BUP
07/11/2003 04:42 4,096 AUDIO_SV.IFO
07/11/2003 04:42 2,021,376 AUDIO_SV.VOB
07/11/2003 04:42 14,336 AUDIO_TS.BUP
07/11/2003 04:42 14,336 AUDIO_TS.IFO
07/11/2003 04:42 16,502,784 AUDIO_TS.VOB
07/11/2003 04:42 3,145,728 DVDAUDIO.BUP
07/11/2003 04:42 3,145,728 DVDAUDIO.MKB
16 File(s) 2,196,148,224 bytes

Total Files Listed:
34 File(s) 4,957,739,008 bytes
6 Dir(s) 0 bytes free

[JCR]

Originally posted by Malcolm Crabbe:
Hey I only caught the tail end of the add and assumed it was a CD !

More info here http://www.jeanmicheljarre.com/movie.html

John, I take it you have the DVD then, how do you rate it ? In a word? Superb, but as I said I am a JMJ fan. I have not listened to the CD, but the DVD is very good. Clever use of the 5.1 channels. Not too keen on those "eyes" but you can either turn these off or simply switch off the monitor/TV set. Apart from one or two "Brand New Aerology" and some "Scene" tracks, all the other tracks are from JMJ's earlier work - the "latest" being Chronology 6. Nothing from "Revolutions", "Waiting for Cousteau", "Oxygene 7-13" etc.

As a "music" DVD-Video (not to be confused with DVD-Audio) this is pretty good.

This CD/DVD set is pretty good value for money at £10-12.

Regards

[Malcolm Crabbe]

I'm off to the local Virgin megastore in the morning then smile.gif

Thanks John

[RayL]

Yeah, a 5.1 CD wouldn't do you much good since no CD player could play it . 5.1 CDs are available and are playable using a standard CD player providing it has a digital output. In my case I link the CDs digital optical out to the optical input of my surround amp and select 'Digital Input'.

Ray Liffen

[mooblie]

Originally posted by RayL:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr /> Yeah, a 5.1 CD wouldn't do you much good since no CD player could play it . 5.1 CDs are available and are playable using a standard CD player providing it has a digital output. In my case I link the CDs digital optical out to the optical input of my surround amp and select 'Digital Input'.

Ray Liffen </font>[/QUOTE]Agreed - I was going to comment that Dolby Digital (and its predecessor Dolby ProLogic) are multi-channel encodings onto two "normal" channels which allows much of the existing audio infrastructure (broadcast, recording media, processing, storage, etc.) to be used, provided it carries two sufficiently high fidelity channels (i.e. stereo).

True, you need a DD decoder to decode 2 channels into 5.1, but any stereo transmission and recording medium can carry 5.1 encoded sound.

[Malcolm Crabbe]

"True, you need a DD decoder to decode 2 channels into 5.1, but any stereo transmission and recording medium can carry 5.1 encoded sound. "

If thats the case, how come movies are not broadcast in 5.1 or is it something to do with the way NICAM stereo works. Just wondered, as me and a few friends have home cinema systems and none of the current transmission via terestial or sky come up as been transmitted in Dolby Digital 5.1 !

[mooblie]

I believe that's because the two-channel encoding of Dolby Digital 5.1 is not backward compatible - that is, although the 5.1 soundtrack is recognisable when played as un-decoded two channel, technically it's not "correct".

So they can't broadcast 5.1 on two channel systems unless they KNOW everyone has a decoder - and that's not going to happen. I also suspect, with NICAM TV sound, the double encoding (5.1 to two-channel, and then two-channel to NICAM) probably causes artefacts and audible distortion.

However, someone here may well correct my amateur interpretation of this - Do we have a surround-sound expert here?

[PaulD]

Originally posted by mooblie:
...although the 5.1 soundtrack is recognisable when played as un-decoded two channel, technically it's not "correct".
Hi
I don't think the Dolby Digital stream is recognisable in any way by an analogue system, as the digits are in no way similar to a PCM audio file - that's why Dolby Pro-Logic exists, because that is playable as an ordinary analogue stream quite happily.

[Christian Lett]

So they can't broadcast 5.1 on two channel systems unless they KNOW everyone has a decoder - and that's not going to happen.Sky transmit Dolby Digital 5.1 on their movie channels but only people with Sky+ can take advantage of it. I don't know whether Sky+ subscribers actually receive a different version of the Sky Movies channels than regular sky customers though...

Christian