Review of Dolby Digital: We`ve Got the Whole World Listening

Introduction

Many of you who visit the cinema regularly will have come across the Dolby Digital trailers that prequel many movies presented in this sound format. For a while some of these have been available on a demo disc which became popular enough for Dolby Laboratories to sell via their online website.

A few weeks ago the company released a brand new disc due to popular demand. Aimed as much at the consumer as people wishing to demonstrate equipment to potential buyers, this represents Dolby`s answer to anyone who sat in a cinema staring at the glorious Digital intros before the film appeared and wanted to recreate the experience in their own home.

Video

Dolby do sound, its all they do or have ever expressed much intention to be involved with. Therefore don`t expect the latest in computer generated wizardry or breathtaking visuals. Everything on display is there for the purpose of keeping your eyes moderately happy whilst your ears gasp at the wizzy sound effects wandering from speaker to speaker.

But what there is happens to be fine. The menus are nicely laid out and easy to follow, presented in a pseudo back row cinema experience. As you select an option, the curtains part revealing a black screen as the camera zooms in, then the track selected starts.

Its all rather nice and neat, not the best thing you`ve ever seen in your life but more than does the job. One minor niggle is the way the menus forget your prevoius select whenever your return back from watching some footage, but this is a demo disc whos main purpose is to provide you with the suite of Dolby Digital trailers so it can be forgiven.

The trailers themselves are a mix of pretty standard 3D renderings and not overly imaginative visuals. The Rain trailer is probably the most dull here, marginally followed by Aurora. Don`t watch these with the sound off, unless you want to fall asleep.

The two short featurettes which cover the history of Dolby Laboratories and Dolby Digital itself, are fun to watch but again not strikingly visually appealing. In some respects they are almost eighties in their approach to the subject matter, but who cares, its the sound your buying this disc for.

Audio

And so what about the sound? For many people DTS is about subtlety, and Dolby Digital is about power. The 6 trailers are designed to show off your sound system in various ways from body thumpingly low bass to multi channel mayhem. Everyone has a favourite, mine is the Train. I could play it on repeat all day listening to the tentative intro as it leads into the heavy steam engine chuffing and finishes with an echoey ending.

The Canyon comes a pretty good close second for its great use of the rear speakers, whilst the City trailer is the one to bung on if you just want to scare granny to death with the sheer noise wandering between the speakers. If you have a nice subwoofer, this disc is going to make you love it even more. And if you don`t? It will probably make you want to buy one.

If you do however want to show someone who`s ears are somewhat more delicate than the average action movie gower, there are some great additional music tracks on the disc featuring Earth, Wind & Fire and a beautiful guitar quartet spread across all speakers. Even listening to the acoustic group as their voices appear on different speakers is a joy to behold.

Whenever friends come over to see a demo of my home cinema setup, this is the first disc I`m going to get out. It has to be the best demonstration of gratuitous Dolby Digital abuse I`ve seen so far, short of having to place all the best bits of all your favourite DD movies onto one disc.

Conclusion

No plot, no ground breaking special effects, just Dolby Digital trailers to help pretend your really in a movie theatre and not locked up at home. The introduction to Dolby Labs is nice and fast paced, even interesting without being too technical or nerdy. The Dolby Digital Story is a great starter on what its all about and why its so popular, but again not too deep for you to be bored.

The additional music is a great addition to the trailers, and there is even a loop option which plays the entire disc from start to finish endlessly. The whole thing is well thought through.

But to be honest, this isn`t going to be a must have disc for everyone. Its just a reasonably cheap way of owning all the current Dolby Digital trailers to abuse your sound system with and show off your cinema setup to your friends.

It`s shallow, it has a short limited attention span, I love it. Every home cinema Dolby Digital system should have one.