Page 1 of DTS or DD5.1?
General Forum
I am wondering about the likelyhood of Dolby Digital 5.1 becoming extinct.
With DTS becoming more popular, does anyone think that DD5.1 will become obsolete and DVD`s will be released without a DD5.1 soundtracks?
PiKL
No.
All the best,
Andrew.
Sorry about the curt answer. See "moan time" in general.
Coupla reasons why DTS won`t ever rule supreme :
(1) Dolby Digital 5.1 was in the original DVD Forum specification (well, actually MPEG 2 was, but thankfully they saw sense !) so all hardware/software has to conform to, at the very least, Dolby Digital (even if it`s only mono sound)
(2) DTS is a big space eater. Hence, any discs that do have DTS soundtracks invariably run to two discs if the package includes stuff like documentaries, deleted scenes etc. If DTS were to win you would have a choice between single discs at reasonable prices with hardly any extras OR 2-disc rip-off packs at £25 a throw.
Whilst I`m a big fan of DTS, I certainly wouldn`t like other extras to be foresaken to cram it all on one disc and keep the prices down.
Just my take on things, anyway.
I have seen a loverly DVD player housed in a Technics mini hifi system (SC-DV250) and (although not totally sure) it doesn`t have DTS decoding built in. This puts me in a dilema whether to purchase the system with a built in DVD player or buy a seperate 5 speaker hifi system (or equivalent) and a seperate DVD player.
If Dolby Digital 5.1 is going to go out of the window to DTS then I think that I will weigh up all of the other options - however I have been looking at a lot of the new DVD releases and virtually all of the them have got a DD5.1 soundtrack (even the DTS ones).
Would you buy a DVD player without DTS decoding on?
Future proofing is the name of the game when you buy audio-visual gear, so to answer your last question - "no, I wouldn`t buy something without DTS on it".
Try the separates route : all in one systems are all well and good, but what happens if the tuner or the DVD player breaks - one knackered system.
There are more pros than cons in owning separates, not least that it`s very easy to upgrade in stages - better DVD player, better speakers, better amp, better tuner, so on and so forth. And, it`s usually cheaper too, if you shop around !
To the uninitiated,the differences between dolby and dts are negligable to say the least.Us av nutcases can spot the subtle differences sure,but as Clayts mentions Dolby Digital has been embraced as the industry standard,so the chances are very slim indeed.
And just to confuse things even further,dts now have their new format "dts 96/24"-high bandwidth audio that simply munches up data space.
So whatever made you think that dolby would soon be superceded by dts-put it in a box and throw it away.
As long as there are movies,there will always be dolby.
Westy