Are HD-DTS and Dolby True HD important ?

[noddy.]

Vista Media Centre and foxtel IQ connected via A/V receiver to projector and 7.1 speakers.

I'm moving to the A/V receiver to another room and upgrading the A/V receiver in my home theatre.

I'm thinking about getting the pioneer VSX-AX4ASi but also wondering whether to consider one of the newer receivers like the Denon 3808 that can decode HD-DTS and Dolby True HD.

I watch a lot of downloaded movies and TV series. It's clear that the quality of download material is getting better all the time and blue ray downloads are now available (time to increase my broadband cap!). My VMC connects via SPDIF to the receiver. I guess the audio decoding of a downloaded blue ray would be done on-board the A/V receiver, right ?

Should these audio formats matter to me ? Is it worth spending extra money to have this, or am i just worrying about features that won't count for much. Thanks for any advice.

[logifuse]

If you're going fo the full BR experience, then I suppose it is, but most rooms are that small that it probably wouldn't matter. I've only got 5.1 in my lounge room because I don't think I could fit any more speakers in. Even if I could, I don't think it would make much difference.

Besides that, I just got a Denon AVR-2308 - wow! I would imagine that any model higher than that would be out of this world.

Justin

[AdrianW]

I think you'll be hard pushed to find any ripped blu-ray material with either HD-DTS or Dolby True HD audio tracks (they just take up too much space). The rippers usually just go with the AC3 track (or occasionally a dts track if it is available).

These audio formats make more sense if you buy actual blu-ray discs.

[noddy.]

thanks guys. good responses.

i do have a large room. it's a dedicated home theatre with good quality 7.1 speakers.

i understand the comment about the audio streams that are encoded in downloads, i guess i'm thinking a couple of years out. i'd be expecting the a/v receiver to be a purchase that i wouldn't be replacing for many years and if i look at how dramatically download material has improved in the last year or so, it's not unreasonable to expect continued improvement.

i guess my question really is - will HD-DTS or True HD become the standards for high definition audio for movies and tv ? if so, then i could justify spending the extra bucks to get this capability.

another question would be - can i do the audio decoding in my htpc ?

[duaned]

You have stated that your connection to your reciever for multi-channel audio is SPDIF. That's fine, but unfortunatley this standard does not have the bandwidth to carry lossless audio in this way. You have two options.
1/ Use HDMI output from the card to the reciever ( will use bitstream) and the reciever ( with all the latest decoders on board) will do the decoding for you.The Pioneer AX4 is not compatible here as it doesnt have the latest codecs onboard. But at this stage I believe we dont have this HDMI audio solution available to us as yet to handle these high standards via bitstream for our HTPC's. Only 4 standalone players give full audio options ( all lossless tracks, not just core only) at this stage with more on the way. How is that for crazyness?

2/ Using a good sound card, utilze the 6,7 or 8 channel analouge outputs to the reciever's analogue inputs and let the HTPC do all the work. This is the only option ATM for lossless audio, but it is not still true to form. Depending on the soundcard, some down processing of the audio will take place but the result will still be an increase in quality compared to plain old DD and DTS via SPDIF.

Hope this helps you!

[noddy.]

thanks. yes, this is very helpful.

most of what i watch is via my htpc, i use it as my dvd player as well. looks like the way to go is to eventually upgrade components in my htpc to make it capable of playing bluray dvds, decoding and playing bluray files, and decoding hd-dts & true HD and then passing everything to the receiver via hdmi. Given that hdmi is the only transport for the new audio formats, then i guess we'll be needing a video card that can decode everything, including audio, and shove it out via hdmi. It sounds like these cards don't exist yet.

When looking at a new receiver, it's helpful to know what my htpc is likely to look in a year or two.

[brentonsav]

a good budget receiver is the onkyo 605 which can be had for under $800. it supports all of the next gen audio formats and has enough nuts to drive some pretty reasonable speakers.

[Severus606]

The single biggest advantage is native 7.1 audio, rather than 7.1 upmixed from 5.1. 7.1 can be really nice, and is a very noticable improvement over 5.1, the surround effect is considerably more subtle and natural. That said, as noted above, 8 speakers is a hell of a lot, and as ever, 6 good speakers will destroy 8 crap ones any day of the week.

The higher bitrates are a nice bonus too, and again can make a real difference particularly if you're aware of and can notice AC3 compression artefacts.

That said you can't bitstream 7.1 channels over HDMI from a HTPC yet. I really wish the vendors would get their act together.

That Onkyo is nice enough, and they do make good gear, but it seems to get most recommendations from US forums where it is routinely available as a factory refurb for under $500US. For $800AU I feel 0.9% THD at 90 Watts simply isn't good enough for all but the smallest rooms*. 0.9%THD is a substantial amount of clipping and represents a real danger to your tweeters, so you won't be able to drive it (comparatively) that loud before high frequencies start to distort. Also, it could use at least a third HDMI port and 1080p upconvert, although at least it features 7.1 analogue inputs. I personally think the Denon's are better value for money, although they do cost a bit more.

*It'll be plenty good enough for pop music, but classical music and movie soundtracks, with their much larger dynamic ranges, will want considerably more headroom.