Video Asylum

Posted by Tim S. on June 26, 1999 at 15:30:52:

In Reply to: First DIVX, now DTS? posted by Larry on June 25, 1999 at 18:47:47:

It seems only fitting. DTS and Divx are one in the same! No 2 other formats have done so much harm in confusing the public. Both of these formats have stunted the growth of DVD. Just think, if DTS and Divx never confused the public, DVD players might be $150 and in most homes. DD decoders and receivers would have had the lower prices of today, but yesterday. DTS' death will not come soon enough. The icing on the cake is that DTS sounds the same or worse than DD, plus takes much more data space.

Home Theater professionals have done the closest balancing of channel levels that could be done. They found the sound quality the same. In some cases, they prefered the DD soundtrack. Dolby Digital has been found to be the more accurate encoding method. The DD soundtrack's levels and mastering are closer to the original than DTS. This has been stated in many different magazines. DTS is considered less accurate than DD. Stereo Review did a sophisticated comparison on the mixing and channel levels on the 2 formats. They compared directly against the original studio soundtrack which was 6 channel PCM. DTS and DD encode that soundtrack into their formats. When the final release comes to theaters, DTS', SDDS' and DD's formats are used for the encoding and decoding of the soundtrack. DTS supporters say that the DVD's DTS soundtrack is very accurate compared to the theater released DTS soundtrack. That could be true. If the theater release isn't as accurate as DD's, how could the DVD's DTS be? Simple, it couldn't. Some may believe DTS sounds better because of less compression and a higher bit rate, but what about the codec? The bit rate means NOTHING. The codec is the meat of the matter. If the codec isn't efficent, of course it needs a higher data rate. This higher bit rate is a disadvantage, not an advantage. It takes up much more space than it should, for what it offers. Dolby Digital takes much less space because of it's higher compression, lower bit rate. That lower bit rate is used because of Dolby Digital's much more efficent codec. When will people see that DTS advertises the bit rate as a GIMMICK. It has nothing to do with the overall sound. The Atrac encoding method uses 20 bit resolution over CD's PCM 16 bits. Does this mean that a 20 bit recorded mini disc will sound better than a CD. Quite the opposite, with very detailed music.