Video Asylum

Posted by uzun (A) on April 23, 2003 at 10:45:17

In Reply to: My Dolby Digital EX...5.1 or 6.1 or am i going nuts? posted by aluminum angel on April 23, 2003 at 00:41:48:

I have a Sony STR-DA4ES and in the manual it states that Dolby EX material makes the surround back go into Matrix mode, which is the same as telling the receiver to "make up" the surround back on it's own, since no surround back channel information resides on the sound mix itself. If I recall correctly, the Dolby EX makes my system go into Matrix surround mode (I refer to this as Fake surround back, since its not generated by it's own channel in the mix itself), but the DTS-ES stuff makes it go into discrete surround back mode (I call this real mode since it has it's own channel in the mix itself). I normally force matrix on all the time, except when I am playing DTS-ES discs, then I put it on auto mode. That way I get "fake" (matrix) surround back all the time (including from Dolby EX sources), and discrete surround back from the DTS-ES discs. If I keep it in Auto mode all the time, I get "fake" (matrix) surround back when playing Dolby EX discs, real (discrete) surround back when playing DTS-ES discs, and no surround back at all otherwise.