New Processors passing HD Sound?

11-30-07: Kr4
First, the report was by Wes Phillips. Barry Willis is no longer affiliated with Stereophile.

Second, the lossless version of dts is dtsHD-MA. The MA stands for master audio and is lossless. dtsHD (no MA) is less lossy than regular dts but not truly lossless.

Aah, Wes Philips. That's who I meant, but I get those names confused these days. And thanks for clarifying which surround schemes are lossless.

What I found interesting in Philips' report, though, was that for all the high-buck surround separates he's no doubt heard thru the years, the uncompressed surround scheme playing into an A/V receiver was the best-sounding surround he'd ever heard.

This matches my experience. Back in the Dolby ProLogic days, conventional wisdom gave short shrift to the bandwidth and dynamic range of the surround speakers. In my current 7.1 digital setup, I've found that anything I do to improve the surround channels such as better speaker cable, higher quality interconnects, and better amplification has resulted in remarkable improvement to the overall surround field.

I'm going to have to be patient awhile before I can have uncompressed surround in my rig, however.

Wes's discovery is not a surprise to me. Very few high end companies are on the cutting edge of MCH technology these days and there have been very few MCH demos, at shows or in showrooms, that utilize high-end equipment effectively. That's why I write "Music in the Round": To spread the word, even among the writers.

Kal

Guys - thanks again for your input. Looks like I'll just have to wait and see what comes out of CES as far as processors are concerned. The HD sound I have heard was spectacular in those venues (running through receivers!) - it is really something special done correctly. I do look forward to incorporating this capability into my system, albeit in several months, hopefully.

There are suitable AVRs (and a very few pre/pros) available now that will do the job but there will, undoubtedly, be more coming. A problem has been the unpredictability of the players' capabilities in decoding and/or outputting the lossless formats coupled with the lack of explicit info from the manufacturers. Sometimes the only way to know what the player will do is to try it or get the info from someone who has. I try.

Kal http://www.stereophile.com/musicintheround