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Thread: Worth upgrading for lossy and uncompressed sound? |
    
New member Username: Bob_ralph
Post Number: 1
Registered: Jan-09
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| Posted on Tuesday, January 13, 2009 - 04:16 pm: |
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Hello,
I am wondering if it's worth the money to upgrade my receiver so that I can take advantage of the new audio codecs on the blu-ray format (TrueHD, DTS-Master Audio and Uncompressed PCM).
I currently own a Yamaha RX-V430 and have Paradigm Studio 20s as my fronts with it. It's not a big room (about 15 feet by 11 feet) so I don't need a lot of power, so my current receiver gives me enough power for the volume levels I need.
I was looking at the Onkyo 606 and Yamaha RX-V663. The Onkyo sounds great, but I've read about overheating and "humming" issues with it, so I started looking more closely at the Yamaha 663.
Is there that much difference between the old compressed formats and the new lossy and uncompressed formats? I've read varrying points of view. Would this upgrade be worth it to be able to hear the new audio formats?
Thanks. |
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Platinum Member Username: Glasswolf
Raccoon City,
MI
USA
Post Number: 12284
Registered: Dec-03
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| Posted on Wednesday, January 14, 2009 - 12:16 am: |
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Honestly, you probably won't hear much difference with that small of a room. You might tell more of a difference in a dedicated media room with treated walls, and properly positioned 7.1 speakers using dipoles for surround, and so forth, where everything is set up to take full advantage of the upgrade. Otherwise I'd look more at HDMI upconversion to 1080P for video sources as the main reason to upgrade and not just uncompressed audio for discrete 7.1 |
Gold Member Username: Dmitchell
Ottawa,
Ontario
Canada
Post Number: 2011
Registered: Feb-07
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| Posted on Tuesday, January 20, 2009 - 09:34 pm: |
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To me there is quite a noticeable difference between the older surround formats and the new HD audio formats. Even my wife notices, and she's not listening for it like I am.
I find having half decent rear surround speakers makes a difference, since that's where the improvements with the new HD codecs seems most noticeable. Surround effects are quite stunning, actually. |
New member Username: Bob_ralph
Post Number: 3
Registered: Jan-09
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| Posted on Wednesday, January 21, 2009 - 09:23 am: |
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Is there much improvement in the clarity of dialogue? I find with my current set-up I'm constantly having to turn up the volume of my centre speaker to be able to hear low dialogue levels clearly. |
Gold Member Username: Dmitchell
Ottawa,
Ontario
Canada
Post Number: 2014
Registered: Feb-07
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| Posted on Wednesday, January 21, 2009 - 09:28 am: |
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I find it depends on the particular movie. Some movies seem to have the dialogue mixed too low, so I'm constantly turning the volume up and down. It's annoying, actually.
I did find a huge improvement with dialogue when I moved to a matching center channel though. |
Platinum Member Username: Glasswolf
NorthWest,
MI
USA
Post Number: 12359
Registered: Dec-03
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| Posted on Wednesday, January 21, 2009 - 12:23 pm: |
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also, dolby digital supports a dialog enhancement feature that boosts dialog clarity on the center channel for DD encoded movies.
check your receiver manual for how to turn that feature up a few clicks |
Gold Member Username: Dmitchell
Ottawa,
Ontario
Canada
Post Number: 2017
Registered: Feb-07
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| Posted on Wednesday, January 21, 2009 - 08:08 pm: |
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My old receiver (Pioneer VSX-1016K) had a dialogue enhancement. It actually was useful for those movies where it was too low in the mix. |
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