DTS or not

[shaemus]

Why is it that Star Wars was not done in DTS? Why is it that the regular edition of LOTR is in Dolby Digital EX and the extended edition is in DTS? Where does THX fit in with these technologies?

[noddin0ff]

Lucas and THX and Dolby go way back together.

The general gist
http://www.dvdfile.com/news/special_...or_partone.htm

[kexodusc]

Yeah, lots of longer movies don't have room for all the extras and DTS tracks on the same disc. I don't know if that applies to Star Wars or LOTR or not, but it is a shame that DTS didn't make it.

Don't worry though, I have little doubt you'll have another opportunity to buy those movies again in a future format with non-compressed hi-rez audio...BluRay, HD-DVD, or something is sure to replace DVD sooner or later, and when it does you can bet zillions of people will be screaming for Star Wars.

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

Just like any industry, the film industry has a political twist to it. You have two partners(literally in the industry that have worked together for many, many years. Dolby has worked with THX to develope THX standards. Without Dolby's help, THX would have never been able to develope this revenue stream. Dolby worked with THX to create the ability to do surround EX. This has become a liscensing revenue stream for both companies.

Dts is a direct competitor to Dolby. Before Dts, Dolby was the only sound technology widely in use in the industry. When Dts came online, they ate deep into Dolby's market share. They have continually beat Dolby in introducing new audio technologies. When their codec came to LD, reviewers tended to give them sonic edge over DD soundtracks. More theaters installed Dts decoders and more market share was lost by Dolby. Dts tracks came to DVD, and the same opinion that reviewers had about Dts on LD transferred to DVD as well. Dolby seeing its domination of the market somewhat eroding attempted along with Warner to discredit the Dts codec perfoming their OWN listening test. Because the studio where the test were conducted wasn't listed on the white paper Dolby submitted to the public(it was warner studio's), nor were the listening subjects, test parimeters, associated equipment, and lastly the test conductors. Without this pertinent information on the white paper, it was widely panned by industry insiders and the public as well.

With THX being such a close partner to Dolby, it is likely that any movie produced by Lucasfilm with every get a Dts soundtrack. This would be considered backstabbing.

Every wonder why the only speakers you see in theaters are JBL? Its because Dolby, THX and JBL all recommend each others stuff for theater installations. You want your theater THX approved? They will recommend JBL speakers and Dolby digital as the foundation to that theater.

[L.J.]

Wow, thanks for the lesson Sir T.

[shaemus]

Fabulous Sir T. I had a sense there might be some politics involved here. Why would the extended version of LOTR have DTS and not the standard. Is it just cost and space?

Does everyone here agree that DTS sounds better or are there still some who prefer Dolby Digital EX.

Thanks for the link NoddinOFF.

[Woochifer]

Keep in mind that the THX label on a DVD only indicates that the video and audio transfers were done according to a set of minimum standards. It's not an actual audio format like DD and DTS.

Fabulous Sir T. I had a sense there might be some politics involved here. Why would the extended version of LOTR have DTS and not the standard. Is it just cost and space?

Yup, the theatrical cuts of LOTR put the entire 3-hour movie onto one disc, which leaves no room for a DTS track without severely increasing the compression level on an already highly compressed video track. The extended cuts put 3 1/2 hours onto two discs -- a lot more room for both video and audio data.

Does everyone here agree that DTS sounds better or are there still some who prefer Dolby Digital EX.

All things being equal, the DTS track generally gives you a somewhat tighter sound that has more depth and transparency than the DD track. Keep in mind that DD EX is not a true 6.1 format because the back surround channel is matrix-encoded into the L/R surround channels, and then decoded by the EX decoder. It is not discrete, and cannot exist without information encoded into the L and R surround channels. DTS ES is a true 6.1 format because it contains a discrete back surround channel that does not rely on encoded information from any other channels.