why do people like 2.0 channel so much???

[N. Abstentia]

A PROPERLY done 5.1 mix can be good. VERY good! See Floyd's Dark Side SACD for reference. Problem is, for every 1 properly done 5.1 mix there are 10 that are horribly done.

However, I find taking a 2 channel source and playing it through '5 channel stereo' is just simply asanine and I want to beat people that think it sounds good

So there is a difference.

[shokhead]

2.0 is just to flat. I want all my speakers involved.

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

I think there is several reason why 2 channel advocates are so stuck in that format.

1. They have typically spent more money on equipment than the 5.1 folks have. They have very large collections of LP's and CD"s for which they cannot part with, or see no justification to upgrade to 5.1. IMO they are probably more egocentric about their equipment, and in total denial about the drawback of 2 channel.

2. Multichannel is a format still in its infancy. It has only been five years or less that multichannel AUDIO has been available, and audio engineers still have not quite gotten their hands around the format. They are alot of very mediocre titles, a few more very excellent titles, but in reality DVD-A and SACD are still born formats thanks to the heavy handed record companies that do not allow high resolution output via the digital connectors. This prevents the use of your receivers internal bass management and delay functions for proper alignment of these signals. This heavy handed protection measure has all but killed both formats before they were out of the gate. The next big hope for high resolution multichannel will come in the form of HD DVD(A) and BlueRay disc which offer 24/96khz resolution over 8 channels for HD DVD and 8 channels at 24/192khz for BlueRay

Personally I think the book is being closed on both SACD and DVD-A as fewer and fewer titles are released, and even less stocked on the shelves of your local record store.

I think it is pretty sad the the public finds MP3 more paitable than DVD-A and SACD. But then I am not always so surprised that people are so cheap and short sighted that they would pass up something that truely is an improvement over CD, but chase after something that is easily downloadable, but has the sound quality of the cassette tape.