Mono DVD Soundtracks

[kelsci]

John; on your remote control to your Onkyo, do you have a buttom marked "stereo"? My Sherwood has that button. If I play a VHS Hi-Fi mono tape, that tape will have a mono soundtrack on the left and right hi-fi tracks(as well as a single mono track on the linear track). Therefore you have 2.0 analogue FM soundtracks. I have a Laserdisc Republic serial that has a mono recording on the left and right FM analogue tracks(call this 2.0 FM analogue soundtracks) as well as the left and right digital tracks(call this 2.0 16 bit digital tracks). These two machines are connected to two separate analogue inputs on the Sherwood(tape and aux). If I hit stereo on the Sherwood, the left mono track plays out of the left speaker; the right mono track plays out of the right speaker. You now have two independent 2 channel mono sound. Keep this in mind too. The audio from both the above machines are hooked up to the left and right analogue inputs.

Now we have a DVD player with a disc labled 2.0 dolby digital mono. This player is connected to the Sherwoods DVD analogue inputs. There is no PHYSICAL difference occuring as to these hookups of all three machines. Even if you outputted the 2.0 mono dvd through the coax or optical cable from the player, the receiver would still ouput two independent mono tracks.

The only way you would hear a non-mono sound from any of the above is if the receiver has a DSP usually called MONO MOVIE. It is a circuit that is a kind of "splitter" to create a "difference" in the sound on one or both of the channels. When a "difference" occurs, the receiver would then give you five channels from a mono source..

I think the answer to your mono question whether it be D.D. 1.0 or 2.0 steered to the center channel when the receiver is in DPL mode is DIFFERENCE and PHASING. Since the samples above have no difference or phasing(proof of that is listening the examples above; the audio is heard only between the speakers on your tv screen) the DPL chip recognizes the sound as sound that should be placed in the center and as such, in DPL we have the center channel speaker. 'Hope maybe this helps.

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

I know this is a confusing issue, but just so we understand this 2.0 mono, and 1.0 mono areessentially the same thing just decoded differently. They are just listed carelessly. If we were listening to mono dialog from a 5.1 channel soundtrack all we would have to do is mix a discrete center channel only. Since we are talking prologic decoding, there is no discrete center channel. So information MUST be encoded equal level, and 0 degrees in phase into both the L and R discrete channels(much like Dolby stereo) in order for the decoder to derive a center channel signal. The 1.0 mono is essentially the same thing, except that the sound engineer used the discrete palate, and encoded the mono information in the center channel only WITHOUT dolby prologic decoding. So 2.0 mono is the same signal, mixed at the same volume, 0 in phase, and encoded into two channels to be decoded by prologic and directed to the center channel. 1.0 mono is the discrete version that uses only the center channel for the mono signal, and does not require any dolby prologic decoding to place the mono signal in the center channel.

Sir (head spinning in circles) Terrence

[Quagmire]

Don't you just love how John Beresford is a Junior Member here, whereas you and I are "site newbies". How long has it been since you thought of yourself as a site newbie?

Q

[John Beresford]

Don't you just love how John Beresford is a Junior Member here, whereas you and I are "site newbies". How long has it been since you thought of yourself as a site newbie?

Q

Why, what is so strange about being a "Junior Member"?

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

Don't you just love how John Beresford is a Junior Member here, whereas you and I are "site newbies". How long has it been since you thought of yourself as a site newbie?

Q

Yo Q,

I think I was a newbie back in December of 1997. To my recollection I have not been one till now. Maybe you and I are getting younger and will end up back in the egg when it is all said and done.

Sir Terrence

[John Beresford]

I know this is a confusing issue, but just so we understand this 2.0 mono, and 1.0 mono areessentially the same thing just decoded differently. They are just listed carelessly. If we were listening to mono dialog from a 5.1 channel soundtrack all we would have to do is mix a discrete center channel only. Since we are talking prologic decoding, there is no discrete center channel. So information MUST be encoded equal level, and 0 degrees in phase into both the L and R discrete channels(much like Dolby stereo) in order for the decoder to derive a center channel signal. The 1.0 mono is essentially the same thing, except that the sound engineer used the discrete palate, and encoded the mono information in the center channel only WITHOUT dolby prologic decoding. So 2.0 mono is the same signal, mixed at the same volume, 0 in phase, and encoded into two channels to be decoded by prologic and directed to the center channel. 1.0 mono is the discrete version that uses only the center channel for the mono signal, and does not require any dolby prologic decoding to place the mono signal in the center channel.

Sir (head spinning in circles) Terrence

Sir,

Yes, this is all very confusing, and I'm not really getting it, so I believe I am just simply forced to accept what the packaging says and just view mono DVDs via the center channel exclusively; I do understand, to a degree, what you are explaining about the mono/Pro Logic steering into one channel, but I still do not understand why MONO soundtracks are placed on TWO channels on some of these films to begin with, while other MONO films are designated in the (logical) 1.0---what happens to them after that I can accept (the two channels collapsing into the center via PLII, etc), but I do not understand why the marketing of the disc reads 2.0 channel mono to begin with; why mix on two channels if the result is mono? Then why not mix two channel stereo at that point?

I guess it is as was explained to me, that these 2.0 mono DVDs can be watched by those with 2-speaker/2-channel stereo only systems in a more enjoyable fashion than just out of their TV speakers; for folks like me, with a digital 5.1 surround system and a DVD connection made via optical digital cable, these 2.0 mono DVDs are being read by the Pro Logic II chip and being steered to the center speaker only.