DTS or AC3

[Bazza-61]

i dont know if this has been asked before, i had a look and couldnt se it, so my question is, does dts give you a better sound quality than ac3, i see a lot of people down converting the dts to ac3 but is this just for file size only or will there be some loss in quality.

cheers.

[Noahtuck]

is this just for file size only or will there be some loss in quality.

Both

[El Heggunte]

Converting DTS to AC3 always implies some loss of quality.
How much you will notice it, that's a different story.
Anyway: according to what "many people say" ,
640kbps AC3 > ("better than") 1509kbps DTS > 448kbps AC3 > 754kbps DTS

The interesting part of the "debate" is, now that it's possible to create
mono and stereo DTS files at bitrates as low as 192kbps,
"nobody" cares about comparing AC3 and DTS through
other sources than movie soundtracks.

[cal_tony]

Also, many players only have DTS pass thru rather than DTS decoders. So unless you have a theater system, you have no audio in many cases.

Tony

[jman98]

i dont know if this has been asked before, i had a look and couldnt se it, so my question is, does dts give you a better sound quality than ac3, i see a lot of people down converting the dts to ac3 but is this just for file size only or will there be some loss in quality.

cheers.

This is really an excellent question. DTS does lossy filtering where it drops the higher frequencies that MOST people (but NOT everybody) can't hear. It also boosts the volume and studies have shown that human beings will perceive a louder sound to be of higher quality. AC3 is lossy too, but I've yet to see a real technical comparison that shows which is truly more faithful to the original. In the end I would say that AC3 is probably not as bad as many consumers seem to think it is and DTS is really not as good as those same consumers think.

[beb7089]

AC3 is more compatiable than DTS, especially with older equipment. But if you have equipment that can handle DTS then choose either one. There are more "free" tools out there to work with AC3 files than DTS.

In my opinion... I prefer DTS over AC3.... But not always. A lot has to do with the original source that was used in the post production work. I've heard post production work that sounded like crap no matter wether you used DTS or AC3.

DTS tends to be a little more balanced with the volume levels between the dialog, music and sound effects.
DTS (being higher bitrate) does include the extra bandwidth in the audio... Not that you'll really notice the difference unless you have a whole movie theather audio system for you home.

AC3 has more compatiability with equipment and "free" processing tools.
Broadcast DTV uses AC3.

[Bazza-61]

ok thank for the replies, also one other thing is 1509 DTS is this what they call HD and 754 DTS is a std DTS.

cheers and thanks again guys.

[El Heggunte]

^ No, both 1509kbps and 754kbps are just the DTS bitrates compliant with the DVD-Video specs.

"Hi-Def" DTS means a sample rate of 96kHz, plus even greater bitrates.

[Bazza-61]

i have a theatre system with a 7.1 yamaha amp thats about 4 yrs old it plays DTS but i think it doesnt have the decoder.
i only have it playing as a 5.1 at the moment until i get some more speakers, i use to be big on sounds especialy good music and just dont find that movies sound as good as a good music recording, they seem to be low on high frequency sounds as Cal_tony said but big on the base sounds.

[Bazza-61]

ok cheers El Heggunte. so 96khz as compaired to 48khz.

[oldauthor]

I've managed a couple of DVD studios (attached to recording studios) where we mainly did concert or other music disks (you've probably seen a few disks I've authored... we did many of the big names).

Anyway, we did a lot of comparisons between DD (ac3) and DTS, but we were never able to publish the results (both Dolby and DTS employ HEAVYWEIGHT lawyers.

Suffice to say, that first choice is (obviously) PCM*, and then I'd go for high bit rate Dolby rather than DTS. According to our measurements (and we had some of the most golden ears in the industry helping us with our tests, and banks of measuring equipment), DTS plays all sorts of 'tricks' on audio to make it 'sound' better.... but better is not necessarily 'as the original sounded'.

Don't forget you can go up to 640 kbs in Dolby, and I would never encode 5.1 or 5.0 at less than 448 kbs.

The only time I'd go with DTS was if the client was contractually obliged to have DTS on the disk and then I would ask for the track to be especially mastered for DTS compression, where some of the DTS 'tricks' can be thwarted, for instance DTS always boosts the bass, so I would ask the mastering engineer to deliberately reduce the bass on the source track - and do other things - before I compressed to DTS.


And don't get me started on mp3........

(if God meant for us to listen to mp3, he/she wouldn't have given us ears...)


*to my mind, better 'uncompressed' stereo than 'over-compressed' surround.

Footnote, to be fair neither DTS nor Dolby were designed for music. They were both designed for speech/effects, and there is damn little difference between them for the normal film soundtrack.... tho' DTS does use MUCH more bandwidth.

[jman98]

Suffice to say, that first choice is (obviously) PCM*, and then I'd go for high bit rate Dolby rather than DTS. According to our measurements (and we had some of the most golden ears in the industry helping us with our tests, and banks of measuring equipment), DTS plays all sorts of 'tricks' on audio to make it 'sound' better.... but better is not necessarily 'as the original sounded'.

Thanks for this very interesting post. I have long suspected that this would be the case with regards to DTS.

[El Heggunte]

...

DTS plays all sorts of 'tricks' on audio to make it 'sound' better....

but better is not necessarily 'as the original sounded'.

...

And that would/should translate as:

"undocumented/hidden audio processing in the CERTIFIED firmware/software decoders"

*GOOD POST*, by the way. * MANY THANKS*

[Bazza-61]

No thank you guys for being so helpfull i have learnt a lot.

cheers to all.

[milatchi]

I know I'm late to the thread but I had this same decision to make a couple of months ago and ultimately settled on AC3. Not that DTS is bad, but after weighing compatibility, container, transcoding ability, perceived sound quality, and a little bit of future-proofing; I ended up with AC3.