Why do DVDs have hiss in them when played on a PC but not in DVD player?

[VideoFanatic]

I bought a wrestling event on DVD. This is a legitimate DVD and not a copy. When I play it on a DVD player it plays fine with no hiss but when I play it on my PC I can hear hiss. Why is this and have any of you guys experienced this problem before? I haven't had this problem when playing movies or TV series DVDs on my PC.

Also even when playing it on a DVD player I can hear occasional clicking sounds as you can hear on the sample below. Here's some samples which I demuxed from the DVD:

Clip with Hiss

Same clip but after I removed the hiss and clicks in an audio editor

[jagabo]

I didn't hear much hiss in the original (but with all that audience noise it was hard to tell). And only a few very faint clicks. You really butchered the audio in your "fixed" clip. Maybe you have an AC3 decoding problem?

[VideoFanatic]

If you turn up the volume up to a reasonably high volume you can hear the hiss clearly especially after comparing it with my fixed sample which has removed the hiss. Can you not hear the hiss in the original sample when you turn the volume up?

I don't think I've got an AC3 decoding problem because I have watched movie and TV series DVDs on my PC without problems. I just have this problem with these wrestling event PPVs.

All I did was sample some hiss and clicks which I had from an unreleated poor VHS to DVD conversion and applied it to the audio doing 100% noise reduction as I wanted to remove all the hiss and clicks. I had to do 2 passes to fully remove the clicks. Could you please explain to me how I butchered it? I can hear a slight quality loss but it's nothing major is it?

If you know of a better way to remove the hiss and clicks without causing quality loss, I'd certainly welcome the help.

[VideoFanatic]

I uploaded the clip demuxed from the DVD to YouTube which then converts the audio to AAC. The video still had hiss in it so it can't be a problem with my AC decoding.

If you know of a better way to remove the hiss and clicks without causing quality loss, I'd certainly welcome the help.

[lordsmurf]

There's no hiss in the video. What you're hearing is ambient acoustics coming off the crowd.

I have professional reference-quality speakers here. I'm not mistaken.

The "fixed" sample muffled it out. I think it's been over-processed worse.

The difference in audio quality is likely the speakers on your end. Consumer speakers are unreliable. My favorite TV crackles on poorly done audio (illegal spikes in dynamic range). The speakers are not super-duper awesome, so the bad levels on the source cascade into worse errors on the TV. The detail of the audio likely exceeds what your speakers can do, and it craps out as hiss.

What I do hear is mild bass rumbling (almost hard to detect), which is connected to volume rises. I forget the technical term. It would suggest problems with the audio recorded onto the tape. That means this is source from a tape of some sort -- something broadcast grade, given the image quality. Between the video clarity/detail/softness, the event type, and blah audio quality, Betacam SP is a good guess on the source.

[jagabo]

Given all the ambient noise, the hiss on that audio is so low it's not worth worring about. Maybe you have the treble cranked up really high in your audio settings? Your speakers really exaggerate the treble? If you really think you need to reduce the noise try using a low pass filter. The original audio was low quality mono so it doesn't have much real signal over 4KHz.

[sanlyn]

The audio from DVD players, TV speakers, computer speakers and audio cards, etc., varies wildly. I haven't tried every component available, old or new, but the best audio I've heard from DVD players was from DENON and OPPO. PC audio cards and speakers (especially the godawful cheap crap speakers being sold today) are no way to judge the audio output. When I use PC speakers (I usually don't), they are ancient but OK Altecs from 1996, and I'm praying they stay alive until I finish my projects -- if not, then it's my Grado headphones as my only choice. The SR60's and SR80's were designed for low-output devices such as audio cards and portable players. To get better, you need heavy-duty equipment for that and the expertise to use it. If you want to spend $500 for a premium PC audio card, those are available, but audio quality from most consumer gear makes those products a waste of time and money.

I work with audio on my PC by plugging a pair of Grado headphones into my Sound Blaster Audigy's output jack (don't use the audio jack that's usually on the front of most PC's. They're pretty terrible to begin with). The headphones are used with all "enhancements" turned off on the sound card. Most users wouldn't process audio in compressed formats; they would convert to uncompressed PCM (.wav) and re-encode as a last step. I find the free Audacity app to be adequate for most work, but there is some expensive stuff out there that's probably better depending on how extensive you want to alter the sound.