5.1 surround sound mixes - how are these enjoyable?

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Mark Jacobsen, Feb 28, 2018.

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  1. alexpop

    alexpop Power pop + other bad habits....

    Seventies albums? Prefer stereo myself,2 ears flat earth society
     
  2. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product

    so being in the world must be hard for you lol
     
  3. ted321

    ted321 Forum Resident

    I love surround and am lucky in that I got in early and bought all the SACDs and DVD-As on my want lists (I'm also a big vinyl addict)...gotta say this though, listening to surround is a bit of a chore, you MUST sit in the sweet spot or you're missing the whole effect. Of course this is true to a great degree with normal stereo, but essential with surround.
     
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  4. shokhead

    shokhead Head shok and you still don't what it is. HA!

    Location:
    SoCal, Long Beach
    Yep! I'm setup for ME!
     
  5. Bill Mac

    Bill Mac Forum Resident

    Location:
    USA
    True that none of those formats are in their infancy. I went all in on HD-DVD back in the day and we all know how that worked out ;). But my earlier point was that right now to enjoy all the formats listed one doesn't have to invest much on a universal player.

    Other than Atmos enabled discs what new surround audio disc formats are on the horizon that would require buying a new player?
     
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  6. Chris C

    Chris C Music was my first love and it will be my last!

    Location:
    Ohio
    As a fan of two-channel playback first, but also a fan of quality (and truly "discretely" mastered Quad and Surround mixes), I've got to say the following. I have worked through the formats of DTS encoded discs, DVD-A, SACD and Pure Blu-Ray Audio and I'd like to officially kill off that ATMOS format right now! The other formats, more or less work with standard older surround set-ups and players, where this new ATMOS format truly needs more equipment to provide a proper playback and I'm not buying into it! That INXS "Kick" surround sounded like crap on my system and it basically lost all of it's original "kick" of the standard album mix on LP or CD, in my opinion. I'm sure with the ATMOS speakers and ATMOS encoding receiver, that would make that particular surround mix work, but again, I've already got all of the usual needed equipment to hear surround just fine!
     
  7. Bill Mac

    Bill Mac Forum Resident

    Location:
    USA
    I agree 100%! I have no desire to setup a speaker system to enable Atmos playback. I'm quite happy with my 5.2 system for music and movie content playback. I haven't heard an Atmos system and would bet it sounds excellent when setup properly. But to do that in my main listening room (living room) I'd have to put speakers on or in the ceiling.

    Not willing to do that as I already have speakers in the front wall (effects speakers from an old Yamaha AVR), speakers on the ceiling (old bipolar surrounds not being used) and small a/d/s speakers on the back wall (not being used). I have a total of eleven speakers (not including two subs) but six of those speakers are not currently being used. So to add four to six more speakers would be out of the question. I should remove the ceiling and back wall speakers that aren't being used but haven't got around to doing it.
     
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  8. wolfram

    wolfram Slave to the rhythm

    Location:
    Berlin, Germany
    Isn't ATMOS downward compatible? I have the Kraftwerk 3D surround mixes on Blu-ray and they sound fantastic on my 5.1 system. I've heard they sound even more amazing on an ATMOS system and I'm sure that's true. But I don't think I'm really missing anything on my set-up. It just gets downmixed to the 5.1 speakers I have. I decided not to worry about it.
     
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  9. Chris C

    Chris C Music was my first love and it will be my last!

    Location:
    Ohio
    i also have that one thing that always ends the audiophile madness in me and that is called "a wife".
     
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  10. Chris C

    Chris C Music was my first love and it will be my last!

    Location:
    Ohio
    You are more than likely correct, but again, to get the full effect of ATMOS, you have to buy new equipment and I'm not going to do it! I just got convinced to buy a 4K TV and with the barely available 4K Ultra HD discs currently out there of a movie that "I" would ever want to watch, is basically down to three movies and a Charlie Brown Christmas, LOL
     
  11. DaverJ

    DaverJ Forum Resident

    Location:
    East Tennessee
    [​IMG]
     
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  12. wolfram

    wolfram Slave to the rhythm

    Location:
    Berlin, Germany
    I agree with you on not being willing to upgrade my system to ATMOS (even though my AVR is already capable). 5.1 is where it stops for me.
     
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  13. shokhead

    shokhead Head shok and you still don't what it is. HA!

    Location:
    SoCal, Long Beach
    Dolby Atmos speaker layouts parallel the 5.1 and 7.1 setups for surround sound. A 5.1.2 or 7.1.2 system uses two ceiling speakers, or two Dolby Atmos enabled speakers or modules. A 5.1.4 or 7.1.4 system uses four ceiling speakers, or four Dolby Atmos enabled speakers or modules.

    Not going to go with more them 5.1. /$$ for speakers and room for them just isn't available.
     
    Chris C likes this.
  14. Chris C

    Chris C Music was my first love and it will be my last!

    Location:
    Ohio
    Thanks for explaining that, as I wasn't sure how it all worked.
     
  15. weekendtoy

    weekendtoy Rejecting your reality and substituting my own.

    Location:
    Northern MN
    You folks are making the same arguments against ATMOS that people make against 5.1. My system sounds just fine, I'm not missing anything, too hard to set up, too many speakers, etc... I find it a bit ironic.

    Anyway, once you hear, for instance, REM's Automatic for the People or a good movie soundtrack in true ATMOS I'm betting you'd change your mind.
     
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  16. Bill Mac

    Bill Mac Forum Resident

    Location:
    USA
    I'm not willing to replace my current Salk speakers with speakers such as those. I've gone that route in the past and speakers that use walls and the ceiling to reflect and radiate sound are horrible for music IMO. I use my system for stereo music listening as well so that's just as important as surround music listening.
     
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  17. lennonfan1

    lennonfan1 Senior Member

    Location:
    baltimore maryland
    heh, this takes me back to those pricey Bose 901s that had reflection and sounded worse than a jukebox speaker. hahaha....
     
    Bill Mac likes this.
  18. Bill Mac

    Bill Mac Forum Resident

    Location:
    USA
    You make a great point. But for me adding ceiling speakers is a serious PITA as running speaker cables would be a serious challenge. If there was to be a serious amount of Atmos enabled to be released I might consider setting up an Atmos enabled speaker system. But with only a few titles currently being available and none of those really appealing to me it's not a priority.
     
  19. DaverJ

    DaverJ Forum Resident

    Location:
    East Tennessee
    There are Atmos add-ons available to keep your existing setup.

    [​IMG]
     
  20. Kristofa

    Kristofa Enthusiast of small convenient sound carrier units

    Location:
    usa
    Well said, sir.
    A good example that there has been a few ways to achieve surround nirvana, and ATMOS may be another of those attempts to achieve it.

    I adore the ATMOS concept and hope it can become standard, but I am certainly not holding my breath. I haven’t even heard ATMOS yet! But it is starting to match up with my dreams as a child about sound coming from in front, behind, above—and beneath me!!! I would lay in bed and imagine listening to my favorite music while suspended in a sphere of sound.

    As @wolfram suggested, backwards compatibility with surround tracks probably work really well, but I will also not find out for a while as I live in a rental and will need to wait until I have a home to build a dedicated space. If ATMOS is still around by that point, I will prolly jump in head first.
     
    Bill Mac likes this.
  21. Bill Mac

    Bill Mac Forum Resident

    Location:
    USA
    I'm sure those speakers do a good job. But I really don't want to add speakers to my system that are not close in quality to my current speakers. I found this to be important as my current surround speakers are very closely matched to my front speakers. Till that point using ceiling mounted bipolar speakers then small direct radiating speakers was great but no comparison to my current floor standing surround speakers. My point is that unless the speakers added for Atmos would be close in quality (SQ wise) to my current speakers and are installed per Atmos specifications I'm not interested.
     
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  22. mark winstanley

    mark winstanley Certified dinosaur, who likes physical product

    I will probably wait a while before i look into atmos ... to me atmos is a step towards full three dimensional surround sound.
    I imagine 5.2.5 is somewhere near where it may go. 5 on the ceiling, 5 on the floor with two subs.
    It would be so much fun mixing a well recorded drum kit in this field. Hats waist high to the left, snare just off center, toms in an arc, cymbals shimmering around head height.
    The only problem with the whole idea would be the ability to set up.
    I understand folks wanting to stick with the 5.1 though .... it sounds great, it is on a logical musical plain, we have bought these albums a half dozen times already, it's hard enough to get the 5.1 releases we want ....
     
  23. DaverJ

    DaverJ Forum Resident

    Location:
    East Tennessee
    Atmos speakers are FX speakers, not full range. Your main 5.1 or 7.1 bed speakers do all the heavy lifting, and the Atmos ceiling (or bounce) speakers are what stear the object-based directional sound cues supplied by the main speakers.

    With this said, if it appears I'm pushing Atmos for music -- I'm not. I'm just trying to clear up misconceptions about the format. For the record, I have a 5.1.2 Atmos setup, but I usually stick with 5.1 for surround music and don't bother with upmixing the height channels.
     
    Bill Mac likes this.
  24. wolfram

    wolfram Slave to the rhythm

    Location:
    Berlin, Germany
    I guess you're right. And when I said that I'm not missing anything, I meant that all the musical info in an ATMOS mix will be downmixed to my simple 5.1 set-up. Of course I'm missing the effect of having musical elements coming from above. And I find the idea totally intriguing. If I ever find an ATMOS system to try out, I will listen to my Kraftwerk discs on it and it will be mind-blowing for sure. But a decent upgrade of my own system would be too much work and too expensive for me.
     
  25. dkmonroe

    dkmonroe A completely self-taught idiot

    Location:
    Atlanta
    DON'T SLOUCH, or yer OUTTA THE SWEET SPOT! :laugh:
     
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