[natethomas]

I can tell the different in non-TrueHD vs. TrueHD sounds and non-DTS-HD vs. DTS-HD sounds in my 7.1 home theater system. I wish that you live close by, I can let you hear it for yourself.

If there is no different between HD vs. non-hd audio codec's, I don't think that thousand of Boxee, Extreamer, etc owners returned their media players due to issue with HD audio playback. They fight with Boxee, Xtreamer, etc to death to have HD audio playback correctly. Most of them selected these media player for its HD audio playback capability...!

I don't think you addressed my point. Until you have a professional calibrate your system between codecs and then have somebody play hd and non-hd codecs without either of you knowing which is which, you simply cannot say for certain that you can tell the difference. I know this, because THAT IS WHAT THE PROFESSIONALS DO. And those self-same professionals have said, over and over, that a 1.5mbps DTS stream sounds, even to the best, most well trained human ears, exactly like the master audio.

The fact that you can hear a difference says one of two things. Either 1, you are experiencing a placebo effect, or 2, your speaker system is not calibrated correctly. Do you have an audio system worth approximately 30k that was professionally installed and calibrated? If, and only if, you do, then it's the placebo effect. If you don't, then the problem still isn't the codec. It's the speakers and the decoder.

[LB06]

Besides, it's not like Linux can't play HD audio. TrueHD, FLAC and of course LPCM work just fine. Out of the box. In XBMC as well. And there's even a DTS-HD MA patch for ffmpeg floating around.

Besides, FLAC is the better codec anyway. A losslessly encoded 16 bit FLAC is about as big as a lossy encoded 16 bits DTS Core 1536 track. I really don't have any reason to keep DTS-HD (or TrueHD, for that matter). It that way on the disc, but when I rip it to my HTPC there's no reason not to transcode it to FLAC (and don't give me crap about the "but I want a light on my receiver" thing). Also, TrueHD is always 24-bits, but often it's actually 16-bits simply padded with zeroes to 24. FLAC can remove the padding and making it 1,5 times smaller.

[bluray]

But only when sent over the solid gold core MonsterCables, right?
-
I wouldn't say I'm an audiophile, but I would go out on a limb and say that I have 'above average' hearing. I have this uncanny ability to pick up people whispering across the room if they mention my name or certain key words.

I honestly can't tell the difference between the codecs. I watched A-team in theaters. I have the 5.1 AC3 HD rip that I love to watch (It's my "go to" surround sound HD movie). I can't tell a damn bit of difference. Maybe I need to spend the $100 on a monster cable. $1000+ on speakers. $500+ on a receiver and $whatever+ on Windows 7.

If you are this neurotic and have THIS much money to blow on auxiliary HTPC components, then you should go with Windows 7 and its "bit perfect replication". After all of them unzip their pants and wave theirs around, you can point at your HTPC setup and go "yeah, but watch this".

If you're the average joe with a <$300 receiver. Decent surround sound speakers (but not perfect) and you care more about the movie plot than a few missing frequencies. AND want to save a ton of money and CPU, memory, & hard drive overhead, get Linux.

Sorry, I don't have any expensive Monster cable. It's less than $10 hdmi cables from Amazon connects htpc to AVR and HDTV. I made the entire audio cables below:

[bluray]

I don't think you addressed my point. Until you have a professional calibrate your system between codecs and then have somebody play hd and non-hd codecs without either of you knowing which is which, you simply cannot say for certain that you can tell the difference. I know this, because THAT IS WHAT THE PROFESSIONALS DO. And those self-same professionals have said, over and over, that a 1.5mbps DTS stream sounds, even to the best, most well trained human ears, exactly like the master audio.

The fact that you can hear a difference says one of two things. Either 1, you are experiencing a placebo effect, or 2, your speaker system is not calibrated correctly. Do you have an audio system worth approximately 30k that was professionally installed and calibrated? If, and only if, you do, then it's the placebo effect. If you don't, then the problem still isn't the codec. It's the speakers and the decoder.

As I said, there are different but not day and night different.

Hmm, it made me wondering why everyone is buying their 7.1, 9.1, etc with TrueHD/DTS-HD capability home theater system when they can spend less for DTS/Dolby system for the same sound quality. I'm wondering why DTS/Dolby introduced DTS-HD/TrueHD for the same sound quality as DTS/Dolby.

[bluray]

That is called marketing...and it is working with you...they already have your money.

Jerry

I'm guessing that this is all marketing by DTS- COMPATIBILITY AND A BOOST IN QUALITY

[jawilljr]

I'm guessing that this is all marketing by DTS- COMPATIBILITY AND A BOOST IN QUALITY

100% marketing... all hype.

Jerry

[bluray]

100% marketing... all hype.

Jerry

If that is the case, every new hdtv, htpc component, hd avr, cars, hd camera, etc are all marking products!

[natethomas]

As I said, there are different but not day and night different.

Hmm, it made me wondering why everyone is buying their 7.1, 9.1, etc with TrueHD/DTS-HD capability home theater system when they can spend less for DTS/Dolby system for the same sound quality. I'm wondering why DTS/Dolby introduced DTS-HD/TrueHD for the same sound quality as DTS/Dolby.

Those differences are entirely the fault of your speakers/decoder and your own ears. They have nothing to do with the codec.

As for why people are buying those things: millions of people, the world over, have bought snake oil, and monster cables, and dietary supplements, and an astounding list of things that don't actually affect their experience beyond the the placebo effect. The nice people at DTS saw a market telling them to shut up and take their money, and shut up they did. It's as simple as that.

The other reason people buy these new receivers is a slightly more simple one. These new receivers can do a lot of nifty things with HD, hdmi inputs, and accessories that older receivers couldn't do. There's no real reason to give up on nifty things that do help, just because the receiver also ships with audio codecs that don't help.

[Taravel]

... then you should go with Windows 7 and its "bit perfect replication".

I think you are glad to be corrected: also GNU/Linux can use bit-streaming of HD codec with bleeding edge programs

[Scarlin83]

i feel that the Live version runs better. i had it installed on windows 7 on a Acer Revo 3700 and it suttered playing H.264 file @ 1080p, with the live version of XBMC this doesnt happen

[Robotica]

As in this article, power consumption for both Linux and Windows are the same. The article says there is enough room for some Linux improvements, so a +1 for Linux when talking power efficiency.

[bluray]

Those differences are entirely the fault of your speakers/decoder and your own ears. They have nothing to do with the codec.

If the fault of my AVR Audyssey speaker calibration made DTS-HD/TrueHD sounds better than the standard DTS/Dolby, I don't want to calibrate it any other way!

The other reason people buy these new receivers is a slightly more simple one. These new receivers can do a lot of nifty things with HD, hdmi inputs, and accessories that older receivers couldn't do. There's no real reason to give up on nifty things that do help, just because the receiver also ships with audio codecs that don't help.

As you said it, "the new receiver can do a lot of nifty things with HD via HDMI." And the new receiver can do DTS-HD/TrueHD too!

[Taravel]

Another good thing under GNU/Linux is that you can upload music to iThinghs without using iTunes. GNU/Linux sees them like usb pen drives.

+1 Linux

[natethomas]

If the fault of my AVR Audyssey speaker calibration made DTS-HD/TrueHD sounds better than the standard DTS/Dolby, I don't want to calibrate it any other way!

As you said it, "the new receiver can do a lot of nifty things with HD via HDMI." And the new receiver can do DTS-HD/TrueHD too!

Yup. Your speaker calibration made DTS sound worse for whatever reason. If I were you and an audio professional, I'd probably be pretty irritated right now, as you got gypped.

I'm not really sure what your second point was about.

Anyway, I'm done with this conversation now. If you are unwilling to trust every double blind test in existence and insist that your ears are somehow better than those of the best trained professional, or, alternatively, that your speakers are somehow more magical than the $30k reference speakers used in studios, then there's nothing I can do for you. Good luck and god bless.

[bluray]

Yup. Your speaker calibration made DTS sound worse for whatever reason. If I were you and an audio professional, I'd probably be pretty irritated right now, as you got gypped.

I'm not really sure what your second point was about.

Anyway, I'm done with this conversation now. If you are unwilling to trust every double blind test in existence and insist that your ears are somehow better than those of the best trained professional, or, alternatively, that your speakers are somehow more magical than the $30k reference speakers used in studios, then there's nothing I can do for you. Good luck and god bless.

Sorry, this will be my last word on HD audio too. DTS said DTS-HD is better and it reflected in my 7.1 system- COMPATIBILITY AND A BOOST IN QUALITY.

I referred to your point about marketing in my second point. People bought new A/V receiver to enjoy new technologies, such as HDMI, DTS-HD, TrueHD, network streaming, etc. Most of us didn't buy it because of their sleek marketing (or their glamour TV commercial).

If you're happy with the standard DTS/Dolby sounds, you can simply disable DTS-HD/TrueHD in AVR, FFDShow, Boxee, XTreamer, XBMC, etc!