VideoPhile Question: BlurRay Sound, Why does it suck so much....

[Timur Civan]

Why is the sound on bluray so imbalanced.

The dialogue is -30dB under the background effects. this is pretty cosistent across all the blurays i have. I have a panasonic Plasma, and my fathers TV has the same problem, a Sony LED TV.

Thoughts? Surround sound system fix this?

[Gavin Greenwalt]

Hazarding a guess but you are outputting 5.1 or 7.1 without downmixing to Stereo and the TV is only outputting the Front Left and Front Right channels. The dialog is mostly in the Front Center Channel which instead of mixxing into the stereo is getting dropped by a misconfiguration on your end?

[Bruce Allen]

Hazarding a guess but you are outputting 5.1 or 7.1 without downmixing to Stereo and the TV is only outputting the Front Left and Front Right channels. The dialog is mostly in the Front Center Channel which instead of mixxing into the stereo is getting dropped by a misconfiguration on your end?

+1

Either going to a real surround system with a center channel - or configuring the existing system for proper stereo downmix should work.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

[Benedict Heinzl]

+1 on first reply
We have a Home Entertainment system with Barco Projector, Meridian 5.1 and a Cambridge Audio BluRay-Player and it is almost like a "real" cinema (=amazing).
(But still no DCP ;D)

[Timur Civan]

Ok.... os how do you make the audio system do a downmix? Read through the manual, seems like there is no specific way of doing that....

[L. Langer]

Ok.... os how do you make the audio system do a downmix? Read through the manual, seems like there is no specific way of doing that....

It's not a feature that all Blu-Ray players have anymore but it's usually buried in the audio menu if it's there. It can be called various things so you will have to look and think about what you are seeing.

[Timur Civan]

I'm using a PS3, perhaps thats the problem....

[L. Langer]

I'm using a PS3, perhaps thats the problem....

Yeah. A PS3 is roughly equivalent to the Blu-Ray players they had when the format came on the market and it works in exactly the same way in that it's all software with minimalist hardware capabilities. Just go get yourself a nice Panasonic Blu-Ray player and 2.1 soundbar and you'll be happy as a clam.

[Erich Ocean]

And FWIW, the sound on Blu-rays is freaking awesome. I hate watching old DVDs now because the sound is so lifeless. :(