Dolby Atmos Music on AV Receivers

MQJ

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At CES 2020 Phil Hinton was given a demo of Dloby Atmos Music and he was very impressed. Has me looking forward to hearing it myself.

Does anybody know if this demo was on a full Atmos system? Does anyone know if this will come to AV receivers? Is this new music format going to be able to take advantage of a full atmos system?

I know at the moment it is limited to a few devices such as phones and smart speakers.
 
Have you looked on the Dolby Atmos Music website there is a lot of information and videos on there. The DeadMaus one is quite instructional. As for enhancing music.....hmmm. Having a whistle whizzing around the room like a Golden Snitch (Quiditch) I am not sure enhances anything. The problem is that Atmos is artificial, it appears that it’s more about the Producers ability to place and move sounds spatially, rather than capturing them.
 
Have you looked on the Dolby Atmos Music website there is a lot of information and videos on there. The DeadMaus one is quite instructional. As for enhancing music.....hmmm. Having a whistle whizzing around the room like a Golden Snitch (Quiditch) I am not sure enhances anything. The problem is that Atmos is artificial, it appears that it’s more about the Producers ability to place and move sounds spatially, rather than capturing them.
The only information I have about it is this
 
I've got a couple of blu rays that have an Atmos music soundtrack. One is brilliant, Hans Zimmer Live in Prague the other, Mumford and Sons Dust and Thunder is nowhere are good as the DTS HD 5.1 on their previous live blu ray Road to Redrocks.

Don't know whether I'd buy into it. Where have all the blu ray pure audio releases gone. I suspect Atmos music will go the same way. I much prefer my music in stereo anyway and that includes SACD.
 
I've got a couple of blu rays that have an Atmos music soundtrack. One is brilliant, Hans Zimmer Live in Prague the other, Mumford and Sons Dust and Thunder is nowhere are good as the DTS HD 5.1 on their previous live blu ray Road to Redrocks.

Don't know whether I'd buy into it. Where have all the blu ray pure audio releases gone. I suspect Atmos music will go the same way. I much prefer my music in stereo anyway and that includes SACD.
My understanding of it is that Dolby Atmos music is being done in a way that is very immersive and Phil Hinton said he was blown away by it.

If it’s immersive then surely it would be best to demo it with a full Atmos set up.

Also it will be/or is available on streaming services.
 
Pink Floyd's live performance of The Wall is supposed to be good.

The Blu-ray of Roger Waters The Wall sports a Dolby Atmos soundtrack, although for those that aren't Atmos-enabled there's also a 7.1-channel Dolby TrueHD core. We actually reviewed the film with a full Dolby Atmos setup using a 7.2.4 configurationand the results were simply stunning, easily the best sounding concert movie we've ever heard. Pink Floyd and Roger Waters have a long history of superior sound quality at their concerts and they've been using quadrophonic sound since the seventies, so it's no surprise that Waters has embraced Dolby Atmos for this film. However he also understands how to use it to its full advantage, creating a highly immersive audio experience.

These are however titles onclusive of regular Atmos soundtracks as opposed to titles encoded with Atmos Music. Atmos Music is something different.

You may already be aware of Dolby Atmos for movies and TV shows — if not, we have a great explainer and a detailed how-to guide — but Dolby Atmos Music is its own beast. An entirely new way of recording and listening to music, Atmos Music could become a big part of recorded music’s next big leap forward. Here’s everything you need to know.
 
How can I listen to Dolby Atmos Music?

As of December 2019, you can stream select songs and albums in Dolby Atmos Music on Amazon Music HD and Tidal HiFi. But there’s a catch. For now, the only way to access these tracks on Amazon Music HD is to buy Amazon’s new $199 Echo Studio, a high-end version of Amazon’s famous voice-enabled smart speaker that features 3D immersive sound capabilities. If you want to listen to Atmos on Tidal HiFi, you’ll need a Dolby Atmos-compatible Android smartphone or tablet. Recent iPhones, even though they’re Atmos-compatible, aren’t yet supported.
Any other device or streaming service combo — even if that device supports Dolby Atmos via Netflix, YouTube, or other services — will not get the Dolby Atmos Music versions of these tracks.

One exception to this state of affairs is live concert videos recorded in Dolby Atmos. For instance, Taylor Swift’s Reputation Stadium Tour on Netflix was recorded in Dolby Atmos. Live performances recorded in Atmos deliver a slightly different listening experience than studio-recorded Atmos. Live performances benefit from Atmos by delivering a more true-to-life concert experience, enhancing the feeling of “being there.”

Currently, there’s no way to buy Atmos Music in digital formats online. Even online stores that cater to hi-res music fans do not sell Atmos Music tracks — although we’ve been able to find two exceptions so far: AcousticSounds.com, which sells a single Dolby Atmos piece of music, which it provides in .mp4 format, and Matt Darey, an EDM artist who sells his albums Wolf and Retrospective, as dedicated Atmos mixes directly to the public. You can buy them in MT2S, MKV, and MP4 formats.

There is, however, another way to get Dolby Atmos Music. Blu-ray discs can be used to play Atmos Music and there have been several albums released in this format. Beatles fans will be happy to know that Abbey Road happens to be one of them. Unfortunately, the selection is still razor-thin, and it’s unlikely Blu-ray disc will be the way most people listen to Atmos Music in the future.

If you have a Blu-ray disc player and a Dolby Atmos-capable receiver or soundbar, you’re good to go.


What about Atmos Music on headphones and mobile devices?

Headphones (with a few notable exceptions like the Razer Tiamat V2) are effectively 2-channel stereo speakers for your head. However, the fact that each ear can only hear one of those channels at a time means that a technique known as binaural audio can be used to simulate 360-degree sound (our brains are remarkably easy to fool). Dolby Atmos takes full advantage of binaural audio and is pretty headphone-friendly. In fact, Dolby Atmos for Headphones is already widely used throughout the Windows 10 and Xbox One gaming worlds as a way to give gamers a more immersive audio experience that helps them place characters, as well as actions like explosions and gunshots, in context so they can react faster and with greater accuracy.

The same binaural effect that makes Atmos for headphones so effective for gaming works with music as well, with the same distinctions we discussed earlier around cinematic Atmos versus Atmos for music.

The challenge, however, is being able to connect your headphones to an Atmos-capable device that also has access to Atmos Music.

Many smartphones are Dolby Atmos-enabled, including recent iPhones running iOS 13 or later. You can find plenty of samples of Dolby Atmos on sites like YouTube, but it can be very hard to find Atmos Music specifically.

Unfortunately, plugging in a set of cans to the headphone output of an Atmos A/V receiver won’t usually work, even if it’s connected to a Blu-ray player. Most Atmos A/V receivers can only process the Atmos signal through connected speakers and only provide a downgraded stereo mix to the headphone jack.


Not sure about the statement made relating to YouTube? As far as I'm aware, YouTube are limited to 2 channel stereo regardless of what a uuser thinks they've up,oaded to it.
 
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My understanding of it is that Dolby Atmos music is being done in a way that is very immersive and Phil Hinton said he was blown away by it.

If it’s immersive then surely it would be best to demo it with a full Atmos set up.

Also it will be/or is available on streaming services.
Streaming will depend on the service and their bandwidth but as I have never partook any streaming I'll not comment on that aspect. Disc wise I'm afraid it may just follow the DVD-A, Blu ray pure audio path and fade into memory.

I do have a fairly good Atmos set up with a Denon X6500 and Rega Elicit-R involved and Hans Zimmer sounds awesome. I've got just a couple of blu ray pure audio which are as enjoyable as multi channel SACD.

How many people that stream music will have anywhere near a good Atmos set up. Played from the phone to an Atmos soundbar is probably as near as many will get.
 
Dolby wouldn't even be the first to try introduce a 3D immersive music format. The primary reasoning behind Auro 3D was in order to represent music in a more imersive way and many still suggest Auro 3D and its associated upmixing's representation of music to be a reason for investing in a receiver that can facilitate Auro 3D processing.


 
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These are however titles onclusive of regular Atmos soundtracks as opposed to titles encoded with Atmos Music. Atmos Music is something different.

Yes, that's what I understand. Atmos Music is something different.
From how impressed Phil Hinton was, it seems that finally it's been done right.

A few months ago I listened to an interview with Phil Jones, president of Sound United on AVRant's podcast and they asked him would Dolby Atmos music be coming to their HEOS (Home Entertainment Operating System) enabled AVRs. Phil Jones answer was that same HEOS modules are used across the whole range of products and AVR development cycles take time. They didn’t rule it out in the future but it seemed unlikely within the current product range. He didn't seem to know much about it because I think the news had just broken. So, maybe the next AV receivers we see from Denon & Marantz will be Atmos music capable.

And if it's finally been done right, I'm looking forward to it.
 
Tidal have just updated their app on a few devices to support their Atmos content. From memory it was Apple TV, Shield and Fire TV though not every model is included.

Waiting for the update to arrive on my Fire TV Stick 4K to give it a whirl.
 
Tidal have just updated their app on a few devices to support their Atmos content. From memory it was Apple TV, Shield and Fire TV though not every model is included.

Waiting for the update to arrive on my Fire TV Stick 4K to give it a whirl.

Great, so no need for a Dolby Atmos Music receiver (dosent exist as of june 2020) if you have a device that can play it such as above.

 
Got the update last night and it works fine. Didn't do much for me though, bit like watching a film with the TV off, and also not helped by their example tracks.
 


In case anyone here missed this. @46mins Dolby Atmos music Phil talks more about it.
 

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