DTS: X is finally launched

Using KEF R50 modules I find that Neural X expands the front soundfield height wise and gives quite a natural feel. Perhaps it is more suited to modules than in ceiling speakers. It's pretty good at picking out object based sounds as well often placing them perfectly within the soundstage. I've been using my receiver and Atmos combo for just under a year. I have no problems with dialogue as it is fixed firmly to the centre of the screen, centre of the tweeter is roughly 60cm to screen centre.
Yes, happy also with the overall feel and effect of Neural X, more so than DSU.....
Good description there gibbsy, a solid 9/10 from me!
 
Wow, if a person wants to get really confused on whether to apply neural x or dsu all they have to do is read the comments posted in this thread[emoji4]
 
...Or they could use their ears and decide for themselves: I prefer DSU and Gibbsy prefers Neural:X and guess what? We're both right. ;)
 
...Or they could use their ears and decide for themselves: I prefer DSU and Gibbsy prefers Neural:X and guess what? We're both right. ;)

I have Upmixing engaged for all non Atmos content as I think it makes a great addition to the overall affects.
 
I have Upmixing engaged for all non Atmos content as I think it makes a great addition to the overall affects.

Which one though? Not that it matters as no doubt you just pick the one you prefer.

I do tend to turn off any upmixing if it is a music disc though; I just prefer music to be unmolested by any additional processing, though that's just my choice...I'm sure others will prefer it on for music too.
 
Which one though? Not that it matters as no doubt you just pick the one you prefer.

I do tend to turn off any upmixing if it is a music disc though; I just prefer music to be unmolested by any additional processing, though that's just my choice...I'm sure others will prefer it on for music too.
That can depend on the quality of the recording. I've a few where DSU or Neural can flesh out the front soundstage. Some really old DVDs with just a DD 5.1 can certainly be enhanced, a Carole King 1994 concert really benefits but Fleetwood Mac aged The Dance is best left alone and played in LPCM stereo anyway, the 5.1 mix being rather poor. CDs only ever get played as stereo.

It's what you like with music and I'm just talking about concert DVDs or blu ray. You get to know your collection and how it sounds, good or bad, with upmixing applied.

Or could it be that as a teenager in the 60s, brought up on mono recordings I just have a better taste in music.:p
 
Or could it be that as a teenager in the 60s, brought up on mono recordings I just have a better taste in music.:p

I don't know...I go a long way back pre 60's with the songs I've learnt on guitar, though I do have a copy of Tapestry so we have something in common as well as only playing CDs in stereo. :)
 
Slightly off subject I have the original LP of Tapestry. Still brilliant to this day.
 
I don't know...I go a long way back pre 60's with the songs I've learnt on guitar, though I do have a copy of Tapestry so we have something in common as well as only playing CDs in stereo. :)
Over the last few years we have been lucky enough to have seen James Taylor in concert twice. Now that man is a guitar virtuoso for sure.:smashin:
 
I play a Yamaha Tyros keyboard through my AVR and find front stereo speakers only work ok.
Through DTS x it seems to give annoying sounds on surround speakers.
But DTS certainly brings new life to old films :smashin:
 
...Or they could use their ears and decide for themselves: I prefer DSU and Gibbsy prefers Neural:X and guess what? We're both right. ;)
Or someone has better hearing...just a thought...
 
I just leave it as DSU on anything Dolby and Neural on anything dts. Figured they are optimised for their respective codecs and both sound good enough to me that I'm not going to get bogged down worrying about it
 
I just leave it as DSU on anything Dolby and Neural on anything dts. Figured they are optimised for their respective codecs and both sound good enough to me that I'm not going to get bogged down worrying about it
I was thinking the same. Neural X is a DTS product so I would assume it will best apply to DTS-H Master.
And same for Dolby Surround applied to any Dolby Sound soundtrack
 
So do we now need another upmixer for PCM? :confused:

What if the source device is doing the decoding prior to streaming it to the receiver as LPCM, should you be using Neural:X on LPCM derived from DTS and using DSU only on PCM audio derived from Dolby encoded sources? What if the audio was never encoded as either DTS or Dolby?

Dolby Surround Upmixing wasn't developed or designed to be used with just Dolby encoded content and uses the exact same process irrespective of the source or its original encoding

"Dolby surround upmixer analyses and processes multiple perceptually spaced frequency bands, accurately steering each individually. The result is a surround playback experience characterized by precisely located audio elements and a more spacious ambience."
 
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So do we now need another up mixer for PCM? :confused:

What if the source device is doing the decoding prior to streaming it to the receiver as LPCM?
Don't let the source decode it!
Or look at the disc and see if it's DTS or Dolby and adjust accordingly - that would be a whole 3 button press on my remote
Or just leave it on whatever it was last on frankly..... ( thought you used the Yammy up mixers anyway?)

Maybe it would be noticeable with different speakers but honestly, with mine, I'm either engrossed in what I'm watching and don't notice which mixer is on. Or I'm not; which means whatever I'm watching doesn't warrant the effort anyway.

So easy to drive yourself nuts over these things :eek:
 
and as to Neural:X


"I decided to put Neural:X to the test and see how good it was using Auro-3D Blu-rays. Auro-3D Blu-ray discs have both a traditional 5.1 or 7.1 DTS multichannel audio track as well as the height channel information for an Auro-3D 9.1 to 11.1 mix. So here's what I did to test Neural:X. I first played the native Auro-3D mix and then switched to the DTS 7.1 mix and up sampled it to 7.1.4 using Neural:X via the Denon's sound menu. This experiment meant I could jump between the two mixes easily for a near real-time A-B comparison between Auro-3D and Neural:X just by changing the processing modes. I could first go to Auro-3D and hear how the immersive audio mix was supposed to be and then hear how Neural:X was interpreting the 7.1 signal. To conduct this test, I used Auro-3D’s own Auro-3D demo Blu-ray disc, which features a great selection of movie clips, audio, and ambient content.

If you are asking me to describe the difference between Neural:X and the native Auro-3D mix, then I’d say it was like the difference you experience between having a phantom center and a discrete center channel or, to use the visual analogy, using a really good 1080p upscaler on DVDs vs native 1080p content. It’s darn close, but once you kick in the real thing it’s sharper and more detailed. Let me give you some examples.

The Auro-3D demo disc features an 11.1 clip from Rise of the Guardians. Taken from one of the movie's climactic scenes, there's lots of swirling action as Pitch Black and Jack Frost battle in the sky along with a host of conjured black horses. There are ample overhead effects and cues as Santa Claus swoops in on his sleigh. Listening to the native Auro-3D mix yielded pinpoint precision and the overhead audio was superb.

Neural:X took the base DTS 7.1 mix and worked incredible magic on it. It created a comparable immersive soundscape that left me shaking my head constantly in disbelief. The same kind of elevation and sense of space I heard in the native Auro-3D mix I also heard with Neural:X. Color me impressed.

Even ambient material from the Auro-3D demo Blu-ray, such as the 48 second track of fireworks exploding in the sky, was great. Neural:X made it seem like my ceiling was ripped off and I had a front row seat to a firework spectacular. This one is a no-brainer. Neural:X is reason alone to upgrade your home theater to DTS:X. To be clear, the native Auro-3D mix was better, but the Neural:X presentation was an exceptional interpretation.

As a side note, DTS Neural:X cannot be applied Dolby-encoded audio formats. Neither can Dolby processing be applied to DTS-encoded audio. I confirmed one hack around this. If you change your source’s audio output from bitstream (where the AVR does the decoding) to PCM (where the source decodes the signal) you can apply DTS Neural:X on the PCM signal.

Other than a tiny handful of native DTS:X content, there isn’t much else at this point. I asked Jordan about the dearth of native content and he told me that this is quite normal at this stage of introducing a new codec and that there will be more DTS:X native content coming over time."


Listening Evaluation of DTS:X on the Denon AVR-X7200WA Receiver


The above is factually incorrect when it states that Neural:X cannot be applied to non DTS formats and when it says that DSU cannot be applied to DTS formats.
This was something specific to the first generation of Atmos enabled Denon AV receivers and has since been rectified by Denon via a firmware update.
 
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Don't let the source decode it!

I don't use my source devices to do the decoding. I'm dismissing the fallacy that Neural:X and DSU are designed to be used with their creators own proprietory formats. You do not get better results using Neural:X with DTS encoded content and you do not get better results from only applying DSU to Dolby encoded content.
 
So do we now need another upmixer for PCM? :confused:

What if the source device is doing the decoding prior to streaming it to the receiver as LPCM, should you be using Neural:X on LPCM derived from DTS and using DSU only on PCM audio derived from Dolby encoded sources? What if the audio was never encoded as either DTS or Dolby?

Dolby Surround Upmixing wasn't developed or designed to bw used with just Dolby encoded content and uses the exact same process irrespective of the source or its original encoding

"Dolby surround upmixer analyses and processes multiple perceptually spaced frequency bands, accurately steering each individually. The result is a surround playback experience characterized by precisely located audio elements and a more spacious ambience."
Yours is a tricky question sir
 
@dante01 , you certainly come across as an Atmos fan boy with little time for the DTS offering.....
 
Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD MA are just ways of packing the Sound Mix. Once unpacked, whether you prefer DSU, Neural or Auro Upmixers, is irrelevant to the Source.

For those who prefer to keep Source type with Upmixer type, fine. It's a good a way of any to decide....

Each of the Upmixers brings something different, and different speaker setups will give different results, i.e. I use FH & RH, which I think suits Neural. I have observed those with Atmos centric setup often think Neural adds too much to their TF & TR speakers, and they prefer DSU.

Nobody is wrong for Upmixers.
 
I don't use my source devices to do the decoding. I'm dismissing the fallacy that Neural:X and DSU are designed to be used with their creators own proprietory formats. You do not get better results using Neural:X with DTS encoded content and you do not get better results from only applying DSU to Dolby encoded content.

It's a good as any way to stop fretting about it, is perhaps how I should have phrased it. I can't tell enough of difference between up mixers compared to how the soundtracks themselves are recorded/mastered etc. So I just keep them matching their respective formats. That satisfies the more OCD part of my psychology anyway.

More annoyed that DTS:X encoded blu rays seem to very thin on the ground!
 
It's a good as any way to stop fretting about it, is perhaps how I should have phrased it. I can't tell enough of difference between up mixers compared to how the soundtracks themselves are recorded/mastered etc. So I just keep them matching their respective formats. That satisfies the more OCD part of my psychology anyway.

More annoyed that DTS:X encoded blu rays seem to very thin on the ground!
Good point
 

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