Is BluRay of 'Australia' DTS-HD(MA)?

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Dingbatt

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Topic # 32893 26-Apr-2009 17:45

I just hired a copy of the movie "Australia" for my better half to watch on a wet Sunday afternoon. Having recently purchased a receiver capable of decoding the new HD formats (Onkyo TX-SR606) I was looking forward to seeing how it went with a lossless format. However the 606 stubbornly remained in DTS only. After much twiddling, confirming settings on the player (bitstream, 2nd audio off, etc) and the receiver (dts, hdmi audio, etc) it dawned on me that maybe there was no DTS-MA track on the disk.
A quick net search came up with several threads where region B blu-ray disks don't have the audio tracks that their dust jackets say they have. The most recent being "Twilight" in Aussie, according to one thread.
Fox was particularly mentioned and "Australia" is a 20thCentury/Fox product.

Before I leap off and complain to the Commerce Commission I would like to confirm it is the disk and not my setup. Owners of the Panna BD35 and Onkyo 606 may be able to save me some embarrassment if there is something obvious I have missed.

So anyone who owns this disk (or has run into the same thing with a rental) can you confirm the existence of a HD audio track on it? The disk has DTS-HD(masteraudio) printed on it which just adds to the frustration.

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Reply # 209742 27-Apr-2009 13:49

I watched this film this past weekend and it has a DTS MA sound track. Just set your amp to multi chan and all will be good.
Not sure about the Panna BD35 and whether it decodes this but with a PS3 set to PCM and onkyo to multi all good for me.
You should see "Multichannel PCM" on your Onkyo.

What a corny movie! Looks good though.

lchiu7

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Reply # 209831 27-Apr-2009 17:11

A quick scan of the Panny BD35 indicates that it can output PCM or bitstream for DTS HD Master so if it's set to bitstream and the title has a DTS HD track and you've selected it, the DTS HD light should come on.

For the PS3 all decoding is internal so the light won't come on but the audio will still be lossless

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Dingbatt

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Reply # 209846 27-Apr-2009 17:53

whatty: I watched this film this past weekend and it has a DTS MA sound track. Just set your amp to multi chan and all will be good.

Not sure about the Panna BD35 and whether it decodes this but with a PS3 set to PCM and onkyo to multi all good for me.

You should see "Multichannel PCM" on your Onkyo.

What a corny movie! Looks good though.

I don't have a PS3. Does it tell you what data stream it is decoding to LPCM? Because what I'm trying to ascertain is if the English DTS-MA 5.1 track has been replaced by a DTS 5.1 one (even though the audio options setup menu on the disk says DTS-HD(MA)). Wouldn't using LPCM mean the receiver is just getting 5.1 channels of something?

Ichiu7: A quick scan of the Panny BD35 indicates that it can output PCM or bitstream for DTS HD Master so if it's set to bitstream and the title has a DTS HD track and you've selected it, the DTS HD light should come on.

For the PS3 all decoding is internal so the light won't come on but the audio will still be lossless

I just assumed that since both the BD35 and the SR606 have DTS-HD(MA) logos on them that they would pass bitstream and all would be good. The BD35 will not decode to LPCM that I'm aware of (certainly can't decode to analogue).

As for the movie, yup more corn than a field full of cobs, but I was looking forward to hearing the attack on Darwin in HD glory

.

Might just have to try a different movie to see if it's my settings or not.

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lchiu7

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Reply # 209876 27-Apr-2009 19:00

Dingbatt:

I just assumed that since both the BD35 and the SR606 have DTS-HD(MA) logos on them that they would pass bitstream and all would be good. The BD35 will not decode to LPCM that I'm aware of (certainly can't decode to analogue).

Not sure the US version would be any different to the NZ version but according to this site

http://www2.panasonic.com/consumer-electronics/shop/Video/Blu-ray-Disc-Players/model.DMP-BD35K_11002_7000000000000005702

The BD35 outputs DTS HD Master as PCM or Bitstream. So if you by chance set your BD35 to output PCM then the BD35 is decoding the DTS HD signal and your 606 won't see a DTS stream at all - just multi-channel PCM (over HDMI of course)

Analogue is quite a different kettle of fish - the player would need to have good DACs in it and of course have 6 analogue output connectors.

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whatty

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Reply # 209889 27-Apr-2009 19:33

You are using HDMI for your sound o/p?

paul151

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Reply # 209950 27-Apr-2009 21:02

I've just got a 606 and apart from an Eagles DVD we have at home have not seen too many DVD's or Blueray disks down at the local video shop with more than 5.1 Dolby on them. Very few seem to come with DTS audio. Notably a number of blueray disks also just carry the standard 5.1 audio not the HD variant - this even for quite recent titles released to blueray.

Agree with comments about about checking your audio source for correct output.. just to be sure.

Sorry don't have this film, not would want to hire it to test out the theory.

Dingbatt

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Reply # 209963 27-Apr-2009 21:16

Yes to hdmi.

Thanks for clearing up the lpcm bit. I was getting confused between lpcm via hdmi and pure analogue.

Still doesn't answer my initial query though. Was there a DTS-HD track on the disk or just a DTS one?

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Batman

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Reply # 209992 27-Apr-2009 22:08

dts-hd(ma) for sure. watched it this afternoon and it was awesome. lossless audio!

you need to
- SELECT the dts-HD audio track when playing the show. usually the default track is the compressed dts track and you have to either tell the player to always select HD track or do it each time.

note: if you're outputing via bitstream the dts-hd word should appear on your onkyo. if you're outputing via lpcm it wont light up.

Swype on iOS is detrimental to accurate typing. Apologies in advance.

jonathan18

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Reply # 210259 28-Apr-2009 16:52

Dingbatt: The most recent being "Twilight" in Aussie, according to one thread.
Fox was particularly mentioned and "Australia" is a 20thCentury/Fox product.

Apparently the same problem on this disc in NZ (not that I'll ever rent it!) - see http://audioenz.co.nz/forums/showthread.php?t=8036

Have you had any luck in getting the appropriate audio of "Austraila" playing yet? I'm yet to plug in a BD35 I bought in the weekend, so hope this isn't a struggle!

Dingbatt

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Reply # 210280 28-Apr-2009 17:38

I'll have to have another look at the bd35 because I thought I had it set up correctly. Bitstream for all the audio types and no in the second language.
I wonder if the firmware needs updating?

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KracsNZ

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Reply # 210409 29-Apr-2009 08:00

Yep, definitely a DTS MA 5.1 track, watch this piece or... ah... silly movie last night. PS3's onscreen display showed it was decoding DTS-MA 5.1.

Dingbatt

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Reply # 210656 29-Apr-2009 20:10

KracsNZ: Yep, definitely a DTS MA 5.1 track, watch this piece or... ah... silly movie last night. PS3's onscreen display showed it was decoding DTS-MA 5.1.

Cool, thanks for that. It means it is a setting I need to track down in my setup. I have a couple of possible culprits but I thought they were only to do with PCM (downsampling 96 to 48 kHz, downmixing, or secondary audio).
I don't particularly want to hire the same 'movie' again (it was bad enough first time) so I might give another title a try. As I said at the beginning of the thread this is the first instance I have tried to play a BD with HD audio through the 606 from the BD35.

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KracsNZ

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Reply # 210724 29-Apr-2009 22:03

I gather you already tried changing the audio tracks, I have to do this for a few BDs on my PS3 as it sometimes defaults to a lossy track.

Also, have you updated the firmware on your BD35, currently update 1.4 and it includes a fix for HD decoding.

http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/bd/download/bd35/bd35_asia.html (this patch says oceania/taiwan, so guessing thats the right one).

Can go here for the others...
http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/bd/download/bd35/index.html

Stability of decoding for HD audio, etc.

Dingbatt

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Reply # 210810 30-Apr-2009 09:46

KracsNZ: I gather you already tried changing the audio tracks, I have to do this for a few BDs on my PS3 as it sometimes defaults to a lossy track.

Also, have you updated the firmware on your BD35, currently update 1.4 and it includes a fix for HD decoding.

http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/bd/download/bd35/bd35_asia.html (this patch says oceania/taiwan, so guessing thats the right one).

Can go here for the others...
http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/bd/download/bd35/index.html

Stability of decoding for HD audio, etc.

Yes I have downloaded version 1.4 firmware but haven't installed it yet. I may have to give it a go. I will give panasonic a ring and make sure that is the correct one before I do.

Edit: How 1990s of me

. I just connected my ethernet cable thinking I would have hassles with IP addresses etc (like I did with my Samsung), and lo and behold the bd35 just automatically logged on and is downloading the update as I type.

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Dingbatt

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Reply # 210935 30-Apr-2009 16:11

SOLVED.

The firmware update made no difference.

In the end it was the Viera-link that was causing the problem. I don't use the viera-link to control the blu-ray with the TV (it sees it though) but I do use it to control the receiver. The viera-link audio setting for the blu-ray player was set to TV, as soon as I changed it to Home Theater viola the HD formats appeared on the 606. I assume the BD35 was looking through the 606 to the TV for its audio settings, as soon as I broke that link all was good.

Funny how systems that are supposed to make things simpler sometimes just don't.

Thanks to all above for your assistance, particularly letting me know the disk was okay so I could dig deeper into my system setup.

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