Are You Ready for 13.1 Sound?

[James Fee]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.joystiq.com/entry/1234000310026429/' target='_blank'>http://www.joystiq.com/entry/1234000310026429/</a><br /><br /></div><i>"Dolby Digital Plus builds on the original Dolby Digital specifications, allowing for higher bit rates and more channels. Dolby Digital Plus has a maximum bit rate of 6mbps, and support for 13.1 channels. In comparison, Dolby Digital caps out at 640kbps and 5.1 channels. So Dolby Digital Plus essentially provides 10 times the bandwidth of the original Dolby Digital. The new format also allows for extremely low bit rate multichannel sound for streaming on the Web or over the air. The benefits of the Dolby Digital Plus codec include transient prenoise processing, enhanced channel coupling, adaptive hybrid transform processing, and channel and program extensions."</i><br /><br />Ok, this is getting a little overboard. I mean really, who has room for 13 speakers in an average house? :roll:

[Filip Norrgard]

Hmmm... isn't 13 the number for bad luck? ;)

[Philip Colmer]

I remember reading an article about Dolby's future plans and the idea is that the speakers aren't just on the walls - they start being fitted into the ceiling.

They did some blind tests, i.e. where the listener was placed in a dark room, and the audio really was all-encompassing.

That said, has anyone actually seen any 7.1 material yet?

--Philip

[Doug Johnson]

According to the Dolby web site, there isn't any true 7.1 with Dolby Digital. The 7.1 speaker setups actually send the same signal to the two rear speakers.

http://www.dolby.com/consumer/technology/dolby_ex.html

In any case, here are the listings of Dolby Digital EX encoded movies (6.1 or 7.1 depending on your definition):

http://www.dolby.com/consumer/motion_picture/listing_upcoming.html
http://www.dolby.com/consumer/motion_picture/listing_opening.html
http://www.dolby.com/consumer/motion_picture/listing_previously.html