Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Denon 3806 Surround Modes question

Hi folks, I have been lurking since my first posts because my house took an extra month to finish up. Thanks to everyone who helped me decide on the choices I went with. Now that I'm up and running, let me first say, SWEET!!!


My setup still needs tweaking but equipement =
- Denon 3806
- M60s, 150, and EP500 front line
- Harmon Kardon Bookshelf surrounds
- Sony Satellites for back surrounds (I may give up on these and go back to 5.1)
- Mid end at best, Panasonic DVD player with optical patch to receiver. Does progressive scan, 5.1 & DTS and the usual CD, CD-r, etc.

Denon Specific Question
--When I play something in Dolby Digital 5.1 (Star Wars III) the receiver defaults to [Dolby Digital EX / +PLIIx] I first confused this as wrong because I associated the PLII acronym with Pro Logic II that I would have thought was for converting stereo sources into simulated 5.1. However, the manual states that this is a correct decoder for 5.1 or DTS sources. I'm OK with that now but can someone elaborate a bit more, I'm curious?

Further, when I play say, War of the Worlds, and choose DTS from the setup menu, I still get [Dolby Digital EX / +PLIIx] . The manual does say this is a valid decoder for DTS but it also lists other modes such as [DTS-ES DSCRT 6.1...], [DTS Surround], [DTS 96/24], [DTS+PLIIx1] and [DTS Neo]. I'm not up on what the variations are. Manual only mentions neo as a music based decoder.

Now I'm not sure if I should be able to, but try as I may, I can't fidget the receiver in any way to have it display a DTS labeled. That is with the exception of the "neo" choice but I lose a lot of the depth for movies in that mode. Not sure I like it for concerts either.

Should I expect to see it automatically switch to a DTS mode and actually display something different or is [Dolby Digital+PLIIx] going to be my decoder for both 5.1 and DTS formats?

Thanks again ! Hopefully someday, I will be able to contribute instead of ask questions.

Andrew

Hi Andrew. Congrats on the new system.

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--When I play something in Dolby Digital 5.1 (Star Wars III) the receiver defaults to [Dolby Digital EX / +PLIIx] I first confused this as wrong because I associated the PLII acronym with Pro Logic II that I would have thought was for converting stereo sources into simulated 5.1. However, the manual states that this is a correct decoder for 5.1 or DTS sources. I'm OK with that now but can someone elaborate a bit more, I'm curious?

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I believe this is normal for a 7.1 setup. It happens because you've told your receiver that you have rear surrounds, so it automatically chooses a format that utilizes those rear surrounds.

Quote:

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Further, when I play say, War of the Worlds, and choose DTS from the setup menu, I still get [Dolby Digital EX / +PLIIx] . The manual does say this is a valid decoder for DTS but it also lists other modes such as [DTS-ES DSCRT 6.1...], [DTS Surround], [DTS 96/24], [DTS+PLIIx1] and [DTS Neo]. I'm not up on what the variations are. Manual only mentions neo as a music based decoder.

Now I'm not sure if I should be able to, but try as I may, I can't fidget the receiver in any way to have it display a DTS labeled. That is with the exception of the "neo" choice but I lose a lot of the depth for movies in that mode. Not sure I like it for concerts either.

Should I expect to see it automatically switch to a DTS mode and actually display something different or is [Dolby Digital+PLIIx] going to be my decoder for both 5.1 and DTS formats?

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This, on the other hand, doesn't sound normal to me. If you've selected the DTS option in the disc's menu, your receiver should automatically switch to DTS, DTS ES, or DTS+PLIIx1 and show "DTS" in it's display. I'm not a Denon owner, so I am unable to tell you how to correct this situation, but I'm reasonably sure it is correctable. We have a number of Denon owners here, and I suspect several of them will be along shortly and they'll be more help than I.

Hey Murph, I can try this myself on my 2805. I thought there was a way to cycle through various options, either by hitting the "rear channel" button in the lower right corner of the remote, or by hitting the "standard" or "cinema" buttons. I'll have to give it a try some night or this weekend, if I can find time.

Murph, under the front panel on your Denon 3806 there is a button that says mode, when you are in DVD press this until you see auto on the screen, this should make the receiver go to the sound format you chose on the DVD, it should also display DTS on your Denon.

Is it possible that you don't have DTS enabled in the DVD player setup?

Thanks for the replies so far. I'll double check pressing the mode button. If I remember correctly, I had been pressing it and auto is the only setting I get any sound from.

I'll definitely check the DVD player. I don't remember having to turn it on historically but it has been sitting in storage for 5 months so if ever was a setting I fixed before, I'm sure it would have been lost.

Thanks again

Yep you want it on Auto, however, to the right of that there is a button for the "Rear" speakers, I think if you cycle by pushing you get various options like Matrix ON, Matrix Off, Off, On, etc... Also, if you click the Cinema button or Standard button you cycle back/forth from Dolby/DTS.

I would think that if you select DTS from the DVD menu, the receiver should recognize this, I need to test this soon, you've got me curious.

I’m betting you didn’t select DTS on the DVD audio set menu. DTS is ‘usually’ an optional format for the few disks that have it. DD and DTS are both on the disk and you have to tell the player which format you want to listen to.

If you are selecting DTS and your display still shows Dolby, I’m guessing your display is messed up. Dolby can not extract DTS coding. Both formats are proprietary from what I understand.

I went back and checked the DVD player settings. I discovered two places where I had the option of choosing Digital Bit Stream output or PCM. One was set for Bit Stream, the other to PCM. When I choose Bit Stream for both options, I was able to get my receiver to recognize the DTS format.

I'm not sure what PCM was (I might even be forgetting the proper acronym as I didn't sleep much with all that music blaring, LOL.) However, for experimental sake I also tried PCM for both output settings and couldn't get a peep in any mode from the receiver.

Thanks for all the great suggestions. I now have

You may have tried this. When you start the War of the Worlds DVD, you should see a "menu" screen for the disc itself (not the DVD player). There should be a selection that says something like: Languages or Setup or Audio Options, each DVD is different. Scroll down and select that option. You will see a variety of choices. One should be: DTS .... Select DTS. Now play the movie. The receiver should now play the DTS sound track. Hope this helps.

Glad to see you got it figured out.

Andrew, good you got it. Yes, PCM is Pulse Code Modulation(that explains everything, right?). Well, a bit(intended)oversimplified, but adequate in this context, Bitstream means digital multichannel information and PCM means digital stereo; the two are both digital, but are encoded differently. So, if the player was set to send PCM stereo, but the receiver was trying to find and decode Bitstream multichannel, nothing resulted.

Elaborating on the DPLIIx point, DPLII is used to extract natural ambience from two channel material and steer it to side and back(if present)surrounds, where it belongs. If the material is five channel, DPLIIx is in effect and the three front channels are unaffected. The side surround channels discretely already contain the surround information and DPLIIx processes them to extract the information which should image in back, sending it to the back surround speakers in "stereo" form.

And to complicate things further, HD dvd introduces lossless multi channel PCM. I can't tell you a damn thing about it because I don't understand any of it.....But that you need HDMI to hear it. I can't get mine to work, but I hear it sounds great.

I hate HDMI. < I think I'm gunna make a signature out of that.

Thanks everyone. You guys rock!
Unless, of course, your more of a classical kind of person.
Then you ummm, well then You Bach!

Sorry, that was really bad, I know.

I would have gone with Rach (...maninoff), myself.

Yes Andrew, I Rach a lot more than I Bach.

Personally, I Bach a lot more than I Rach.

I'm with John and Peter on this one, sorry Ken.

No one respects the classics.