Recently I had my dad and one of his friends over and was showing them how good high def looks over my tower antenna that I just put up. Then I said, "wait until you see blu-ray it looks even better". So, I go to my collection of blu-rays and realize that I don't know what scenes are good demo scenes in any new blu-rays. I was fumbling around and just pulled out Crank and cranked up the volume at some random scene at the beginning and they weren't all that impressed audio-wise. You see, even if the audio sounds great (and Crank definitely does) it isn't necessarily a good demo scene. Another example is Pirates of the Caribbean 1. Any scene is great for a video demo but there aren't any good audio demos in this movie. Don't get me wrong, the audio sounds great but there aren't any good demo scenes.

With dvd I used to just pop in Master and Commander chapter 4 with the dts audio and this was an amazing demo scene. But, this isn't available on blu-ray yet. When it is available then it probably will be on the short list for demo scenes.

A good demo scene has to have good use of the sub and surrounds. It also has to have good pans across the front and from front to back or back to front. Hopefully the Blu-ray also has top notch video as well in that particular scene.

I'll start the list and hopefully others can come up with better ones than me.

1. Cars chapter 25

In this scene Doc races around a dirt track while Lightning McQueen watches in the distance. You get all of above effects as Doc races around the track in the uncompressed pcm 5.1 and it sounds great.

2. Spiderman 3 where sandman is created in the particle thing-a-ma-jig

I don't know the chapter since I don't own this title. If people are prone to motion sickness you may want to skip this one for them. I only heard this soundtrack on the dvd in dolby 5.1 and was blown away. I can't wait to hear this in uncompressed 5.1 on Blu-ray. I should get around to getting the spiderman trilogy on Blu-ray soon.

- Nick

Once Ironman comes out on Blu, that will be an amazing demo movie. Transformers comes out in the fall, that again will be an amazing demo as well.

The sound effects were pretty amazing in Cloverfield for the regular DVD, I'm buying the Blu-ray version when it comes out on 6/3.

Underworld comes to mind just now, I think that is out on bluray right? The scene when michael gets bit by that liken that is supposed to be dead, forget his name, in the elevator. AFter that there is a bit of a chase, and MAN, the sub presurizes the room with this loop of music that is playing in the background, as well as the surrounds being very active. That movie has some stellar demo material for sure.

Thanks for the suggestions. But, what I am looking for is a scene that is at most 5 to 10 minutes on a Blu-ray that audio-wise is on par with Master and Commander chapter 4. In that scene the cannons are firing gut-wrenching LFE and when the cannon balls hit the ship you can hear the destruction all around you due to the good use of the surrounds. You feel like you are in the middle of all of this chaos. This is a scene where you need to wipe the drool from your chin when it is over. That is what I am looking for on a Blu-ray disc.

- Nick

Master and Commander B/R is in stock at Amazon.

I quite like the first Helicopter crash scene from Black Hawk Down.

I've been going through this same search... first, as was mentioned before, Master & Commander is out now on Blu-Ray. I don't have this one yet, but do plan on getting it on Netflix and most likely ultimately buying it.

One of the best room-filling bass scenes I have heard is on the Hitman Blu-Ray. There is a gunfight scene that includes a background soundtrack that just plain rumbles the room. The scene runs about 2-3 minutes. For me, it's better than the Blackhawk down scene, which I also like, but it's not quite as good. Hitman is currently my #1 demo disc for this scene. Highly recommended.

Jason

Maybe this is an odd question, but if you have to search for special scenes to show off your HD audio capabilities, are the new HD formats really any better than the standard 5.1 stuff??

The opening scene of Hart's War - right from the very beginning - is amazing. Because it's a field in winter (something most of us are very familiar with) - the crispness of the image is just unbelieveable. That one might fit the bill.

Them be fightin' words.

Fred, even with tracks in an HD format, I still find that the quality varies quite a bit, especially when listening to older movies that are re-released onto Blu-Ray. Some masters use the LFE channel a lot better than others.

I should also have mentioned the Dave Matthews Band Live at Radio City Music Hall Blu-Ray. This was recommended to me on the forums when I first picked up my Axioms, and it remains one of my favorite demos for musical material (without a lot of bass). Because it's mostly acoustical guitar, it is not going to show off your subwoofer, but the quality of the audio track (Dolby TrueHD) is otherwise stunning.

The audio is so detailed that you can hear the pick moving across the strings of the guitar and the surround effect of the music hall is very well-integrated into the audio track as well. In my opinion, it is another must-have to show off your Axiom system (on my M80s, it is just plain awesome).

Amie, thanks for the suggestion on Hart's War... it's going on my Netflix queue today.