Is 1.3 hdmi necessary for Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio?

I use my PS3 for my Bluray/dvd player. I just ordered some V5 Paradigm Monitors,pair of Titans,CC-290,and a pair of mini monitors for my surrounds.I am now in the market for a new receiver. Is 1.3 hdmi necessary for Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio? If not,what receivers are able to process the new HD audio formats? What should I look into buying?

[Snatcher]

As a short answer, no you don't need HDMI 1.3 to get the full quality of HD audio releases. What you need to know, is that teh source for those lossless compression tracks is a PCM track. All HD players need to decompress those dformats to PCM for internal processing. Unlike with DVD, the player decompresses the audio and mixes in real time the menu sounds, PiP audio or any other such track, and can pass the uncompressed PCM via HDMI or the analog outputs.

if you have a 1.3 HDMI receiver, and have it set up to receive True HD or DTS MA teh player needs to recompress the audio to either format and send it over via HDMI. So there is nothing to gain from it. You can as well use a receiver capable of getting Pure PCM via HDMI and you are done. Just make sure that it supports what you need (for instance, some receivers like teh Onlyo 604 only allow 5.1 PCM up to 88 Khz, while the Yamaha RX-V1700 allows 7.1 @192 Khz, might help you out if you use SACD as well)

[Face]

So when I select TRU HD audio in DVD setup(NIN's "Beside you in time" HD DVD), is my receiver receiving TRU HD through optical?

[Snatcher]

Face wrote:

So when I select TRU HD audio in DVD setup(NIN's "Beside you in time" HD DVD), is my receiver receiving TRU HD through optical?

Unfortunately no. You are recieving eirther Dolby Digital or DTS. It depends on the player, and in some cases it depends on its options. The usual output bitrates are 652 (or around that) for Dolby Digital and 1.5 mbps for DTS. The optical can only carry 1.5 mbps, and True HD is higher than that. The original PCM from which the True HD is generated is around 6 mbps and lossless audio compression would reduce that to something no lower than 2.5 mbps. The only options so far are:

1) Use PCM trough HDMI
2) Use analogs
3) Use a receiver that can decode True HD, but this is just doing work twice with no benefits from #1, since the player has to decode everything to PCM internaly, and later encode it again to True HD, send it over to the receiver and the rceiver has to redecode it to PCM.

[Face]

Thanks for the reply!

I have considered upgrading my receiver to one that can decode TRU HD and that has pre-outs so I can upgrade to some real speakers.

Thanks for your help.

[MACCA350]

Face wrote:

Thanks for the reply!

I have considered upgrading my receiver to one that can decode TRU HD and that has pre-outs so I can upgrade to some real speakers.

Thanks for your help.

Does you're receiver have HDMI(any version)?
if yes then you can already take advantage of the Dolby TrueHD tracks. As it's already been stated you're player will decode and output the uncompressed high resolution multichannel PCM over HDMI(any version).

Just to add, Any Blu-ray disc mastered as Player Profile 1.1(or higher) or HD DVD disc mastered as 'Advanced content' will NOT allow the player to output the RAW Bitstream of audio data(ie Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HDMA, etc) because these advanced features allow the mixing of audio tracks and this can only be done in the player. therefore any disc encoded this way will force the player to decode the RAW data, mix internally then output as high resolution multichannel PCM over HDMI or the analogue outputs and re-encode as DD or DTS and output over SPDIF.

Here is an excerpt from the HDMI FAQ's:

Q: Do I need v1.3 HDMI to hear the new Dolby TrueHD and DTS Master HD audio content on HD-DVD or BluRay players?

No. The Dolby TrueHD, Dolby Digita Plus, and DTS-HD Master Audio can be decoded by the playback device into multi-channel Pulse Code Modulation (PCM) digital audio streams, which is an audio format standard that can be sent over any version of HDMI. In fact, all versions of HDMI can support up to 8 channels of PCM audio at 192kHz, 24 bits per samples.

Now to the 'Advanced content' thing.
All HD-DVD discs that are produced are mastered as 'advanced content'(HDI)

Many Blu-ray discs that are produced now(it is believed this will increase to ALL once the Java profile comes online) are mastered as 'profile 1.1'(or higher)

What are they:
Here is a brief summery of HD-DVD's 'advanced content'(HDI)

High Definition Advanced Content is where the difference really lies. HD DVD Advanced Content is no more DVD than VHS is to DVD. It is a totally new and a very complex ball game. First is its ability to interact on many different levels.

The authoring platform is called HDI for High Definition Interactivity. Invented by the Disney studios and Microsoft it is more akin to the HTML environment for web development. It is really a whole new way of writing code and code writing is what the game is all about.

Whether it is picture in picture or “floating” popup menus the authoring process begins with the writing of a computer program that’s one purpose is to play your HD video on a DVD disc. This is where the majority of the “authoring” cost lie. Until you see it, you won’t understand how the new features of HD DVD really make a DVD presentation shine like never before. It is simply beautiful, albeit somewhat expensive.

Here is a summery of Blu-ray's profiles:

The BD-ROM specification defines four profiles of Blu-ray players. All video-based profiles are required to have a full implementation of BD-J.

1.0

This is the basic profile that all current Blu-ray players (as of March 2007) are based on. Players based on this profile are only required to have 64 KBof application data area storage, which is typically used for bookmarks and other preference storage[2]. Most players have more than the minimum required 64KB.

1.1 (mandatory November 2007)

Profile 1.1 adds a secondary video decoder (for PIP), secondary audio (for commentary) and local storage (for storing audio/video and title updates) of 256 MB. Compliance with this profile will be mandatory for player models introduced to the market after October 31, 2007[3], but existing products will be unaffected. No players compliant with this profile have been announced or released.

Some profile 1.0 players may be upgradeable via firmware update to profile 1.1. When software authored with interactive features dependent on Profile 1.1 hardware capabilities are played on profile 1.0 players some features may not be available or may offer limited capability (i.e. director commentary may provide only audio rather than audio and video). Profile 1.0 players will still be able to play the main feature of the disc, however.

2.0 (BD-Live)

Profile 2, also known as BD-Live, adds network connectivity to the list of mandatory functions and increases mandatory local storage capability to one GB. No released players have been announced as compatible with this profile. However it has been speculated that the PS3 will be upgradeable to this profile.

All this Advanced Content stuff is what the high definition formats are all about. In addition to the HD picture and the lossless sound you get a plethora of interactive options.

So you can see that even if you fork out for a HDMI 1.3 capable receiver you may not be able to use its on-board decoding of these formats. Thats not to say that there is anything against buying a HDMI 1.3 receiver if you don't have a HDMI receiver now, but if you are buying it purely for the ability to have the receiver decode the RAW DD TrueHD or DTS-HDMA tracks you will be in for a disappointment.

cheers

[Jack Gilvey]

Nice post!

[Jack Gilvey]

Just make sure that it supports what you need (for instance, some receivers like teh Onlyo 604 only allow 5.1 PCM up to 88 Khz, while the Yamaha RX-V1700 allows 7.1 @192 Khz, might help you out if you use SACD as well)

I would agree that if the new audio codecs are desired, it's far more important to get a great LPCM receiver than to worry about 1.3. Cheapest I've seen is the Yamaha RX-V661. It'll accept 7.1 LPCM up to 24/196 as well as DSD from SACD (not sure what'd send it, though). It will also post-process a 5.1 PCM feed into 7.1 via DPL IIx. ~$400 street.