Opeth - Pale Communion 5.1 (Blu-ray)

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Can we move all this technical stuff to another thread please? I appreciate its relevant to this disc but it's all general and great stuff too, deserves it's own sweet sticky thread, imho (y)
 
This thread was growing faster then I could keep up this morning... I have been gone this weekend but tried the disc on Friday before heading out-of-town. Changing from the 5.1 to stereo on the blu-ray showed the obvious missing bass or something in the 5.1 mix. I woke up today trying different things and actually went as far as recording the LFE output by my Involve Surround unit when playing the stereo track and then placing just the LFE in the 5.1 mix... gave me more "thud' but definitely not the answer. THEN I read this thread and tried reversing the phase on the FL and LFE (a simple button selection in Vegas). "Whala" there it is! I do not have full range (large) speakers but have always felt more then compensated with two subs, each packing 350 watts a piece. I haven't ever had problems with any media 4.0, 5.0, 5.1, etc. until this disc. The substantial difference of fixing the phase (which by the way, when a channel is out-of-phase it actually cancels out the other channels playing the opposite phase). While I have now fixed this VERY GOOD music to play right, thank you list, I still have a disc that is defective. Writing to the powers to be for a replacement. Thank you folks for all the testing and final solution (or at least a much better solution so far). Let me also say this again as it was worth all the hours this AM to try and fix myself, this music is VERY GOOD!
 
Well, I have 2 issues now. First, I'm disappointed that I can't pick up the issue with out of phase channels. Is it possible that I don't hear the lack of bass so much as I have my speakers set to small and the sub is handling the lower frequencies? Or is it more likely that my hearing is not what it used to be?

Second, I don't think I can adjust the phase on my REL quake sub as it is connected via a coaxial cable and I didn't find a way to swap the phase in the amp (Denon AVR2310).

Also, I'm seriously considering not pre-ordering any more. This is what the fourth disc now that has had a fault.

Just curious, what were the other 3?
 
I think I was the first one here to point out the phase issue since it's very noticeable and irritating to me.

The title of "King" has already been taken by steelydave but there is an opening for a "Duke" in honor of your contribution. Well done Nimbatus!

Duke.jpg
 
I accept your nomination!

Under my benevolent rule, no dynamic ranges will be below 14, mixing will be discrete and releases will be cheap and plentiful!

Oh my. You've really outdone yourself. We'll have to get the by-laws amended to allow for a longer term than just a day ;)

King.jpg
 
Opeth - new album "Pale Communion"

According to this thread, Steven Wilson was notified and the problem was indeed with the authoring of the Blu-ray disc, not Paschal's mastering. I've forward my email from several days ago to Opeth's management, though I'm sure they've already been contacted. I suspect we'll get some official announcement on Opeth's website soon enough on a course of action for owner's of the defective disc.
 
Nope, I asked Stereoboutique about this, but have not received an answer yet.

Good luck with that. StereoBoutique are a pain to deal with. I emailed them last Tuesday (yes a whole week ago) regarding my Vinyl arriving damaged and still no response. It took them until Thursday to send me an email 'confirming' they received my email and will respond within 2 working days.

The previous time I contacted them, regarding the supposed 'bonus tracks' download from the latest Mastodon album they didn't even address the issue. Plus I had to chase them up for a refund on shipping, in which they offered because they delayed shipment of the album for a week.
 
Is it just me, or does the center look a little weird also. It looks like some of the peaks are clipped off.

No, it looks like there was an analogue device in there somewhere.
This is the problem with looking at a mix instead of listening to it! Looking at pictures will not tell you how it sounds.
 
I'm running my BD optical for now, No HDMI and only 1 set of multichannel inputs on my AVR. Only lossy DD and DTS on my BD player unless I get an analog multichannel switcher or a new AVR. If a disk has DTS, I never listen to the DD, so I hadn't listened to Heritage DD. Lossy apples to apples comparison. The Heritage DTS sound much better on my system and if Pale Communion had DTS I think it would too.

This is only my third BD so I haven't felt the need to address my sub par BD player hookup yet.

Seriously?
You're running audio out of a blu-ray player using optical?
No wonder it sounds like crap, as you are playing AC3 not lossless. Here's the skinny with these codec forms:
Blu-ray supports multichannel at up to 24/192 5.1 and 24/96 7.1 via analogue outputs or HDMI *only*.
No lossless audio is output at all down "legacy" connections such as optical lightpipe/ADAT & CoAxial, simply because it has to be disabled otherwise some streams would work & others would not -= this is a bandwidth issue..With both DTS-HD Master Audio & Dolby True HD Multichannel streams only the hidden core audio stream has mandatory support. This means you can have the True HD or the DTS-HD MA lights up but be hearing lossy audio. In both codecs, only core is mandated. This cannot be overstated.

Moving on, whoever set a dialnorm of -27 needs shooting as well - this is a default setting designed for film, and all music should be at -31.
DRC settings should be set to "music light" in the codec, and set to OFF in the players. Setting to "none" will - if DRC is left on in the player or amplifier - cause the "film standard" DRC profile to be applied.
Having any form of player or amplifier bass management on a full range system is equally stupid.

As to LPCM 5.1, this is our preferred way but we also add DTS-HD MA & default to this precisely because there are people who have got players hooked up via inadequate connections.
Almost all Blu-Ray issues are player related or setup related.
 
Bought the BD/CD on SW spec today, first Opeth album purchase. $25 AU off the shelf in Australia ($23 US, 14 GBP). I only have 'Storm Corrosion', but I knew that's not a true representation of Opeths/Akerfeldt material.

My 4.0 set-up sounds full and has depth, and musically I'm happy as well. Definite Tull keyboard influence on first listen.
Solid surround mix, with some nice treatment of delayed instruments to expand the field.

As for the font/typesetting... :mad:@: impossible.
 
I have ripped and analyzed the wave files and can confirm with certainty that both the Front Left and LFE channels have their polarity reversed with respect to the others. Also the Center channel has been limited to -3.25 dB.

Here's a sample image (from top to bottom: RS, LS, FR, FL, LFE, center channel not shown):
Opeth.png
 
Thanks to everyone for the debug and analysis. I had come to a similar conclusion on my own, but had no way to extract the waveforms to confirm.

I found that with my speakers set to "small" (how I usually run them), I got very little bass. The sub was very quiet. As soon as I set my speaker to "large", the bass became much more prominent. But, the additional bass wasn't coming from FL/FR... the sub was actually MORE active. The only way this is possible is if the low frequencies from different channels were actually cancelling eachother out. Of course, it is still possible for bass to acoustically cancel each other out in the room, but that wasn't happening too much in my room.

Has anyone heard back from Roadrunner on this issue? It would really be nice to get a corrected disk. The "workaround" isn't too painful, but I will likely play the album less because of it.
 
I have ripped and analyzed the wave files and can confirm with certainty that both the Front Left and LFE channels have their polarity reversed with respect to the others. Also the Center channel has been limited to -3.25 dB.

Here's a sample image (from top to bottom: RS, LS, FR, FL, LFE, center channel not shown):
View attachment 15993

Can you mail that pic to Roadrunner? :)
Thank you for your work.
 
Likewise, I emailed Opeth's management. I don't think it will take very long for some kind of acknowledgement and official announcement.

I've experienced defective discs in the past. Rush's Sectors Box Set comes to mind. It had several defective discs in it. Instead of requiring owners to return entire boxsets to their points of purchase, the band's management and label setup contact information for the specific defective discs to be mailed for corrected replacements. I'm not sure what RoadRunner will do in this case, but hopefully they figure out something quickly.
 
I have ripped and analyzed the wave files and can confirm with certainty that both the Front Left and LFE channels have their polarity reversed with respect to the others. Also the Center channel has been limited to -3.25 dB.

Here's a sample image (from top to bottom: RS, LS, FR, FL, LFE, center channel not shown):
View attachment 15993
Could you explain a bit for the people unfamiliar with this. You can see that the FL is out of phase because it has a mirrored image of the FR/LS/RS? Thanks.
 
Could you explain a bit for the people unfamiliar with this. You can see that the FL is out of phase because it has a mirrored image of the FR/LS/RS? Thanks.
Yes, usually the bass is mixed at similar levels and at the same phase since it anchors the mix. Mixing completely out of phase (phase inversion) results in a mirroring of the waveform, and sonically it can be used to create a certain special effect when listening to both sources at the same distance. That's not the case with this mix, since this phenomemon occurs all along the album (I checked it) only with these channels, and says that somewhere during mastering they ended up being inverted.
 
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