Listening to Now (In Dolby Atmos)

[himey]

That was the answer. I re-ripped Abbey Road as one unit and gapless play back was perfect. The good news is the video with the rip, in this case, showed each song title so looking at the video portion as I was listening I knew exactly what song I was at.
Good day today as I learned a lot.

Change the chapter #'s to song titles using MMH, "edit chapters in MKV".

 

[marpow]

Listening to Lennon's Gimme Some Truth. A ripped digital file. Playing from JRiver. MKV video file. DR avg 17 of the Blu Ray rip.
TruHD7.1 rip for the Atmos layer.
Still having some minor tagging issues using MMH (Music Media Helper) some of the tabs, got renamed and new ones appear. I just need to reaquaint myself with MMH.

 

[himey]

Listening to Lennon's Gimme Some Truth. A ripped digital file. Playing from JRiver. MKV video file. DR avg 17 of the Blu Ray rip.
TruHD7.1 rip for the Atmos layer.
Still having some minor tagging issues using MMH (Music Media Helper) some of the tabs, got renamed and new ones appear. I just need to reaquaint myself with MMH.

tabs?

 

[AXington]

I also use MKV's for my Atmos rips. I use Kodi. Kodi can play Atmos audio only rips but I haven't found a way to have them play gapless, so I use MKV for now, and edit all the chapters to the song titles.

I just stumbled across the new Atmos 16 channel processors because @ted_b posted he was looking for one with balanced connector's. I started reading the reviews and the HDMI problem stuck out because that would be a total deal breaker for me. That was a week or two ago and I haven't followed up.

Personally, I think Atmos is first generation stuff, and I am not going to invest that much in this format. The process from going from 2D to 3D shouldn't rely on a local process, it should be done in the studio with higher quality processors. We already went through this with quad and SQ, QS and other non-discrete formats. To me it seems like a sales gimmick to get you to buy an infinite number of speakers. Eventually, quadraphonic went from decoding two channels into four, to 7.1 discrete channels. Until that happens with 3D, where all my channels have been processed in the studio properly, rather than relying on different chips at home, I will not break the bank. Hopefully the next generation 3D audio will be 16 discrete channels or something resembling it.

That's not how 3D audio works at all. Since it's object based, for the studios to pre-process it, everyone would have to have the exact same setup, basically. The speakers would all have to be the same efficiency, the positions would have to be pretty exact and dampening and dispersion would have to be roughly the same. The height speakers would have to be at the exact same height...

The reason for this is that each sound is considered an "object" and it places that object into 3D space based off your setup and what it knows about that. The reason for adding insane amounts of speakers? Pretty simple, because with each set it can get more and more accurate with the placement of those objects.

Otherwise, you just have a pre-rendered track selection, which would probably come to consumers as 5.1.2, and then have to be upmixed to go beyond that. Same with most 5.1 audio content and 7.1 or 9.1 etc setups.

With object based audio it can also make actual use of however many channels are available without upmixing.

Really though, it's a new technology and sound engineers, masters, mixers, and end users have to change their entire way of thinking about how mixes are done. Simply put, you can't really pre-render it because it will heavily rely on your setup. But also, this kind of sounds a bit like mistrust of new tech. But you have to remember, what we're able to do processing at home compared to what we were able to do even just a few years ago has radically changed. The theory behind the technology is solid though. It's simple physics that was, until recent years, unfeasible or impossible to achieve without very large processors and computers, and likely dedicated processors. But as I said, what we can do today on our smart phones is more than most people could do on multiple home computers in 2010. And we can even process stuff in real time we couldn't even play back pre-rendered then.

Is the tech really new? Yes.
Is it a completely new paradigm of audio playback and processing? Oh yes indeed.
Is there a lack of content? Definitely.
Is it finally starting to see enough adoption for content creators to take it seriously? ehhhhh...

And this is where I get on my soapbox a bit about early adopters and why we need more of them... plain and simple... demand dictates supply. If people aren't buying Atmos content, or playing it back on streaming services, it will never be taken seriously. This is pretty much why SACD was only ever niche outside of Japan. I think most of us here know that SACD is pretty damn cool and a legitimately better technology than Red Book CD, right?

Know why there's not a ton more multichannel SACDs, SACD players, and it's impossible to find SACDs anywhere but audiophile stores? Because there wasn't widespread adoption. A lot of people probably looked at it and said "I'll get an SACD player when there's more SACD content". A lot of people had SACD players and didn't even know it, or even what SACD was. I'm one of them, via PS3, hell I might have had more than that in the form of several DVD and Blu-ray players. I had no idea what SACD was before about a year ago. Now I'm a multichannel addict. And I LOVE Atmos music, in fact, I subscribe to Tidal just for it, despite having a subscription to Qobuz because I refuse to use MQA for moral/ethical reasons.

But there's not much content for Atmos, especially music. And it's slowly getting better, but it's not getting better fast enough. Maybe that'll change if Spotify or Apple Music ever support it, but likely not even then, at least not until a lot more people start investing in Atmos for home and consuming a lot more of that content. So, as an enthusiast and music lover, I am investing in Atmos and enjoying what I can in it. And not all of it is amazing... but stuff like Kraftwerk's 3-D the Catalog, Glass Animals' Dreamland, and Steven Wilson's the Future Bites are already available and fantastic, and I've heard good things about Abbey Roads and John Lennon, though, Lennon's not really my thing and the Beatles... I could take or leave for the most part.

Oh, and there's a few Elton John songs on Tidal, specifically Rocket Man is phenomenal. Just wish they had more than just a few singles from him and several others (like Rush and Guns n Roses).

And WAP in Atmos is probably one of the funniest thing I've ever heard. But I think that song is about the funniest thing ever.

 

[marpow]

tabs?

In Music Media Helper, left side column are tabs to click on for a variety of functions.
Music Media Helper has some of those Tabs/Functions redone since my last use about 4 weeks ago, that is all I meant.

 

[AYanguas]

I also use MKV's for my Atmos rips. I use Kodi. Kodi can play Atmos audio only rips but I haven't found a way to have them play gapless, so I use MKV for now, and edit all the chapters to the song titles.

I just stumbled across the new Atmos 16 channel processors because @ted_b posted he was looking for one with balanced connector's. I started reading the reviews and the HDMI problem stuck out because that would be a total deal breaker for me. That was a week or two ago and I haven't followed up.

Personally, I think Atmos is first generation stuff, and I am not going to invest that much in this format. The process from going from 2D to 3D shouldn't rely on a local process, it should be done in the studio with higher quality processors. We already went through this with quad and SQ, QS and other non-discrete formats. To me it seems like a sales gimmick to get you to buy an infinite number of speakers. Eventually, quadraphonic went from decoding two channels into four, to 7.1 discrete channels. Until that happens with 3D, where all my channels have been processed in the studio properly, rather than relying on different chips at home, I will not break the bank. Hopefully the next generation 3D audio will be 16 discrete channels or something resembling it.

I think the market does not go in that direction.

The 3D sound cannot be pushed to the market trying to sell Trinnov for everybody. Medium range AVR can decode Atmos and that is valid for a medium tech market.

Nevertheless, there are other technologies arising to reach more market like the new virtualisation codecs for the “fake Dolby Atmos” for mobiles devices and Amazon Echo Studio and the Sony 360 Reality Audio for small devices and headsets.

So, those are the current trends.

I think, so far, current 3D Sound Technology and AVRs decoding is a mature enough technology. But still new for the mixers and artists, that have to learn it. The question is if the amount of 3D sound (say Dolby Atmos) content quality production releases from the Studios and the Artists will be high enough to amortise our Rig inversion.

 

[harync]

That's not how 3D audio works at all. Since it's object based, for the studios to pre-process it, everyone would have to have the exact same setup, basically. The speakers would all have to be the same efficiency, the positions would have to be pretty exact and dampening and dispersion would have to be roughly the same. The height speakers would have to be at the exact same height...

The reason for this is that each sound is considered an "object" and it places that object into 3D space based off your setup and what it knows about that. The reason for adding insane amounts of speakers? Pretty simple, because with each set it can get more and more accurate with the placement of those objects.

Otherwise, you just have a pre-rendered track selection, which would probably come to consumers as 5.1.2, and then have to be upmixed to go beyond that. Same with most 5.1 audio content and 7.1 or 9.1 etc setups.

With object based audio it can also make actual use of however many channels are available without upmixing.

Really though, it's a new technology and sound engineers, masters, mixers, and end users have to change their entire way of thinking about how mixes are done. Simply put, you can't really pre-render it because it will heavily rely on your setup. But also, this kind of sounds a bit like mistrust of new tech. But you have to remember, what we're able to do processing at home compared to what we were able to do even just a few years ago has radically changed. The theory behind the technology is solid though. It's simple physics that was, until recent years, unfeasible or impossible to achieve without very large processors and computers, and likely dedicated processors. But as I said, what we can do today on our smart phones is more than most people could do on multiple home computers in 2010. And we can even process stuff in real time we couldn't even play back pre-rendered then.

Is the tech really new? Yes.
Is it a completely new paradigm of audio playback and processing? Oh yes indeed.
Is there a lack of content? Definitely.
Is it finally starting to see enough adoption for content creators to take it seriously? ehhhhh...

And this is where I get on my soapbox a bit about early adopters and why we need more of them... plain and simple... demand dictates supply. If people aren't buying Atmos content, or playing it back on streaming services, it will never be taken seriously. This is pretty much why SACD was only ever niche outside of Japan. I think most of us here know that SACD is pretty damn cool and a legitimately better technology than Red Book CD, right?

Know why there's not a ton more multichannel SACDs, SACD players, and it's impossible to find SACDs anywhere but audiophile stores? Because there wasn't widespread adoption. A lot of people probably looked at it and said "I'll get an SACD player when there's more SACD content". A lot of people had SACD players and didn't even know it, or even what SACD was. I'm one of them, via PS3, hell I might have had more than that in the form of several DVD and Blu-ray players. I had no idea what SACD was before about a year ago. Now I'm a multichannel addict. And I LOVE Atmos music, in fact, I subscribe to Tidal just for it, despite having a subscription to Qobuz because I refuse to use MQA for moral/ethical reasons.

But there's not much content for Atmos, especially music. And it's slowly getting better, but it's not getting better fast enough. Maybe that'll change if Spotify or Apple Music ever support it, but likely not even then, at least not until a lot more people start investing in Atmos for home and consuming a lot more of that content. So, as an enthusiast and music lover, I am investing in Atmos and enjoying what I can in it. And not all of it is amazing... but stuff like Kraftwerk's 3-D the Catalog, Glass Animals' Dreamland, and Steven Wilson's the Future Bites are already available and fantastic, and I've heard good things about Abbey Roads and John Lennon, though, Lennon's not really my thing and the Beatles... I could take or leave for the most part.

Oh, and there's a few Elton John songs on Tidal, specifically Rocket Man is phenomenal. Just wish they had more than just a few singles from him and several others (like Rush and Guns n Roses).

And WAP in Atmos is probably one of the funniest thing I've ever heard. But I think that song is about the funniest thing ever.

I do think having SACD and DVD-Audio as proprietary formats requiring special players was a big misstep that kept surround music from gaining a foothold. However, the existence of blu-ray audio that plays on any typical blu-ray player and the similar lack of engagement suggests that majority of the music buying public just doesn't care about surround music. I think very few people sit in a dedicated room and listen to music that way. I just hope there continues to be enough of a market for the 5.1 and Atmos releases to keep coming. It would be nice if it wasn't just value-added content in very expensive box sets, but I'll take what I can get.

 

[AXington]

I do think having SACD and DVD-Audio as proprietary formats requiring special players was a big misstep that kept surround music from gaining a foothold. However, the existence of blu-ray audio that plays on any typical blu-ray player and the similar lack of engagement suggests that majority of the music buying public just doesn't care about surround music. I think very few people sit in a dedicated room and listen to music that way. I just hope there continues to be enough of a market for the 5.1 and Atmos releases to keep coming. It would be nice if it wasn't just value-added content in very expensive box sets, but I'll take what I can get.

I can agree with that, however, I think that the industry trends are showing that after Covid, music and home theater sales are up and I think some people are just starting to discover surround music, like myself. There's also the fact that Tidal and Amazon music both added Atmos (even though you have to have two pieces of proprietary hardware to play back the Amazon Atmos... grrrrrrrrr). And I watch Paul McGowan of PS Audio's youtube channel a lot, and he's been fielding more and more questions about multichannel audio in just the last month or two than he probably ever has on his Ask Paul series. I think people are just now starting to pay attention. But the streaming services will have to be shown that people care. And more hardware will have to become available to play it back, especially at higher quality. Right now the best I have is my nVidia Shield TV Pro + Kodi/Plex/Tidal + Yamaha RX-V6A receiver. I also wont stream multichannel music in it's MusicCast app. It's not exactly a top of the line setup.

I've of course emailed them about adding multichannel Flac setup. It also doesn't make much sense to me that it wont playback DTS files either since it's an Atmos capable 7.1 or 5.1.2 receiver.

Then people who are buying music hardware that actually care... well... other than the Oppos, is there a high end 5.1 or 7.1 or 5.1.2 or higher count DAC? And the Oppos are discontinued. There's that other company that's supposedly bringing a new one to market, but I'm highly skeptical.

There's not even DIY multi-channel DACS. Hifi-berry, Allo, etc, none of those support more than stereo.

And of course the general public needs to get a taste and want it too.

So the cards are stacked against us already. But honestly, the cards were more stacked against Oculus, but enthusiasts talked about it so damn much that it got a lot of other people excited and now we have a market flooded with way-too-early VR headsets that are little more than gimmicks or tech demos of things to come.

5.1 is not going to become mainstream at this point. However, Atmos could. But you gotta get people hyped about it. If they'll pay $2K for a VR headset rig (that includes a $1000 PC that is basically the minimum requirements for half-decent, not even actually decent, VR play) to which they also have to have a room with open space to make use of most titles... I think Atmos could be too. It's all about the hype and the name. I would like to see Sony's 360 Audio and DTS:X also do well, maybe 360 Audio will come to receivers and speakers soon-ish, and maybe DTS:X will gain a bit of traction.

We also have to avoid the typical pitfall of Audiophiles and not be snobbish about it.

So... buy Atmos, consume atmos, tell everybody you know how amazing it is or could be, give reasonable recommendations to non-audiophiles who ask for equipment setups rather than "buy an Oppo" or "Only way to enjoy it is with a $3000 receiver"...

 

[marpow]

Then people who are buying music hardware that actually care... well... other than the Oppos, is there a high end 5.1 or 7.1 or 5.1.2 or higher count DAC? And the Oppos are discontinued. There's that other company that's supposedly bringing a new one to market, but I'm highly skeptical.

Welcome @AXington to QQ.
If interested a real good DAC company is Exasound of Canada

 

[GOS]

Welcome @AXington to QQ.
If interested a real good DAC company is Exasound of Canada

Your link is wrong my man.

 

[marpow]

Your link is wrong my man.

Fixed=Exasound of Canada

 

[marpow]

Speaking of Atmos, Later, after I get all my ducks in a row I will start a thread that will be for jRiver users who want Atmos playback. I have been super successful, still ripping my Atmos music discs, I have even ripped a Atmos concert video. Just need to explore the external hard drive, my synology NAS went from 68% to 69% with just about 10 music videos.

 

[svengaleekie]

Luca Turilli's Rhapsody - Prometheus: The Dolby Atmos Experience + Cinematic And Live

 

[marpow]

Listening to King Crimson from the 1969 box set, Atmos. These two pictures is what it looks like on my end playing from Synology NAS>to Jriver player on my PC> HDMI out to PrePro (MX122)>HDMI video E-arc out to TV. It is not necessary to have TV screen on for playback, but for now I am still learning.
First look is my version of JRiver in the Video tab, for these type of Atmos Video files. The second picture is when the display of JRiver is expanded on PC and TV.

 

[beerking]

Listening to King Crimson from the 1969 box set, Atmos. These two pictures is what it looks like on my end playing from Synology NAS>to Jriver player on my PC> HDMI out to PrePro (MX122)>HDMI video E-arc out to TV. It is not necessary to have TV screen on for playback, but for now I am still learning.
First look is my version of JRiver in the Video tab, for these type of Atmos Video files. The second picture is when the display of JRiver is expanded on PC and TV.
View attachment 64364
View attachment 64363

I am closely following your articles on ripping Dolby Atmos to play via JRiver and look forward to your comprehensive , informative and interesting, future threads ...keep up the good work...

 

[marpow]

My final post for the moment, I gotta get out of here.
Took 2 hours (ripped/split/moved to NAS/imported to JRiver) to rip the Blu Ray of INXS Live Baby Live. I imported as chapters and full video.
Dolby Atmos successful.
JRiver played as chapters and full video successful.
I noticed when looking at PC screen there was a tiny stutter/delay, not enough to wreck it but probably more a function of the PC?
However at the exact time playing on TV there was no stutter on the TV, so that's what counts.
INXS Live At Wembley, possibly best concert ever by the best band ever.
I'm done, I am not going to rip my entire movie/concert video collection. That would be crazy. But I had to at least experiment.

 

[perzon57]

My final post for the moment, I gotta get out of here.
Took 2 hours (ripped/split/moved to NAS/imported to JRiver) to rip the Blu Ray of INXS Live Baby Live. I imported as chapters and full video.
Dolby Atmos successful.
JRiver played as chapters and full video successful.
I noticed when looking at PC screen there was a tiny stutter/delay, not enough to wreck it but probably more a function of the PC?
However at the exact time playing on TV there was no stutter on the TV, so that's what counts.
INXS Live At Wembley, possibly best concert ever by the best band ever.
I'm done, I am not going to rip my entire movie/concert video collection. That would be crazy. But I had to at least experiment.

Great concert,but not much Atmos going on.

 

[AXington]

Man, I did not know that there was an Atmos mix of In the Court of The Crimson King. Time to go drain my bank account some more...

 

[AXington]

My assessment, after several listens, is "uggggh"...

They made Peart's snare sound like a trash can lid. The toms sound different too. I think the remix engineer used a favorite reverb plugin, rather than trying to match the original sound. Unforgivable.

It's basically the same approach as the 5.1. Main band parts up front, synths favoring the rears.
The Atmos doesn't really have anything unique going on. Just makes everything BIGGER in the room. Not necessarily a good thing.
I prefer Chycki's 5.1 and those that know me well know that I'm not a Chycki fanboi.

I know this is a super late reply, but... seriously, that mix is GARBAGE. There's like no bottom end. I think you're definitely spot on with the assessment about the snare. And the synths... just... damn... I was waiting for that first synth sound to hit when I first listened to it and just felt like it was weak and lacked that kind of almost growl the original had. That was the first Rush song I ever got into, like a lot of people my age (I'm 33). And that opening synth part is just iconic. Now I have most of their discography on vinyl, I have a bunch of their stuff in 5.1. So disappointing.

 

[marpow]

Great concert,but not much Atmos going on.

For sure on that good buddy.