Atmos vs 5.1

[Thonolan]

This is the way that my 7.1 system is set up. The surrounds are beside where I am sitting up the wall and the rears are behind me to the side. When I play 5.1 the surrounds are duplicated into the rear speakers making everything sound great when the mix is correct. The 5.1 is enveloping and the 7.1 from ATMOS also sounds great. I'm generally a happy camper.

So would you say that having the surrounds content duplicated into the rear speakers makes the overall 5.1 mix sound even better? I always have the impression that it would sound somewhat muddier, and that getting the sound only from a single pair of speakers (whether it's the surrounds or the rears) would make it sound cleaner.

 

[jimfisheye]

Equal distant speakers is still quite important in a listening space. You can use delays to dial in the timing for a sweet spot. It's a crafty trick. The problem is that doing that reduces the listening to only the sweet spot! Any other location in the room will be time smeared. When you walk up to a speaker in a equal distance setup, you hear delay from distance to the other channels just like real life perspective of proximity. Do that with a time skewed system dialed in for a single sweet spot and things get weird.

Just another example where using passive techniques instead of relying on some DSP heavy lifting can go a long way.

If you are only ever in a sweet spot in a small listening space... carry on!

110 deg rears for me too. All equal distant to the listening position including the heights. By the book with that.

 

[Owen Smith]

The original 5.1 speaker layout from the early 2000's placed the rear speakers a lot further behind the listeners head...

Indeed it did. On the rear wall behind the listener was recommended using dipole or bipole speakers that spread the sound to either side of the speaker. You don't see those much any more.

Here are my 5.0 system's rear speakers on wall brackets laid on their backs firing at the ceiling above the sofa. These are Castle Richmond 3s which are rear ported so avoid boom off the ceiling:

 

[LuvMyQuad]

Indeed it did. On the rear wall behind the listener was recommended using dipole or bipole speakers that spread the sound to either side of the speaker. You don't see those much any more.

Four corner 5.1 placement worked great for movies of the day that were in pro logic. Not so much for music unless it's old school quad.

I've read several comments on this board with members saying they are dissatisfied with modern mixes when played on a 4 corner setup. Still they are convinced it's the mix and not the speaker layout.

 

[mandrix]

Equal distant speakers is still quite important in a listening space. You can use delays to dial in the timing for a sweet spot. It's a crafty trick. The problem is that doing that reduces the listening to only the sweet spot! Any other location in the room will be time smeared. When you walk up to a speaker in a equal distance setup, you hear delay from distance to the other channels just like real life perspective of proximity. Do that with a time skewed system dialed in for a single sweet spot and things get weird.

Just another example where using passive techniques instead of relying on some DSP heavy lifting can go a long way.

If you are only ever in a sweet spot in a small listening space... carry on!

110 deg rears for me too. All equal distant to the listening position including the heights. By the book with that.

Yes you've stated that many times. We can't all do that. But my mlp is one spot only so there's that.

 

[Guy Robinson]

So would you say that having the surrounds content duplicated into the rear speakers makes the overall 5.1 mix sound even better? I always have the impression that it would sound somewhat muddier, and that getting the sound only from a single pair of speakers (whether it's the surrounds or the rears) would make it sound cleaner.

I would definitely say that. No change to the sound being muddier at all. I actually had a a' WOW' moment when I hooked up my new AVR and found the surrounds being duplicated into the rears automatically for 5.1 mixes. Before this, I was actually creating my own files that duplicated the surrounds into the rears creating a 7.1 mix from a 5.1 mix. Now I no longer have to do that. All my speakers are approximately the same distance from my main listening position.

 

[jimfisheye]

Yes you've stated that many times. We can't all do that. But my mlp is one spot only so there's that.

The "carry on, then" part was for you then.

Don't take it as a snobby admonition. It's a setup strategy that has a lot of bang for the buck. It's mentioned because it's not just an obvious intuitive tip. (Until you know in hindsight anyway.) I just see these casual comments... "Oh, just adjust the delays. It doesn't matter. The AVR has these controls. Just start turning stuff on!" Sometimes more passive strategies do some heavy lifting better.

I'll try to make an example with a turntable. You've heard the result of an off center hole in a vinyl record? Speed ramping up and down cartoonishly. Pretty altering! So... Let's crank up the speed correction DSP! Silly right? It would take moving the mountain with that and you'd create more artifacts than you started off with. Or... just grab a hole file and put the thing back to center. The 2nd great pyramid looks taller because it's built on a hill, right?

But you absolutely can dial in delays for a single sweet spot. If that's the setup in a very small space, then carry on with that! But if you have something weird going on and had not considered any of this, it might be a frugal way to upgrade things.

 

[barfle]

My first “room” (the living room in my bachelor pad 50 years ago) had the sofa against the wall, and speakers sitting on end tables. Balance was an aftterthought.

My second room had the sofa somewhat in the middle of the room, with speakers a bit behind the PLP. Today, I have two rows of seats, 5.1 with the speakers about 3’ behind the second row.

I always felt that the only way to be surrounded is to have speakers in front and behind you. The idea of having the “rears” only being “sides” was never in the equations I used.

In my current (and I hope, last) room, I barely considered side speakers. There’s cable run to an approximate location, but really, there’s no place I can put side speakers.

 

[Sal1950]

Indeed it did. On the rear wall behind the listener was recommended using dipole or bipole speakers that spread the sound to either side of the speaker. You don't see those much any more.

I had a 5.1 system like that back in the mid 80s. I used three Paradigm Titans across the front and 2 of their dipole/bipoles? mounted high on the side walls a few feet behind the MLP (which was mid room). I was never too happy with that system for doing surround, the rears just didn't seem to put together a proper image either with music or movies. Here's my ebay sales photo.

 

[Sal1950]

I always felt that the only way to be surrounded is to have speakers in front and behind you. The idea of having the “rears” only being “sides” was never in the equations I used.

That's a reasonable assumption, but very much depending on what the setup was at the mixing console and the how production image was voiced.
But still many of us just have to deal with our listening room and the positioning options allowed.

 

[barfle]

That's a reasonable assumption, but very much depending on what the setup was at the mixing console and the how production image was voiced.
But still many of us just have to deal with our listening room and the positioning options allowed.

Of course, the ideal reproduction system mimics the mixing room’s setup. Clearly, if there are more than one seat in the listening room, that won’t happen.

Maybe, just maybe, if I had given it much thought, I would have made room for sides when I was figuring out my space. But as the seating is virtually against one wall, it’s going to be quite a problem with balance, especially for the seat with a speaker 6” from your right ear. So I probably won’t bother.

I do have ceiling speakers, though. They’re just not doing anything at the moment.

 

[Guy Robinson]

Luckily I never had any surround formats until around 2000 when I started collecting DVD-A. I have been happy with the "upgrades" all the way up to ATMOS on Blu-Ray. I am happy with both 5.1 and 7.1 (From ATMOS). When the mix is done correctly it doesn't really matter to me which it is. But the thought of going back to something lesser in music playback is like thinking of buying an old car rather than an improved new car.

 

[Guy Robinson]

Luckily I never had any surround formats until around 2000 when I started collecting DVD-A. I have been happy with the "upgrades" all the way up to ATMOS on Blu-Ray. I am happy with both 5.1 and 7.1 (From ATMOS). When the mix is done correctly it doesn't really matter to me which it is. But the thought of going back to something lesser in music playback is like thinking of buying an old car rather than an improved new car.

And by "lesser" I mainly mean stereo delivered whatever way you want it..

 

[inspclouseau]

My first “room” (the living room in my bachelor pad 50 years ago) had the sofa against the wall, and speakers sitting on end tables. Balance was an aftterthought.

My second room had the sofa somewhat in the middle of the room, with speakers a bit behind the PLP. Today, I have two rows of seats, 5.1 with the speakers about 3’ behind the second row.

I always felt that the only way to be surrounded is to have speakers in front and behind you. The idea of having the “rears” only being “sides” was never in the equations I used.

In my current (and I hope, last) room, I barely considered side speakers. There’s cable run to an approximate location, but really, there’s no place I can put side speakers.

Ours has always been the typical 5.1. The rears behind and about 5 feet up and a bit right and left of main seating. All adjusted with an old radio shack analog db meter. It just always worked well. But NOT designed for atmos at all. Totally fine with our set up in 5.1. Hope DTS 5.1 stays in the loop. We will not purchase Dolby Atmos only music. ~Correction 5.3. It took 3 subs to even out the bass response in our room and several years to make it sound good in it though adjustments and placements..Bass was the hardest to get where we like it. NO BOOMYNESS either. We refuse to tear apart our system to replace it with a very expensive atmos along with more speakers hanging over our living/front room etc. only to try to convince ourselves it sounds wonderful and never upset about how well it worked before... If it did work fine, great then..... but.....$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Build Back Better! ..........................and we do not want speakers in our view either! Image from in front of living room windows.. All the best all~

 

[Mr. Afternoon]

There's a 5.1 side???? And players prefer that????
Every time I run into something like this I want to rip my hair out.

The few Atmos mixes I've listened to on my humble 5.1 system sound sound just fine, with the rears at around 105 and the fronts at around 35. I certainly have many SACDs that have a diagram that suggest a 110-130 degree rear placement! Unfortunately I don't have the room...

Even though I don't have it set up that way, I much prefer a 5.1 setup arranged like quad, where's it's essentially a square of speakers and then the center in the front in the middle. Not the weird disproportionate sphere, IMO. I try to engineer my mixes so it doesn't sound excessively awkward on either...

Also, the Atmos height speakers being at different locations than the floor speakers hurts my brain...

 

[jimfisheye]

There's a 5.1 side???? And players prefer that????
Every time I run into something like this I want to rip my hair out.

...

Yes, this really happened. There were (and still are) to be two 5.1 formats; 5.1(side) and 5.1(rear). Early on, that intention apparently got lost or missed, or however these mistakes were made. Masters were getting delivered in technically the 5.1(side) format even though the intention was 5.1(rear) and it seems as though it wasn't widely known that there were two formats. So media players "corrected" themselves and put channels 5/6 of the 5.1 format they saw being delivered to them to the rear speaker channels.

Result:
5.1(side) plays as 5.1(rear) in most media players. Yes, even the popular VLC player! 5.1(rear) is either treated like 5.1(side) or doesn't play at all (as though an undefined format).

Now we actually started using 7.1 and 7.1.4 when Atmos came along and... surprise! All 5.1 program comes out as 5.1(side) in a 7.1 or 7.1.4 system. Because all 5.1 program is rendered to technically 5.1(side) format and 7.x systems are treating it correctly. Hence the snarky notes on that Pink Floyd disc suggesting swapping your speaker cables as you switch formats. (And probably a few others now.) Fixing media player software now would be a hard end to backwards compatibility and wouldn't be an option with all the stand alone hardware disc players. Two wrongs made a right... until they didn't! ie. Errantly using 5.1(side) as a generic "5.1" and 5.1(rear) being depreciated and media players treating 5.1(side) as generic "5.1" and not recognizing actual 5.1(rear).

Pulling your hair out might be the only option but it will not correct the issue and I don't recommend it. My hair has been malfunctioning and falling out on its own but I digress. You can also try the tried and true "Lalalala I can't hear you!" This is a popular option.

 

[Owen Smith]

There were (and still are) to be two 5.1 formats; 5.1(side) and 5.1(rear).

I remain unconvinced. Do you have any references to official specifications showing this?

 

[Owen Smith]

and 5.1(rear) being depreciated

The word is "deprecated", it has no 'i' in it.

 

[jimfisheye]

Spell check has failed to me. Yeah, this must be the root cause of this issue, right?

Next time you rip a bluray with MakeMKV, click on one of the 5.1 tracks and look at the codec and format used. What does it say? Say's "5.1(side)" doesn't it. Now play that rip with any media player with a 5.1 system. Playing like 5.1(rear), right? (It should technically be speaker managing the side channels into a 5.1 array and you should have the mix half folded to the front. Sans speaker management, the rear channels should be silent and those channels omitted during playback.)

Anecdotal there. Try to find even one counter example though! You can see both 5.1(side) and 5.1(rear) listed as supported formats for the codecs. Just matter of fact from the horses mouth there.

 

[Mr. Afternoon]

Pulling your hair out might be the only option but it will not correct the issue and I don't recommend it. My hair has been malfunctioning and falling out on its own but I digress. You can also try the tried and true "Lalalala I can't hear you!" This is a popular option.

Surely I wouldn't want to lose my hair so soon...thanks for the advice. Maybe punching the wall will hypersonically send the message to whomever is the right person!