Front heights worth it?

[DrKlahn]

Roger that!

Another version of a faux product? Like the circa '90s surround AVRs with no actual multichannel inputs that could only add reverb and put it in the surround channels?

Yeah, get out the speaker test recording! A 12 channel version now counting 1 - 12. (Needs a deep voice for ch 4.)

It would be interesting test for sure. To help clarify this here are the two scenarios I see:

The first scenario is one pair of heights and one pair of ceilings. There's a few ways that I can see this working.

Height = Atmos pair 1 (meaning it gets the same signal as the first set of Atmos speakers in the second scenario)
Height = Matrix of Atmos pair 1 and bed channels

Might be some other combinations I'm not thinking of. I said wides earlier, but the diagram wouldn't support them being treated like wides.

The second scenario is a typical 5.x.4 setup with an unconventional layout. Works like any other Atmos setup, but the processor would need to do some magic to deal with the spacing. The nice thing about this option is you don't have to guess how it's going to get treated by the current or future processors since 4 ceiling channels is the norm (for now at least).

 

[perzon57]

I have front heights and surround heights in my 7.4.4 setup and it sounds quite alright. The front heights are high on my front wall and the surround heights are high on the wall over my side surrounds. My side surrounds are not beside me but at about 120 degrees behind me. This layout is configured in my Denon AVC before running Audyssey.

 

[jimfisheye]

That would be another advantage of using 'computer -> audio interface' instead of an AVR. You could put up any non-standard speaker array you wanted and customize your speaker management to it to be able to play standard released commercial media.

If the goal is just to make something sound good, there are a lot of options! If the goal is reproducing audio someone else mixed, now you have to put speakers where they said to.

 

[pat bateman]

Thanks for all the replies ya'll.

^^^This. I think @patbateman is not using "heights" and "overheads" synonymously. He's asking about replacing front overheads with front heights, as in his IMG_314.

This is correct.

That's because it IS confusing. This is my understanding, a traditional speaker mounted high or at the ceiling being fed an an Atmos signal is a what your processor considers a ceiling channel the same as an in ceiling speaker. The height channel he's showing is something that some processors "create". And gets even more confusing when some processors could consider that the same as a wide channel. At least in a wide setup, Atmos will sometimes have a discreet channel or be effective at creating information for it. Height, my understanding would be that it depends on the processor on how or if it's used. And I could be mistaken.

Either way, I would still bet that using them as the front two Atmos positions in a x.x.4 setup would be the most effective use of them.

It looks like the "front height" channel was originally designed for Pro Logic II, but can also be used for Atmos. Page 14. Then Page 57 shows a diagram. https://www.dolby.com/siteassets/te...atmos-installation-guidelines-121318_r3.1.pdf - so the million dollar question is - are mixing engineers actually using this channel? If the answer is "not really", then I guess I could just "tell" the AVR that all 4 Atmos speakers on the ceiling and see how it goes.

Front height mounted speakers

Most AVRs will support the use of front height (Dolby® Pro Logic® IIz) mounted speakers with Dolby Atmos playback; however, we recommend the use of either overhead or Dolby Atmos enabled speakers to create the most lifelike and enveloping audio experience.
Front height speakers may be used in conjunction with overhead speakers in larger room installations that can support a greater number of overhead/height outputs.

However, this is where I have a hard time taking what Dolby says seriously - their nomenclature for "Dolby Atmos enabled speakers" is up-firing Atmos. They are saying that up-firing Atmos speakers are more effective than front height mounted Atmos speakers. Up-firing Atmos is placebo. I know that might be mean, but I tried it in 2019, and after being honest with myself, the effect was zero. I did the best blind test I could - I put banana plugs on the speaker wire, and asked my wife to randomly disconnect the speaker wire when I was not home, and randomly plug it back in. Over a 2 week period, I could never tell when if they were actually on. To be fair, at this time there were only movies being released in Atmos, I don't think it had really hit music yet.

I donno, pat--I expect you've done as much reading about this and gathered as many opinions as any of us, probably more. I don't have any direct experience with front heights, but my instincts say more speakers = better in every circumstance. I'd say go for it. Connect & configure those front heights as if they were in-ceiling or ceiling-mounted overheads; that way any musical content intended for front overheads will be directed to them. Then tell the rest of us how it all ends up sounding!

https://support.marantz.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/14464/~/difference-between-a-height,-top-and-dolby-atmos-enabled-speaker

I've found some forum discussions, mainly on avsforums.com, but many of them are old and inconclusive, including one from 2015. Holy crap, Atmos is 9 years old already? I feel like it's still almost brand new. Crazy. But beyond that, I have only the Atmos guide previously mentioned in this post. I'm just gonna try it, hopefully I'll get it setup this week and report back. So now the conundrum I have is, I have 10' ceilings, so putting a 20* angled speaker at the ceiling isn't going to work. I can go 24' from the ceiling, and have it pointed relatively close to MLP. I think im gonna roll with this (pic attached).

 

[pat bateman]

It would be interesting test for sure. To help clarify this here are the two scenarios I see:

View attachment 107192
The first scenario is one pair of heights and one pair of ceilings. There's a few ways that I can see this working.

Height = Atmos pair 1 (meaning it gets the same signal as the first set of Atmos speakers in the second scenario)
Height = Matrix of Atmos pair 1 and bed channels

Might be some other combinations I'm not thinking of. I said wides earlier, but the diagram wouldn't support them being treated like wides.

The second scenario is a typical 5.x.4 setup with an unconventional layout. Works like any other Atmos setup, but the processor would need to do some magic to deal with the spacing. The nice thing about this option is you don't have to guess how it's going to get treated by the current or future processors since 4 ceiling channels is the norm (for now at least).

Drawing #1 is what I'll be going for, however your drawing isn't to scale to my room - my room is a 10'x10'x10 square box, so the ceiling speaker will closer to MLP if adjusted to my scale. I thought about drawing 2, but I don't think a 10'x10' room would create enough separation for 4 ceiling speakers.

 

[Horbus]

As can be seen in the "show us your gear thread" I also have my restrictions correctly placing my height speakers. But any height speaker is better than none! My Receiver (Pioneer Elite SC 901) does not distinguish between Atmos and "normal" height speakers when connecting to the amp. It's the processor in the amp which does the work in combination with the automatic speaker adjustment program.

 

[mandrix]

Thanks for all the replies ya'll.


This is correct.


It looks like the "front height" channel was originally designed for Pro Logic II, but can also be used for Atmos. Page 14. Then Page 57 shows a diagram. https://www.dolby.com/siteassets/te...atmos-installation-guidelines-121318_r3.1.pdf - so the million dollar question is - are mixing engineers actually using this channel? If the answer is "not really", then I guess I could just "tell" the AVR that all 4 Atmos speakers on the ceiling and see how it goes.

Front height mounted speakers

Most AVRs will support the use of front height (Dolby® Pro Logic® IIz) mounted speakers with Dolby Atmos playback; however, we recommend the use of either overhead or Dolby Atmos enabled speakers to create the most lifelike and enveloping audio experience.
Front height speakers may be used in conjunction with overhead speakers in larger room installations that can support a greater number of overhead/height outputs.

However, this is where I have a hard time taking what Dolby says seriously - their nomenclature for "Dolby Atmos enabled speakers" is up-firing Atmos. They are saying that up-firing Atmos speakers are more effective than front height mounted Atmos speakers. Up-firing Atmos is placebo. I know that might be mean, but I tried it in 2019, and after being honest with myself, the effect was zero. I did the best blind test I could - I put banana plugs on the speaker wire, and asked my wife to randomly disconnect the speaker wire when I was not home, and randomly plug it back in. Over a 2 week period, I could never tell when if they were actually on. To be fair, at this time there were only movies being released in Atmos, I don't think it had really hit music yet.



I've found some forum discussions, mainly on avsforums.com, but many of them are old and inconclusive, including one from 2015. Holy crap, Atmos is 9 years old already? I feel like it's still almost brand new. Crazy. But beyond that, I have only the Atmos guide previously mentioned in this post. I'm just gonna try it, hopefully I'll get it setup this week and report back. So now the conundrum I have is, I have 10' ceilings, so putting a 20* angled speaker at the ceiling isn't going to work. I can go 24' from the ceiling, and have it pointed relatively close to MLP. I think im gonna roll with this (pic attached).

But you can buy speaker mounts that are almost infinitely adjustable. All 4 of my height speakers point directly at the mlp. Unless of course you are determined to flush mount your speakers.

 

[barturtle]

If you can do 4 in-ceiling speakers with the rear-most directly overhead they should be assigned as top-front and top-middle for the ones directly overhead. If you assign them at top front and top rear, it will try to phantom sounds that are supposed to be directly overhead and pull them forward

 

[DrKlahn]

Drawing #1 is what I'll be going for, however your drawing isn't to scale to my room - my room is a 10'x10'x10 square box, so the ceiling speaker will closer to MLP if adjusted to my scale. I thought about drawing 2, but I don't think a 10'x10' room would create enough separation for 4 ceiling speakers.

Not to scale? I'm insulted. That was at least 3 minutes spent in Paint and a longish glance at your picture

Seriously though I agree with your plan to tell the processor that the 4 channels are the standard ceiling channels and position the speakers to where they make the most sense. It doesn't sound from the verbiage you posted that the heights would be treated like the standard ceiling speakers and I doubt they would see much use unless the processor does some matrixing of the signals to put content in them. And I would much rather have them playing the actual Atmos material vs whatever the processor creates to put there.

 

[JohnN]

Artificial paradise: Yes, worth it for Dolby Surround & dts Neural X alone. All 5.1 benefits to me.

 

[jimfisheye]

Seriously though I agree with your plan to tell the processor that the 4 channels are the standard ceiling channels and position the speakers to where they make the most sense. It doesn't sound from the verbiage you posted that the heights would be treated like the standard ceiling speakers and I doubt they would see much use unless the processor does some matrixing of the signals to put content in them. And I would much rather have them playing the actual Atmos material vs whatever the processor creates to put there.

+1

Yeah if the choice is between reproducing all the channels of a mix in standard 7.1.4 format vs some AVR upmix feature (that the artist never heard or vetted their mix with) and further, missing actual delivered channels for it. Call those Atmos channels now!

 

[JohnN]

dts Neural X rules!

Sports on TV note: With a receiver's processing crowd sounds are sometimes awesome for atmosphere. Clear curse height channels.

Jays/Astros game tonight. The calls for hot-dogs from the stands/heights is crystal clear. Hilarious! Hungry now.

 

[barfle]

I'm pretty sure there were receivers/processors that supported "height" channels before Atmos/DTSX came along (same with wides IIRC). Of course those options were matrixed. That's the reason I made a distinction. I don't know if the processor in this case would treat the "height" channels like the front 2 ceiling Atmos channels. I guess the only way to be sure would be if you took an Atmos mix that is specifically coded to 7.1.4 and played it with the speakers in the height position shown in the diagram and they played the material meant for the front 2 Atmos channels.

My Marantz pre-pro has a pair of “height” outputs, and as I recall, the manual shows the speakers as being high on the front wall. There’s not much more information about those channels in the manual, and I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a disc that says it uses those channels, so frankly, I don’t know what they’re for. I hooked them up to an old amp and a pair of pretty good bookshelf speakers and didn’t hear a thing. So they are no longer connected.

I bought the unit about a year before anyone started talking about Atmos.

 

[AYanguas]

My Marantz pre-pro has a pair of “height” outputs, and as I recall, the manual shows the speakers as being high on the front wall. There’s not much more information about those channels in the manual, and I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a disc that says it uses those channels, so frankly, I don’t know what they’re for. I hooked them up to an old amp and a pair of pretty good bookshelf speakers and didn’t hear a thing. So they are no longer connected.

I bought the unit about a year before anyone started talking about Atmos.

The letter 'z' in Pro Logic IIz is the key.

From my Onkyo TX-SR607 manual (Second House, pre-Atmos era):

Front high left and right speakers
These speakers are necessary to enjoy Dolby PLIIz Height, etc.
They enhance significantly the spatial experience.
Position them at least 3.3 feet (100 cm) above the front left and right
speakers (and as high as possible). Although it is acceptable to
place left and right at an angle slightly wider than the front left and
right speakers. Ideally they should be positioned directly above the
front left and right speakers.

Also from Wiki:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolby_Pro_Logic#Dolby_Pro_Logic_IIz

 

[JohnN]

The letter 'z' in Pro Logic IIz is the key.

From my Onkyo TX-SR607 manual (Second House, pre-Atmos era):

Front high left and right speakers
These speakers are necessary to enjoy Dolby PLIIz Height, etc.
They enhance significantly the spatial experience.
Position them at least 3.3 feet (100 cm) above the front left and right
speakers (and as high as possible). Although it is acceptable to
place left and right at an angle slightly wider than the front left and
right speakers. Ideally they should be positioned directly above the
front left and right speakers.

Also from Wiki:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolby_Pro_Logic#Dolby_Pro_Logic_IIz

Dolby reintroduced the Dolby Surround terminology in 2014. The term now refers to a new upmixer whose purpose is to enable Dolby Atmos receivers and speaker configurations to serve non-Atmos signals.

Works great with TV and Get Smart DVDs.

 

[jimfisheye]

It sounds like those Dolby PL "heights" are purely an upmix thing. If you're after reproducing a mix in one of the surround formats, these would be genuinely useless and a waste of components. If you're more into altering things to your taste and this delivered something you liked, then there it is.

 

[AYanguas]

It sounds like those Dolby PL "heights" are purely an upmix thing. If you're after reproducing a mix in one of the surround formats, these would be genuinely useless and a waste of components. If you're more into altering things to your taste and this delivered something you liked, then there it is.

According to Dolby: https://professional.dolby.com/tv/dolby-pro-logic-ii/ At the end it says that:

"""
When broadcasters encode their stereo signals specifically for Dolby Pro Logic II playback, it allows them to deliver surround and localization effects over stereo services that are more like discrete 5.1 transmissions
"""

So it suggest discrete mix 5.1 matrixed encoded into a stereo signal. Not clear if the additional channels 7.1 PLIIx and with Heights PLIIz can be also matrixed encoded or they will be only upmixed.

Anyway, who did any mix like that 7.1 or 9.1?

Now, Dolby has evolved and we have Atmos and the DSU upmixer.

Can old Prologic II matrixed encodes or old Dolby Surround CDs be decoded properly with the actual DSU upmixer?

 

[sperezmore]

These are my "front heights" and "front heights atmos" speakers. Also on the picture: 4 front speakers, center speaker (under TV) and subwoofer on the left corner. Polk Audio speakers all around.

This audio configuration and speakers placement sounds great to my ears.

Regards,