Within the article it states that BD is using PCM 5.1 to start for audio. No Dolby Plus or True HD. It's probably a size issue. Since Most of the new BD titles will be put on a single layer blue ray disc (encoded in MPEG2) they're limited on space.
PCM 5.1 is good! Uncompressed 5.1 channel audio! It's actually the best of the three mandatory Blu-ray audio formats. The other two are DD 5.1 and DTS 5.1 (the same formats as used on DVD).
Although Blu-ray does support Dolby Digital Plus and DTS HD, these audio formats are not mandatory, and decoders for them may not be present on the first-generation players (Sony BDP-S1 in particular).
Within the article it states that BD is using PCM 5.1 to start for audio. No Dolby Plus or True HD. It's probably a size issue. Since Most of the new BD titles will be put on a single layer blue ray disc (encoded in MPEG2) they're limited on space.
Toshiba HD DVD player has a built-in decoder for DD Plus (and a 2-channel decoder for True-HD). Sony Blu-ray player has none of those, so 5.1-ch. PCM is the only option for premium audio on Blu-ray.
Toshiba HD DVD player has a built-in decoder for DD Plus (and a 2-channel decoder for True-HD). Sony Blu-ray player has none of those, so 5.1-ch. PCM is the only option for premium audio on Blu-ray.
Not if the DVD player has the DAC's to decode them.
The current HD DVD players have the DAC's to process DD+. The DD+ audio is outputted only on HDMI or 5.1 analog. I have both 5.1 analog and digital optical outputs connected from my XA1 to my Sony 5.1 receiver. On most HD DVD's the DD+ audio is much, much nicer. The sound flows from all speakers on most scenes. When playing standard DVD's, I switch to digital optical, and my receiver seems to do a better job of decoding the DD5.1 or (mo' bettah) DTS 5.1 on DVD's.
Unfortunately, there's currently no way to enjoy the True HD encoded on some HD DVD's, until there is a receiver that can decode them, presumably from the HDMI output. :
That's right! You can enjoy Dolby Digital Plus today with any of the HD DVD players using analog cables. Thanks to Toshiba for including 24-bit 192 KHz digital-to-analog converters!
Alternatively you can use HDMI if you have one of those latest AV receivers capable of extracting 5.1 PCM from the HDMI connection. Toshiba player can decode DD+ to 5.1 PCM and send it over HDMI. This is supported even in present version 1.1 of HDMI.
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