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  • What is the difference between 2.0 Stereo, 2.0 Dolby Surround and Dolby Digital?

    Posted by Charles Tranquille on January 16, 2012 at 6:39 pm

    Hi,

    I need a little bit of precisions on these differents ac3 formats.

    Here’s what I know, correct me if I’m wrong:

    -2.0 Stereo is basically L & R, recorded separatly and playing on their respective speaker.

    -2.0 Dolby Surround is 4 channels (L,C,R,S) encoded through a Matrix to a LtRt signal and decoded by the amp to play on the L & R speakers, splitting the surround informations on both speakers.

    -Dolby Digital, is actually the same thing than Dolby Surround except it goes up to 6 channels.
    Although commonly associated with the 5.1 channel configuration, Dolby Digital allows a number of different channel selections. The options are:

    * Mono (Center only)
    * 2-channel stereo (Left + Right), optionally carrying matrixed Dolby Surround
    * 3-channel stereo (Left, Center, Right)
    * 2-channel stereo with mono surround (Left, Right, Surround)
    * 3-channel stereo with mono surround (Left, Center, Right, Surround)
    * 4-channel quadraphonic (Left, Right, Left Surround, Right Surround)
    * 5-channel surround (Left, Center, Right, Left Surround, Right Surround)
    (From Wikipedia)

    If that’s true, then what’s the difference between 2 channels stereo carrying matrixed surround and 2 channel stereo with mono surround.

    Please help me understand all this, I’m getting really confused.
    Thanks

    Michael Slowe replied 14 years, 8 months ago 2 Members · 1 Reply
  • 1 Reply
  • Michael Slowe

    January 16, 2012 at 9:13 pm

    You might well be right in your definitions but that is not always how it works.

    Although I’m encoding for 2 Dolby Stereo with an ac3 file, in my edit I adjust my audio channels to centre so that I get the same from both speakers as I generally shoot with one channel or at least select the edit channel from one of two inputs. Except that with a music sequence I leave as it’s recorded, ie. left and right and when the DVD plays it will play as a CD would, in stereo. It this sensible or should I being doing this differently?

    Michael Slowe

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