I can't think of any better "big bang" demo than the depth charge sequence from U-571. With my system, after it's all over you will feel as pummelled as the characters would have. The dynamics are incredible - just make sure you have the power and the speakers to handle it. I use the version contained on the DTS Demo Disc No. 5, but I imagine it's no diffrent that the "Collectors Edition" version.

I read the other day regarding(one) of the boat movies U-571 or DAS BOOT, someone was commenting had alot of material down to 5Hz. (depth charge scene's prob).

Whose sub (Ha ha...LFE Emitter UNIT) goes flat that low?! and does the dynamic range of a DVD even follow to there?

None of my three subs goes much lower than 18Hz so I can't say that I've ever felt anything that low. However the "blasts" in U-571 seem to have most of their energy (and impact) at higher frequencies. When I run this demo, at "higher than normal extended listening levels," it affects just about all parts of the body. You really do feel somewhat scrambled - just like the fictitious characters in the film would have. A check for bleeding cavities is in order!

I suppose, if it is allowed in the digital format, 5 Hz could be there, but I don't know any commercial theaters that would bother paying for subs down to 5 Hz.

The exception may be some specialty theaters, like those of Showscan, that include motion seating and other effects. These theaters may wish to include very low frequencies.

For consumer playback, I would think strong 5Hz signals would be harmful to most equipment and therefore would be something that internal filtering would eliminate in order to protect the equipment.

While it is entirely possible to have 5Hz in the sound effects, there is no way that the mixing engineers heard it when the film was mixed, theater subwoofers only go down to around 30Hz before falling off like a rock. With pretty much everything digital in the sound chain for film mixing nowdays, there is no limitation on low end, at least in the creation side of the equation.

Playing "U-571" on my own system (with four 18" subs, flat down to 18Hz, and hanging on down to 12Hz) is not as spectacular as some other films I've played, and nowhere near as impressive as some pipe organ recordings I have with 32 foot ranks of pipes that produce honest fundamental frequencies of 16Hz. When playing these, you actually feel like you're being thrown vertically by the bass frequencies

[This message has been edited by soundhound (edited July 18, 2003).]

Slightly off topic, but … I have thoroughly enjoyed recordings of some of the very large pipe organs. What are one or two of your favorites, SH?

Miller and Kreisel (M&K) made some direct to disc ones that were good. I mostly have made my own however, direct to digital using three spaced omnidirectional mics and a custom mixer - basically the same technique that Mercury used in it's "Living Presence" recordings from the 50s & 60s. There's a particularly nice and huge old church near where I live that has ideal acoustics. I did a commercial CD there.

Soundhound,

I agree that nothing beats the old organ for great deep bass. I collected a lot of E. Power Biggs' stuff on vinyl - and even with that format's limitations it was as impressive as anything in my collection.

However my original point regarding U-571 was not the deepest frequencies but rather the shear dynamics of the depth charge sequence. Yes other DVDs have explosions, but none as crisp, and in one sequence, rapid fire as in U-571. No pipe organ can "attack" and produce a blast effect like that. And mixed in between the blasts are all sorts of neat sound efcets - like the depth charge "shrapnel" scratching along the side of the sub after the last rapid fire set of blasts.

And by the by, the de facto "organ" demo classic on vinyl was, in my opinion, not the real thing, but rather Walter Carlos' Switched-on Bach. Audio magazine (I think) had an article on how to build the ultimate passive home sub (it was huge by today's standards) and used that album in its testing of the version that they built. I wore out two copies of that album. The re-done 25th anniversary CD pales in comparison - which is one of the few times you will ever hear me choose vinyl over CD!

Regards.

Jeff Mackwood

Jeff If you’ll forgive me for entering an alternative universe. SH’s talk of pipe organs sent me web hopping to try and find a pic of the one looming large in my past. I used have to live at FBC Dallas as my mother was Children’s Choirs Coordinator when growing up. And if I admit to it; played hide and seek in the Sanctuary. Other times I’d roam through it on my way here and there often when alone. Whenever I thought NO ONE would catch me I would sit at the organ, I had too much respect and fear of it to ever MESS with it. But it was the focal point in that room for me, It seemed (sitting there quiet and waiting) to have a living presence in that huge dark space as (in my imagination) it was a beast sleeping. I played it once or the one before it..I say play loosely) when the organist let me….pull/push this …, he let me blast trumpets and harps etc) While typing in search words I learned something about its history I never had cognizance as a child. I knew it was was not world class, but seemed a nice one.
I found this:

“Shut for a quarter of a century, the swank seventh floor of Eaton's College Park reopens next month, giving Toronto a truly dazzling new social venue, JAMES ADAMS writes

By JAMES ADAMS
Saturday, April 12, 2003

One element of the original Eaton Auditorium that won't be on view when the restored venue opens to the public next month is the famous Casavant organ. It's now housed in First Baptist Church in downtown Dallas.

Built in Quebec by the famous Casavant Frères, it was a four-manual 90-stop beast with 5,804 pipes. The first person to play it in public was the then-conductor of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Ernest MacMillan (later Sir Ernest), who performed at an Eaton Auditorium recital on Mar. 26, 1931. Almost 14 years later, a 13-year-old Glenn Gould made his recital debut on the same instrument, playing pieces by Bach, Dupuis and Mendelssohn. A review in the Dec. 13, 1945, Toronto Telegram was headlined, "Boy, age 12, Shows Genius." (Gould was born Sept. 25, 1932)....Even after Eaton's College Street closed in 1977, Gould continued to practise and occasionally record in Eaton Auditorium until the summer of 1981. By that time, the organ had been dismantled by Keates-Geissler Pipe Organs Ltd. of Guelph, Ont..."

Thanks SH for sending me on that search…..for some reason it is amazing to me that the organ I grew up with, was once played by Gould an eccentric genesis who loved Eaton Hall for practice till his force out. I had read he favored its acoustics so strongly most of his recordings were laid there. I’ve found while just looking he made one recording on the Casavant (I’ve never heard it …but now will have to look it up).

If the keys and stops etc are original than I grew up touching (or heard the pipes, - many times) something which a man played whose recording of Bach, The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 2, Prelude and Fugue in C, No.1.(Gould) piano. 4:48 is carried both by Voyager One and Two, the farthest distance man-made objects in the galaxy on 12” gold-plated copper records.

Life is very interesting!



[This message has been edited by Smart Little Lena (edited July 19, 2003).]

Soundhound has some pipe organ recordings that he engineered himself. I wish y'all could hear them. Just incredible. Lots of room acoustics, beautifully captured, and the kind of bass that massages your backbone.

[This message has been edited by boblinds (edited July 21, 2003).]