In case you are wondering, we are reading.
I am curious about this latest firmware fix, since I have high hopes that these bugs will go away and no longer tarnish this great product line. Keep posting.

Elmosaurus, I hope you don't mind me piggybacking on your thread...

I upgraded the firmware in my 970 yesterday as well. So far none of the three issues I saw have recurred.

(No Audio, non-responsive front panel, distorted sound from a DD 5.1 DVD)

I've been using multiple sources and formats:

Oppo 981 DVD playing DD 5.1 and DD EX material.
SD and HD programming with both 2 channel and Dolby Digital audio over my HD TiVo.

If you don't mind I'll post here again after I've logged more significant hours and report on my experience.

Cheers,

Post away, my friend. I'm sure readers will be smart enough to distinguish your posts from mine, so performance history should not get too confusing.


I do need to add something tonight though. The new firmware did NOT help with the cold start/no audio/unresponsive volume knob issue.

It did it again when I powered up tonight. I won't get into too many details as the configuration is exactly the same as usual. The CD I removed from the unit was Enya, Watermark, Reprise Recording. I made sure to stop it BEFORE playback began. It wasn't playing an audio stream, so it shouldn't have been a factor.... ("shouldn't")

From now on, I'm going to power the 970 on first, then the T533, and see if the situation reccurs.

Also, I may have found a programming error in the new firmware. (may have been in the old also, I only noticed it now though)

On playback of DD EX material, or DTS ES material, my 5.1 setup (speakers set to NONE for the surround back channels) locks on to the EX or ES signal, but does not drop back down to standard DD or DTS.

This means I am potentially losing sixth channel information during playback; that information is supposed to be matrixed back into the two surround channels.

I will contact Scott tomorrow morning and attempt to have him recreate this; it's very repeatable, despite whatever source DVD I use. (Finding Nemo, Cars, Pixar/Disney for DD-EX; Gladiator, Dreamworks Video for DTS-ES)

If any of you fancy a go at it, turn your surround back channels off in the menu by designating their speaker size as NONE, then playback any EX or ES encoded material, and tell me if the processor locks on, or downsteps automatically to DD/DTS respectively. Please also post which version of the firmware you have so that we know if older versions were matrixing properly.


E.

This is not a bug, I don't believe. Flagged Dolby EX soundtracks must be decoded in Dolby EX (Dolby requires it), but in cases where no rear surrounds are present the receiver's EX mode knows not to steer any data there. Similarly, DTS ES Discrete tracks such as Gladiator actually contain a discrete rear surround channel, so ES must be used with 5.1 systems to decode the channel and mix it into the side surrounds.

Honestly, I don't know. That's why I said, 'may'. :p

All the other processors I've owned in the past (integrated A/V and the like) would step back down to DD or DTS when it recognized an EX or ES flag, since I never set up the 6th and 7th channels. (I understand that it's actually only one channel though)

I'll just call Scott later today and see what his take on it is.

[eta:

I wanted to add, from what you've posted, it seems that you're implying that the rear surround channel in DD is just an extension of the surround channels? So far as I've always read, even according to the Dolby website, it is an extra channel of audio (meaning distinct) just the same as DTS's 6th channel being discrete.

I also don't quite get what you mean when you say, "...so ES must be used with 5.1 systems to decode the channel and mix it into the side surrounds." Can you elaborate/reword this?

:end edit]

E.

My suspicion is that the 970 is not throwing anything away, but Scott can confirm that for certain.

That is my hope; that it's just redirecting the 6th channel information into the surrounds equally. It's just a little wierd since other units I've had step down to the non 6.1 standard when the rear surrounds are configured to not exist. (both a Yamaha and an NAD processor exhibited this behavior)

I just thought up a quick test; I'm going to hook an interconnect to the pre out of the surround left, and slide the other end into an extra amp channel I have (Adcom GFA-5300) and a spare speaker.

Without changing any menu settings (surround back speakers still set to NONE) I'm going to leave the main NAD T955 amp off, and see if any data comes piping through when I play EX or ES encoded material. =) If the Adcom plays, it's NOT redirecting.... :p

(yeah, I'm such a geek. I know.)

E.

Dolby Digital EX is actually a descendent of Pro Logic - there is a mono rear surround signal specifically mixed for the track, but it is not a discrete channel in the Dolby Digital bitstream (there wasn't room in the AC-3 spec for a sixth full-range channel). Instead, it is matrixed into the side surround channels in very much the same manner as Pro Logic encoded stereo signals from the days of VHS carried center and surround signals mixed into the left and right channels.

Just to toss in a bit of history, there were many early Dolby EX discs (Phantom Menace comes to mind, but there were numerous others) released without any mention of EX on the packaging or the disc. They also contained no "flag" identifying them as EX tracks, but if the user manually enabled EX decoding they'd get the extra channel. Discs eventually began using the EX flag, and Dolby also began modifying the spec for that flag and how it was supposed to force a receiver or processor to behave. Today, if the disc is mastered with the EX flag engaged (and it is still not always done - the latest Star Wars DVD's still don't include the flag on their EX-encoded tracks), the receiver is supposed to force Dolby EX decoding no matter what. It is intended to override everything else, including user preference (many of us prefer to use Pro Logic IIx to get separate left and right rear surround signals using IIx's superior matrix decoding scheme) and quantity of speakers in the system.
I wrote that last night thinking one thing, and need to dig back into DTS to be sure that I had it right. First, we have to remember that "true" DTS ES (sometimes called "DTS ES Discrete") contains a sixth full-range audio channel in the digital bitstream, unlike the way that Dolby EX works. Thinking about it after a little more rest (although not as much as I'd have liked), there exists some mechanism in the DTS standard to allow for retrieval of the sixth discrete channel when using systems that only off DTS decoding (such as receivers made prior to the introduction of the DTS ES extension). My suspicion in this case, though, is that the 970 is using the ES decoding to retrieve that data directly and them allowing the DSP engine to steer that data to the side surrounds.

There was once also a "DTS ES Matrix" mode offered on many receivers and processors that produced a mono surround back signal from regular DTS 5.1 sources (basically, a direct parallel of Dolby EX used with regular Dolby 5.1 sources). A couple years ago, DTS changed the way they identify that mode - it always used the NEO:6 matrix decoding scheme even though it was called "ES Matrix," but now they are referring to it as "DTS+NEO:6" and ES is only used with Discrete ES tracks. I don't know that all manufacturers have done this, but Outlaw's current offerings handle it this way.

Interesting!

That all makes lots of sense.

I think that's what is really the bugger; you come to understand what a standard is supposed to be, and what it's doing and is capable of, and then they go and relabel it or change it slightly so it behaves differently! LOL.

I guess it's just a little unsettling until one KNOWS for SURE what the unit is doing; to see it show EX or ES on the display, when you KNOW you've told it that you don't have those speakers wired or designated. One instantly wonders, 'is the audio really being processed properly for those channels?' (ie, intentionally not 'pulled out' of the surrounds in EX, or intentionally matrixed back into the surrounds in ES, if I'm understanding what you're saying)

I also just realized, my test may not be wholy authoritative, because if the processor shuts down output to the pre outs for the surround back (since I designated them as NONE) it's still feasible that it's not processing the stream properly. (opposite of described above, in that it, 'intentionally pulls out the extra audio from the surrounds in EX mode' or 'intentionally does not matrix the 6th channel back into the surrounds in ES mode') I.E., the data could just be 'lost'. I guess I'd need a test disc with discrete test tones on ONLY those channels to see where the audio all 'went'.

E.

Things took a turn for the worse tonight.

After the game (thankfully) when my guests were dispersing, I was flipping through channels with the one remaining guest to see what else was on.

At some point, the audio dropped out. (I was on Video 2, Dig Coax input 2, Satellite tuner)

The unit seemed to go into that 'locked' mode. No volume commands from the remote would be accepted. I could change sources, but no audio came back on. I did not have time to try more things, like scrolling through the audio modes.

The front panel power switch was unresponsive.

I had to shut the power down from the rear master switch.

For this to happen after the latest firmware update, I'm a little disappointed...

Will update when I notice anything else. (I'd write if, but I'm not very optimistic anymore... )

E.