I compiled a collection of surround sound test files in various formats. Each file contains discrete channel output that plays through each speaker separately. If the test files contain more channels than your setup, you can use them to see if your system properly decodes and downmixes audio so that the sounds appear in their approximately correct locations.
5.1 Surround Sound Test The Helicopter
The Dolby Atmos test files for 5.1.2, 5.1.4, 7.1.2, and 7.1.4 contain four audio tracks: TrueHD, DD+, and two Dolby Digital 5.1 (one with the sound effects and another that tells you that you've selected the wrong audio track). I believe Atmos should be encoded in the TrueHD and DD+ streams, but someone will have to confirm. The 9.1.6 test file has only a DD+ 5.1 track.
While it begins with a ringing sound that should come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time, this sequence gets going as a test for your stereo pair. The whole scene is set to Bellbottoms by the John Spencer Blues Explosion. It's a song with serious attack and it needs to come across with - no pun intended - real drive. If you don't want to hear it again by the end of the scene, then your set-up is doing something wrong.
When the getaway begins, though, it's about how your surround speakers integrate with the fronts. The tyres should screech across the soundscape as the car slides about and it mustn't be so clumsy as to sound like the effect is simply chucked from speaker to speaker. Ideally, it moves across the space so subtly and seamlessly that you forget about your system altogether - not an easy thing to do when you're testing, we grant you.
Marvel means nothing if not great action, and the web-slinger is an awesome character to test big swushing surround effects. This mid-movie, first-time showdown between Spider-man and the Vulture is an excellent work-out for a home cinema set-up.
This scene starts tame, with a gentle cruise over the deserts of Arrakis, but it quickly devolves into a rescue mission as the Ornithopter nose dives and the protagonists rush out into the sandstorm to help the crew of a large spice harvester before a deadly worm attack - it'll make more sense when you watch it. What results is a sonic feast, as the sounds of rushing wind, creaking metal and frantic cries envelop you in surround sound. It culminates with a deep, guttural bass drop as the worm surfaces, accompanied by Hans Zimmer's masterful score, this is not a movie to be missed, especially if you have a good surround sound system.
It culminates in a standoff within a town square, as the baddies open fire on Bond's bulletproof Aston. The effect of bullets clinking against the armoured car, as the glass splinters and buckles is exhilarated, especially in surround sound as many scenes taken place within the car from the protagonists position. But this is Agent 007 we're talking about here, and he always has an escape plan, this time it so happens to involve the rattling machine guns strapped to the front of his car, a hissing smokescreen deployment and revving the DB5 up to perform some graceful donuts before making his escape - looking and sounding as good as ever 007.
As the chase reaches its climax, the Batmobile lets out one final roar as it jumps through a fiery explosion before smashing into the back of the Italian sports car. We're placed within the Maserati as it flips out of control, with the sound spinning around us in tandem, effectively carried out in surround sound.
As the party descends further into chaos chairs and bottles go flying, with the crashing and smashing sounds piercing through the bustle of the crowd and toe-tapping soundtrack, The main draw here is that we follow protagonist Manny as he weaves his way through this party in one long shot, putting us at the centre of the senseless chaos, making it an ideal scene to test drive your surround sound kit.
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In none of the cases have I ever heard surround sound with the effects behind, sideways or overhead that ATMOS should have (simulating of course).
Could it be a calibration problem without Trueplay?
Yes, all done! A thousand thanks!
Selecting "Bitstream (direct)" from the Playstation increases the volume of the overall sound, which is already an advantage! ;-)
The problem of surround effects remains the problem. I don't feel the cinema effect and the spatiality of the sound ...
With the same devices (TV and Playstation) the BOSE soundbar had all these surround and spatial effects and were always heard (for example I could hear the side sounds in the ear very well when there was a scene of a helicopter coming from one of the two sides ...). Now with the SONOS ARC I hear the helicopter only centrally, without that spatiality I am talking about ...
So it's not a problem with the TV or Playstation settings.
The only hope (but tell me if this could be the probable problem) is the speech that I have not yet calibrated the sound with Trueplay.
Surround sound, at its most basic, involves three channels and four speakers: a set of stereo front speakers (left and right) and a set of surround speakers, which are usually placed just to the sides and just behind a central listening position. The next step up involves the addition of a fourth channel and a fifth speaker, placed between the front left and right speakers, that is primarily responsible for dialogue.
It was the summer of 1969 when surround sound first became available in the home. It was called Quadraphonic sound, and as the name suggests, it provided four channels of discrete sound routed to four speakers placed in each corner of a room. It first appeared on reel-to-reel tape, but eventually became available on vinyl too.
With the release of the film Clear and Present Danger on LaserDisc in 1995, the first Dolby Digital surround sound hit home theaters. By the time DVDs came out in 1997, Dolby Digital had become the default surround sound format. To this day, Dolby Digital 5.1 is considered by many to be the surround sound standard and is still included on most Blu-ray discs and tons of streamed movies.
DTS, on the other hand, offered two separate 6.1 versions. DTS-ES Discrete and DTS-ES Matrix perform as their names suggest. With ES Discrete, specific sound information is programmed onto a DVD or Blu-ray disc, while DTS-ES Matrix uses the same technique as Dolby Digital EX to extrapolate information from the surround channels.
In 2015, Yamaha introduced the first Atmos-capable soundbar, the YSP-5600, which uses up-firing drivers to bounce sound off the ceiling. Since then, soundbar manufacturers have fully embraced Dolby Atmos. Some achieve the Atmos effect by using dedicated wireless surround speakers with up-firing drivers to complement the front speakers in the bar. Others use a technique known as virtualized Dolby Atmos to convincingly simulate the Atmos effect using fewer speakers.
Just like with other types of surround sound, DTS has its own version of object-based audio, DTS:X, which was unveiled in 2015. DTS:X aims to be more flexible and accessible than Atmos, making use of preexisting speaker layouts in theaters and supporting up to 32 different speaker configurations in the home.
DTS also recognizes that not all movie lovers have the space or the time to put together an object-based sound system. Research gathered by DTS showed that less than 30% of customers actually connect height speakers to their systems, and less than 50% even bother connecting surround speakers.
Soundbars are slim, unobtrusive, and easy to set up, and the best soundbars can effectively emulate a full-featured surround sound system (for less dough and less effort). But figuring out which soundbar to choose can be difficult, given the diversity of options and the confusing numerical suffixes attached.
Since the movie primarily revolves around the plot where characters are blindfolded throughout, the importance the makers gave to sound design and sound effects are top notch. This movie will give your surround speakers a real treat. It has many layers of surround effects, both ambient as well as directional, that will surely impress. Listen to the aggressive movement of water from all directions and hear the rapid bubbles when you are trapped underwater.
Arguably one of the most all-rounded surround sound scenes of late. Starting off with a high-speed car chase in a crowded street, listen for a loud crash from the behind you that moves from left to right, followed by a truck honk that goes from the front to the left speaker shortly afterwards and finally, a police car ramming from behind resulting in a deafening shatter of rear window glass. The scene then continues into an intense manhunt in a dense, claustrophobic neighborhood.
Helicopter flying overhead? Check. Fight scene that circles around you? Check. The scenes listed are like your guide to what a good surround sound journey is like. Within the first 10 minutes of the movie, you will experience what it is like to be in a helicopter with a crew that has a deadly objective, with suspenseful music and the sound of helicopter rotors being perfectly translated into your room. Hear and feel the constant rumble and drone of the airplane in the background, as the cast engages in a heated exchange that quickly turns messy through your center channels. You will suddenly find yourself in the center of furious hand-to-hand combat action, with the sound of each blow being replicated to the T by your surround speakers. All this happens while adrenaline-pumping music thumps through your subwoofer(s) to inject the needed dose of excitement into the action.
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