Samsung HW-F355 Soundbar DTS and DD Questions

[mikebanks385]

I bought a Samsung Soundbar, the HW-F355. The soundbar supports DTS and Dolby Digital decoding (the regular 5.1) but not Dolby True HD and DTS MA.

PS4, Cable Box plugged to TV with HDMI and soundbar goes into the TV optical out (No HDMI ports on the soundbar). My TV is a Samsung LED that can let 5.1 passthrough. I can switch the options in the sound settings of the TV and put it to DTS or DD. What I'm wondering is:

Let's say I want to chose DTS on my TV and play a USB movie through my TV USB port that was encoded in DTS, I can switch from PCM to DTS in my TV sound options.

So after that I guess the DTS signal from the movie is being downconverted into Stereo since I have a soundbar and not a full 5.1 system with 5 speakers? What's the difference is I leave the sound option to PCM on the TV? Will both processes be equivalent? Will the resulting sound be the same at the end as both will be converted to stereo in the end?

 

[NutBucket]

Basically yes. It's digital decoding so it makes no difference if the TV or soundbar does the decoding.

 

[mikebanks385]

Basically yes. It's digital decoding so it makes no difference if the TV or soundbar does the decoding.

Thank you very much One last question, Why do they put Dolby Digital and DTS signs on the soundbar if in the end I get a stereo signal? Is it just to show that the soundbar can convert DTS and DD to Stereo to make it pretty to the consumer lol?

 

[NutBucket]

Exactly. Ignorant consumers.

 

[danialbi]

I am a newby...
I have F6800 TV and just ordered a HW-F355
Q1: Can my TV let 5.1 passthrough?
Q2: I am having problems with AC3 on .mkv USB: On TV I cannot hear dialogues and have to boost volume to 80 and higher. Are you guys sure that ... it makes no difference if the TV or soundbar does the decoding? Looks that TV downmixing sucks, many users have the same issue...

 

[poofyhairguy]

I am having problems with AC3 on .mkv USB: On TV I cannot hear dialogues and have to boost volume to 80 and higher. Are you guys sure that ... it makes no difference if the TV or soundbar does the decoding? Looks that TV downmixing sucks.

The problem is dialogue is mostly on the center channel, so if you downmix 5.1 content to stereo you will always have the "turn up the volume for talking parts, turn down the volume for exploding parts" issue. Many soundbars I have seen are at least 3.1 for the reason. I would not do any decoding on the TV side if possible.

 

[danialbi]

Thanks,
that's why I bought the soundbar...
...but then why if I play the movie via PC vlc or using WDTV on stereo 2.0 then everything works fine? Also, DTS 5.1 seems ok on TV 2.0

 

[deanjoly]

This soundbar supports the Dolby Digital and DTS 2.1 standards, it downmixes from 5.1 to 2.1 and should spread the center channel evenly between the left and right speakers. Hence why the logos are printed on it. I don't find I need to adjust the volume between dialog and action sequences at all. It has three levels of dynamic range compression (DRC) that can adjust the difference between loud and soft sounds if you find that you do need to adjust the volume often. I leave mine at DRCMIN and am very happy with it.

My father-in-law has a much more expensive Polk Audio soundbar and he's stuck adjusting the volume constantly and neither his bar or TV have any options for compression or volume limiting.