Home Theater Sound Systems

If you think that it is all that easy to get the right audio speakers for your home theater sound system, then you are gravely mistaken.  There are a number of considerations that you have to take in stock of before you go and splurge on that set of speakers.  This is especially true if you want the best sound speaker system for your home theater.

It is mind-boggling how much letters and numbers there are tied in with the most modern surround sound that is digital in format and used in home theater systems.  The name as well as the abbreviations for the different formats of digital audio is enough to baffle the home theater fan, so much more so for someone who is just a newcomer to the home theater scene. 

To make things easier for both those who already owns a home theater system and those who are still thinking of getting one, we will delve into the mysteries of the home theater sound system.  We will clarify what all the letters and numbers stand for.  Hopefully, by the end of this article, some light has already been shed on that dark unknown called the complexities of the sound system.

Digital sound has seen much history along the wake of its evolution.  It went through its sound days when it was still labeled as monaural and then it progressed to stereo, until it came to Quadrophonic sound.  Suffice it to say that the formats of the more modern digital audio reproduce a precise sound that is completely similar to the source from which it originated.

In digital revolution, it is the Dolby Laboratories that is known to be the utmost pioneers.  The currently available Dolby Digital is now considered as the digital format that is most common.  It is being utilized on almost all digital video discs or DVD ever produced since the concept of the DVD format was begun.  The Dolby Digital actually came from the Dolby ProLogic or the Dolby Surround format, which is still very popular in wide circles of the globe's population.  Be sure to remember that you must have the equipment that is topmost in quality for you to be able to distinguish the difference as well as the benefits of any audio format that you wish to get.
 
The DTS that also specializes in digital audio home theater system is really very new to the scene of digital audio.  It is considered as a competition to Dolby Digital even if the Dolby technology had a part in its development.  Even so, DTS is known as having a format that is proven to be good and could stand on its own name.  When using average equipment for your home theater system, there is no noticeable edge between Dolby and DTS.  There are those consumers though who are very tight in backing DTS as the better provider of digital audio.  This is primarily because of DTS' claim of having compression and signal to noise ratios that are lower than the competition.  While this could have some truth in it, one needs to have a receiver that has the capacity to decode the format used by the source to get the best results.

What is the THX in digital audio?  THX has been often misconstrued as a digital audio format when in fact, it is not.  It is just a “stamp of approval” specifically from Lucas Films.  This stamp signifies that the component or equipment you have bought or already has met their rigid standards for accuracy in the reproduction of sound.

After the letters, comes the numbers that you often see as tied in with the different formats of digital audio.  They are also mainly related with the receivers' available audio channels that have been amplified and decoded as well as their placements.  In the beginning, there was only the monophonic or the mono sound. 

This fundamentally only had one speaker or source of sound.  Then came the birth of the stereophonic sound that basically means having two speakers.  As it embodies the precise manner humans pick up sound, it was considered with some greatness in its influx.  After stereo came the Quadrophonic sound, which meant having four sources of sound.  Amazingly, this did not gain as much popularity as the stereo and was not even utilized by most homes except for those who had to get the best of everything.

Of course, the Dolby ProLogic created another trend in introducing surround sound with its 5.1 channels.  These channels are the left, center, right, rear surround fill and the subwoofer.  This new phase into current digital surround sound makes it possible to get integrated sound information that has been encoded as well as having as many as eight channels that are independent in giving out sound information. 

It has the capability to have right, left, center, right-side, left-side, left-rear, right-rear and subwoofer information.  The Low Frequency Effects or LFE channel of the subwoofer answers the .1 designation found in receiver formats.  Adding more speakers to the system will bring one to the 6.1 and 7.1 formats that have yet to gain popularity among home theater system buffs.

If you want the best audio system for your home theater sound system, be sure to get that receiver and DVD player that has the capability to decode both digital audio formats of Dolby Digital and DTS.  Having one or the other for your digital audio format is tantamount to getting that cinematic audio quality that you have long dreamed of.