I went down that rabbit hole. Tidal will only play Dolby Atmos if the app is streamed through apple tv, Nvidia shield or fire stick max. Forget a computer, phone, heos, blue sound, Roku, other fire sticks.
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Dolby Atmos Music
- Thread starter luft262
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That's bullshit. They should be more open about such in their and Amazon's advertising so consumers don't subscribe thinking it's going to be available.
This is a problem with streaming in general. The reason is the whole thing is based on device white lists, not feature handling. For both Atmos and HDR/Dolby Vision. So there is a list of devices approved to be served these formats from each streaming service. The device *supporting* Atmos or DV doesn't mean anything.
There are a number of notable cases where device support existed, but never white listed or it took a long time. The whole thing is a disaster and the industry should be ashamed of relying on device white lists instead of allowing devices to just tell the service what they support.
I am pretty sure it's an anti-piracy measure and as usual for those, only legitimate users get punished.
Dunno if there is a regular 5.1 or 7.1 version, but the Atmos mix of Pearl Jam's No Code via Apple Music + AirPods 3 sounds far better than the stereo mix. Honestly, I might even prefer it over listening to the original stereo CD rip on my HD800S.
Apple is doing some seriously good work, it's a shame that it's a closed ecosystem and the 2 channel downmix algorithm is probably proprietary to either Dolby or Apple.
I'm not even convinced they have all that much interest in making Atmos work on AVRs. The entire marketing push is to use Atmos music to sell headphones. The fact that it works on AVRs seems like a technical side effect that they decided to leave in because it didn't cost them anything more.
That is a large part of the purpose of Atmos though. It's not supposed to be a lot of work to make it work on different platforms, and it's supposed to adapt to any speaker setup you have from stereo to 9.4.6 or whatever. They just need to make the data stream and the hardware on the other end will handle everything else.
The fact they're doing it for headphones is actually really great. Because it provides a large demand and economic incentive. Without the headphone piece, spatial audio would be doomed for economic reasons the same way as previous surround efforts that relied on speakers. At least this way it has a chance to succeed.
Is there actually any music thats been mixed in atmos? Non of the old stuff was. There just processing the stereo mix and Ild expect the results are less than ideal. Sorta like hitting the Dolby surround button or the "jazz club" effect in your AVR.
It has to be an apple tv 4k, right?
BTW. If they have it in the selection, Yello Point is pretty cool. @Cbdb2 , I believe it is an example. At least, CD and blu-ray came out at the same time and it does sound as if it was directly made for atmos.
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Tried it a few times...Afraid they'll fail just like the Quadraphonic of yore... The technology IMHO is sublime but ...
Apple looks like they're into the Apple Music because they started the legit online music business with iTunes .. they seem to be wandering. Kind of a FOMO mentality, As aimless in some ways as Amazon prime Vidéo
On top of that, they make it too difficult to use, unless you're into the Apple ecosystem and even then ...
Apple looks like they're into the Apple Music because they started the legit online music business with iTunes .. they seem to be wandering. Kind of a FOMO mentality, As aimless in some ways as Amazon prime Vidéo
On top of that, they make it too difficult to use, unless you're into the Apple ecosystem and even then ...
To make an Atmos mix the multi-tracks of the recording are needed, I don't think any upconverted stereo tracks will go through pretending they are Dolby Atmos mixes.
I hope this format will succeed but it depends on all the headphone listeners out there, if they prefer the Atmos version over the standard stereo track, the format will have a real chance to make it. This can be like a "trojan horse" for us super-HiFi-nerds to finally get a surround music format that will survive this time, unlike SACD which depended on a 5.1 setup that most of the listeners will never install in their homes.
This time around it's an object-based format that will work in both headphones as well as a multi-channel system, the format will use all the physical speakers you have in your Atmos setup no matter how many they are.
Some good things come with the format as well, like the loudness limit of -18 LUFS that will prevent crushed and overly limited mixes. And according to people who mix in Atmos, there is also less need for compression on individual instruments in the mix now when they have a lot more space and don't need to cramp everything into a stereo mix of just two channels.
If you have 4.5 hours at hand, I suggest you see this video with Andrew Scheps and his friends discussing mixing in Atmos and what they think about the format. There's a lot of good info in there.
For what its worth, the TIDAL app on my new LG TV is sending Atmos to my Denon receiver (via eARC) and the Denon app is Showing ATMOS signal is being received. I don't have Atmos speakers to actually confirm but I would safely assume you could add this to that list^
Unless the music was recorded with a very limited mic setup(mono/stereo mics, or something) then you can remix anything in Atmos if you have the original recordings.
Classical music recording does all sorts of weird shit but for the mostpart I would expect there to be at least 3-5 recorded tracks(eg what's in a Decca Tree).
Modern studio recording uses many more mics than this, sometimes as many as 100 for an orchestra playing a film score in a large studio. So Atmos mixes with that kind of source will likely be better, certainly.
Yep, exactly. From what I've heard from friends in the Apple ecosystem, they do often like the Atmos mixes better...and the industry in general is certainly taking Atmos music very seriously. I know for a fact that some major recording studios have changed their workflows to offer more multitrack options for Atmos mixes.
I am not 100% sure but the heaphone version of Atmos seems quite different from real Atmos.To make an Atmos mix the multi-tracks of the recording are needed, I don't think any upconverted stereo tracks will go through pretending they are Dolby Atmos mixes.
I hope this format will succeed but it depends on all the headphone listeners out there, if they prefer the Atmos version over the standard stereo track, the format will have a real chance to make it. This can be like a "trojan horse" for us super-HiFi-nerds to finally get a surround music format that will survive this time, unlike SACD which depended on a 5.1 setup that most of the listeners will never install in their homes.
This time around it's an object-based format that will work in both headphones as well as a multi-channel system, the format will use all the physical speakers you have in your Atmos setup no matter how many they are.
Some good things come with the format as well, like the loudness limit of -18 LUFS that will prevent crushed and overly limited mixes. And according to people who mix in Atmos, there is also less need for compression on individual instruments in the mix now when they have a lot more space and don't need to cramp everything into a stereo mix of just two channels.
If you have 4.5 hours at hand, I suggest you see this video with Andrew Scheps and his friends discussing mixing in Atmos and what they think about the format. There's a lot of good info in there.
Is it actually object based or do they just take the original atmos mix that is object based and mix it down with a transfer function to standard stereo? If so, this solution could have been used also with a 5.1 mix. I think, even Spotify, without any change of their technology, could stream headphone Atmos immediately.
So, it is cool that people can experience Atmos effects with just normal headphones but it might be one of the reasons why streaming services like Amazon do not support more advanced "real" atmos devices. I hope this will change though. At least apple and tidal seem to do a good job in streaming real Atmos content.
There are different types of headphone Atmos. I think Apple may be the only ones attempting to do it properly with head tracking. Without head tracking it is as you said, just a flat transfer function. I haven't tried it myself but the Apple head tracking stuff reportedly does work although it is laggy. It does also require Apple headphones of course.
I found another thread with a good explanation of how the original Atmos mix is downmixed for headphone listening.
Dolby Atmos music mixing terminology explained by Mix Engineer John Hanes
Hanes wrote this on Gearspace, and it’s a Must Read: “First, we need to get terminology straight. We can't use binaural and stereo interchangeably. Binaural is not stereo; it is a 2-channel downmix to be delivered to Headphones. “So the process is to do the mix, record it into the Dolby...
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valerianf
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The Fire stick 4k is also compatible with Dolby Atmos.
www.dolby.com
Fire TV Stick 4K with Dolby Atmos & Dolby Vision - Dolby
With more power and a lightning-fast processor, enjoy 4K Ultra HD streaming with the Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K enabled with Dolby Atmos & Dolby Vision.
The main problem is that the indications are very confusing overall. For example, the Firestick does not seem to support Atmos on Netflix.The Fire stick 4k is also compatible with Dolby Atmos.
Fire TV Stick 4K with Dolby Atmos & Dolby Vision - Dolby
With more power and a lightning-fast processor, enjoy 4K Ultra HD streaming with the Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K enabled with Dolby Atmos & Dolby Vision.
Tidal should work, Prime Music does only deliver "Atmos" to headphones and their echo loudspeaker.
I hope that things will converge more in the future.
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I find the shield is a decent device for streams with metadata like atmos attached. It's really about the mixing and hope to hear some classics remixed. I absolutely love 5.1 Rock music like Yes,Rush remixed from the original..I find they are my go to now which took a long,long time for me ..like 30 years until digital finally was a format I enjoyed in music. I can honestly say I atmos is real game changer for film and TV. My lovely wife notices and she slept thru an earthquake.
Here are some:
Yello - Point (Atmos Edition, out of print but available)
Kraftwerk - The Catalog, 4 Blu Ray complete (out of print but available), or single disc compilation
Steven Wilson - The Future Bites
Booka Shade - Dear Future Self
These were recorded and mixed for Atmos and make interesting/artistic use of the height channels and surround back
REM - Automatic for the People (remix but done with great care)
John Lennon - Gimme Some Truth compilation (also a remix done with great care)
I don't know if what is available on the streaming services are any good. I don't subscribe to streaming services. I wonder if the audio quality streaming is as good as Blu Ray? I also wonder if what is on the streaming services are actually remixed (or original Atmos recordings) done with artistic intent or if they are gimmicks auto-upmixed to Atmos.
Yup, it is too early to get into Dolby Atmos music. Surround sound music on a 5.1 or 7.1 is pretty awesome.
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