Harry Potter soundtracks in surround sound

Hello everyone.

A few weeks ago I found out that there were surround mixes of some HP soundtracks available. I had already bought the limited edition for Deathly Hallows I and thought the music sounded marvellous in 5.1 surround. I downloaded the surround version of Part II via Warner Bros’s website, but ended up with a bunch of ordinary WAV files. Someone from the company told me I had to burn these files to a cd and decode them with a Dolby Prologic II programme. Rubbish, right? Why would burning them on a CD change anything, and it might be me, but I can hear absolutely no difference whasoever between those WAV files played through my codec pack and the Mp3 files I ripped from the ordinary CD. I e-mailed Watertower music again, even sent them a letter, but received no reaction.

Can anyone help or explain me why this company bothers to upload fake surround files at all? Or does anyone have the true surround mix for Deathly Hallows II?

Kind regards, bollemanneke

I think the main reason they do this is for the technically-challenged citizens.

Handing out discreet 5.1 surround sound files (at a very large size compared to Dolby PLII), most people wouldn’t know what to do with them.

The general audience for the Harry Potter franchise:

Frank: "Hey, George, you get the surround sound soundtrack?"
George: "You mean the 5.1 thing?"
Frank: "There’s 5.1 now? I got just the first version…"

:itsamystery:

Sherlock Holmes was like that. And I think Immortals as well.

If anything is to be said to them, it’s not about the flaws of DPLII.

It’s that you should put in a request for the media to be available in other formats. 5.1 WAV/FLAC/AIF/AIFF, DVD-Audio, Blu-Ray Audio, etc.

Okay, but real 5.1 files would be smaller than these stupid Wav files…

:erm: I don’t think so.

The data for each channel (6 channels) would require more room.

I ripped the end credits to Martyrs off a Blu-Ray.
Originally 5.1 surround sound.
And then downmixed to 2.0.

5.1 Surround Sound

General
Complete name : D:\Work Folder\Martyrs (6ch).wav
Format : Wave
File size : 113 MiB
Duration : 3mn 25s
Overall bit rate mode : Constant
Overall bit rate : 4 609 Kbps

Audio
ID : 0
Format : PCM
Format settings, Endianness : Little
Format settings, Sign : Signed
Codec ID : 00001000-0000-0100-8000-00AA00389B71
Duration : 3mn 25s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 4 608 Kbps
Channel(s) : 6 channels
Channel positions : Front: L C R, Back: L R, LFE
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Bit depth : 16 bits
Stream size : 113 MiB (100%)

Downmixed to 2.0

General
Complete name : D:\Work Folder\Martyrs (Stereo).wav
Format : Wave
File size : 37.6 MiB
Duration : 3mn 25s
Overall bit rate mode : Constant
Overall bit rate : 1 537 Kbps

Audio
ID : 0
Format : PCM
Format settings, Endianness : Little
Codec ID : 1
Duration : 3mn 25s
Bit rate mode : Constant
Bit rate : 1 536 Kbps
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Sampling rate : 48.0 KHz
Bit depth : 16 bits
Stream size : 37.5 MiB (100%)

1536Kbps/2=768Kbps per channel.
4609Kbps/6=768.16666666666666666666666666667Kbps per channel.

You can reduce the size by converting to FLAC.

Sorry, but ac3 files with six channels are half as small as wstuid WAV files with two channels.

AC3 files are compressed lossy formats. (which is why it’s smaller)
The highest bitrate for any AC3 file is 640Kbps.

640/6=106.6Kbps per channel.
Standard DVD audio has a maximum of 448Kbps.
448/6=74.6Kbps
It gets worse when you go as low as 192Kbps, which is usually reserved for Stereo formats.

WAV files are uncompressed lossless and can vary for bitrate.

However, if you have the parent file of an AC3 file (Dolby TrueHD; AC3’s are the core files of TrueHD’s), then you can have lossless audio at varying bitrates and bit depths.

To maintain this lossless quality, with bitrates and bit depths, the destination file must be a lossless format that supports multichannel and bit depths over 16.
A proper decoder is also needed. Different programs work differently. And each program has a different version of their decoders that can give different results.

I’d rather have the multichannel WAV files converted to FLAC rather than AC3.

———- Post added at 03:10 AM ———- Previous post was at 02:51 AM ———-

I did some research on this.

It seems that the DVD is just a standard DVD. As in lossy AC3 at standard DVD formats for video.
Which makes the music either 384 or 448 Kbps.
448/6=74.6Kbps per channel
384/6=64Kbps per channel.

Which means it’s quite low in terms of bitrate. Although surround sound, it would greatly benefit from a lossless format, such a Blu-Ray release in Dolby TrueHD or DTS-HD Master Audio. Even PCM audio would be acceptable.
With lossless audio formats, higher bitrates will greatly add to the texture of the music and give it more depth without constraint.

Any editing is not recommended, as it’s all lossy material.

Okay, but why does the soundtrack for Deathly Hallows one sound ten times beter in ac3 than the soundtrack for part two in Dolby Prologic Wav files? Which programme do I use to obtain the same quality, since Watertower Music keeps claiming these are 5.1 files?

It sounds better because it’s actual 5.1 surround sound.
Had it been Blu-Ray audio, it would sound a thousand times better.

Unfortunately, there isn’t anything you can do with the DPLII files.
Other than burn them to disc and then play it back on your machines that can decode DPLII.
It will give some resemblance of what DPLII is supposed to do.
It will still sound like the regular store-bought CD in stereo.

It would be better to play them through software on your computer/laptop hooked up to a sound system and get your media player software to play with settings and sound features.

Plenty of software out there can simulate and modify the output stream to sound like a really cheap upscale of 5.1.
Reverb, equilizer, phasing, etc.

That’s about all you can do.

I tried with lots of software to get it to enhance it’s DPLII encoding and nothing changed. :/

Hi, who has THE DEATHLY H. Part2 in 5.1 surround music. That was a free download from the OST CD, but the link is expired.

No one has it because effing WB put fake stereo files on their effing website…

"fake stereo" is incorrect interpretation of Dolby ProLogic II.

DPL II is designed to playback matrixed stereo on DPL-compatible devices to create surround sound.
It’s not going to be discreet surround sound. But, you’ll get some effect to it.

Matrixed stereo is still stereo. Just better listened to when it’s decoded through DPL decoder.

———- Post added at 03:13 PM ———- Previous post was at 03:11 PM ———-

Hi, who has THE DEATHLY H. Part2 in 5.1 surround music. That was a free download from the OST CD, but the link is expired.

You should read the entire thread.

While it’s true, as TheSparktank™ 2.1 says, that the Blu-ray encoding is superior, dare I say reference, a good AC-3 file can be very enjoyable if it has been mastered competently. And they are small. The only snag with Dobly Digital AC-3 though, is that the volume is lowered most of the time to increase compression efficiency. DTS does not.

However, the full benefit of Blu-ray audio can only be obtained if you have a Digital Amp with a HDMI port. If you’re connecting with optical cable, you’re going to get compression. Similarly, with older SACD and SACD equipment to play 96KHz software, the best result is achieved with a player that has analogue outputs for all channels, and an Amp with Direct 6 channel input, because SPDIF will compress from Player to Amp.

Pro Logic is a bit of a red herring. Dolby Pro Logic PLII is not surround sound. It’s a 2 channel decoding circuit in an Amp used to create a simulated surround effect using two speakers. Whereas Pro Logic encodes a 2 channel source into 4.1 channels.

@Sparktank: I agree, but they did release a splendid 5.1 mix of Part I. Why, then, is it too much to release the same sort of album for Part II? I don’t want Dolby Pro Logic, I just want 6 channels, like they put on the DVD.

Hi,

i have the original CD with the enhanced bonus, but the download link is expired from the CD !
And who has the music in 5.1 from this film ?

Please help !

Like I said, no one has real surround for this film because it doesn’t exist publicly. The only people having surround files are WB, good luck trying to get them from those good-for-nothings.