[madbull]

Darinf, thanks so much for this!
 
The first wav file sounds incredible on my Westone 4.
 
I'll download all the files when I'm back at home.

 

[zowki]

I created a Realiser On-line Demo page.

One danger of posting demo files is that many people may find that the simulation does not work for them. Then they walk away with a negative impression of the Realiser.

Please bear in mind that the Realiser definitely works really well, but ONLY if you do a personal measurement of a system with YOUR ears.

Here's the demo page. I am not sure it it will help or hurt, but there it is:
http://realiser.us/realiserdemo.htm

Thank you so much! The Master and Commander 5.1 Demo sounds amazing with my Fostex TH900, like I'm in a real movie theater.

 

[darinf]

Quote:

Darinf, thanks so much for this!
 
The first wav file sounds incredible on my Westone 4.
 
I'll download all the files when I'm back at home.

 
Glad it worked for you. At the Head-Fi meet I organized, I had these files available playing on laptops and generally people said that the effect worked pretty well even with the audio calibrated fro my ears. Of course, there was no comparison to the personal calibrations I was doing with real speakers on-site.
 
But if these samples sound good to you, then just try to imagine how much better it can be with it calibrated for your ears.
 
Quote:

Thank you so much! The Master and Commander 5.1 Demo sounds amazing with my Fostex TH900, like I'm in a real movie theater.

 
Yes, for movies, the demos may be even better since the sound quality is less critical than two channel music listening. I really need to take the time to sync the Realiser output with the actual video from the movie so you can watch the movie and listen to the Realiser output at the same time. The audio makes more sense when you see actually see the movie.
 
To me, the sound is WAY better than a movie theater. The sound in most theaters does not compare to a well set up, high end, home theater system. In this case we're talking about $150,000 in speakers alone that you're listening to in that clip.
 
I should upload a clip with a simulation of the Egyptian Theater in Los Angeles. It's a great effect because the speakers are SO far away from you, it really sounds like you are in a theater.
 
I guess posting those clips was worth while after all. I know Lorr at Smyth Research would be mortified to know that I posted those samples. He hates the idea of people listening to calibrations for someone else's ears. I am sure he will still be against it even it it means he ends up selling more Realisers. Go figure.
 
-Darin

 

[jackhamm]

I don't know if this has been posted before, but it was recorded on Nov. 12 and provides some good basic info. on the Realiser.

http://twit.tv/show/home-theater-geeks/136

 

[darinf]

Quote:

I don't know if this has been posted before, but it was recorded on Nov. 12 and provides some good basic info. on the Realiser.
http://twit.tv/show/home-theater-geeks/136

Very cool. Lorr sure knows his stuff. The best explanation of the Realiser I have seen online so far. I have a feeling there are going to be a lot more people on the PRIR exchange thread...

 

[Jand]

Ok, a fairly newbie question -- I'm trying to connect my PC to the Realiser and my TV.  I was hoping to use the HDMI digital audio output but it's not cooperating (an issue with my PC, not the Realiser) so I'm looking to fall back on my motherboard's 7.1 analog outputs.  These outputs are in the form of 3.5mm jacks.  If I use a cable that has one termination in the 3.5mm and the other in RCA to connect these to the Realiser (like these: http://www.monoprice.com/products/product.asp?c_id=102&cp_id=10218&cs_id=1021815&p_id=5602&seq=1&format=2), will this cause any potential damage or anything?  I understand sound quality will not be nearly as good as a digital feed (especially since I'll be needing to use 35 foot cables to reach), but I'm only really thinking of using this for PC games so I'm not concerned about that.  

 

[jazzfan]

Quote:

I don't know if this has been posted before, but it was recorded on Nov. 12 and provides some good basic info. on the Realiser.
http://twit.tv/show/home-theater-geeks/136

 
 
Thanks for the link jackhamm.  Just added it to the Related Media/Links section of the Smyth Realiser product page - http://www.head-fi.org/products/smyth-research-svs-realiser-a8.

 

[Audio Addict]

subscribed.

 

[mirohh]

I just recieved my Realiser HDMI.
As suspected my Denon 2312 av-reciever does not output PCM on HDMI. With the blurayplayer connected into the Realiser its o.k.
But I want to use a av-reciever for all my sources. Is there any av-reciever that puts out PCM on HDMI?

 

[dsperber]

Quote:

I just recieved my Realiser HDMI.
As suspected my Denon 2312 av-reciever does not output PCM on HDMI. With the blurayplayer connected into the Realiser its o.k.
But I want to use a av-reciever for all my sources. Is there any av-reciever that puts out PCM on HDMI?

 
Nobody has yet reported any AVR which does its own decoding and also puts out LPCM via HDMI.  Only BluRay players are reported as the common source device which can put out LPCM via HMDI.
 
However... if your BluRay player only has a single HDMI output, and you set it to output LPCM via HDMI and also try to pass that HDMI through your AVR and on to the Realiser, you may well have a problem if your AVR itself does not have true "HDMI audio pass-through" (i.e. the multi-channel discrete LPCM provided by your BluRay player) for audio.  As an example, my single-HDMI-out Yamaha RV-V863 DOES have true multi-channel HDMI audio pass-ghrough, but my newer double-HDMI-out Yamaha RX-V867 does NOT.  But since the V863 only has a single HDMI output which I want to send to my HDTV, how do I also get HDMI audio to the Realiser?  Can't... at least not without an HDMI matrix-switch port multiplier, which has its own issues regarding HDMI handshake back to the BluRay source device forcing delivery of 2-channel stereo instead of multi-channel audio.
 
So your best solution is to go with a double-HDMI-out BluRay player (e.g. my Oppo BDP-93), where one HDMI output is for video (going to the AVR, but not requiring HDMI pass-through for audio), and the second HDMI output is for audio (going directly to the Realiser's HDMI input).  This will provide 100% problem-free results, allowing you to use your AVR for video routing to your HDTV and also allowing you to feed the required decoded discrete multi-channel LPCM from BluRay player directly to the Realiser's HDMI input.

 

[mirohh]

I have a lot of movies on my homeserver. Therefor I intend to replace my pocorn hour (no PCM on HDMI) with a Dune hd. Is there another mediaplayer delivering PCM on HDMI?
I want to get a HDMI matrix switch to connect the blurayplayer and the dune hd to the realiser. Would this work?
I know these are beginners questions -but: Every beginning is hard.
 
EDIT: I just saw that darinf uses the dune hd. How do you switch the input into the realiser between your blurayplayer and the dune?

 

[darinf]

Quote:

I have a lot of movies on my homeserver. Therefor I intend to replace my pocorn hour (no PCM on HDMI) with a Dune hd. Is there another mediaplayer delivering PCM on HDMI?
I want to get a HDMI matrix switch to connect the blurayplayer and the dune hd to the realiser. Would this work?
I know these are beginners questions -but: Every beginning is hard.
 
EDIT: I just saw that darinf uses the dune hd. How do you switch the input into the realiser between your blurayplayer and the dune?

If you are going to buy a Dune, you have to buy a Dune HD Max or Dune HD Duo. ALL the other Dune devices will NOT work. I use a Dune HD MAx, so no need to switch since the Blu-Ray player is built-in. To be honest, I don't really use the Blur-Ray player since I rip everything to a NAS or to store on the player's hard drive. The Dune HD Max is really good with all media files and streaming over a wired network. I have only found a couple of files that it won't play perfectly. But the best thing is that every file I have gets decoded to multi-channel LPCM whether it's DTS, Dolby Digital, TrueHD, etc. and plays nice with the Realiser. I just connect the Dune directly to the Realiser via HDMI and loop through to the monitor.
 
I hear that the Oppo players will do the same thing if you attache a hard drive to it, or stream over a local network, but I have never owned one, so I can't say for sure how well it streams.
 
Other than that, like dsperber says, the only other devices that will work are Blu-Ray players. I do have a Samsung player that worked. It cost about $180, but it was very picky about the file formats that it would play over a USB attached drive. Streaming was sketchy too. So I would have had to re-rip all my discs to very specific formats for it to work. I also tried a Panasonic Blu-Ray player, which worked, but there was no way to resume or skip forward when watching a ripped file! So if you stopped watching a movie 1 hour into the movie, to resume watching the movie later, you would have to start from the beginning and wait an hour before you could pick  up where you left off!
 
There may be other media players out there that work, but I can confirm that the WDTV products will NOT work. Most media players will not work. It's a matter of licensing and the players would end up costing too much if they paid for the full licensing. That's why the Dune HD Duo and Max are so expensive compared to other media players.
 
-Darin

 

[dsperber]

Quote:

I want to get a HDMI matrix switch to connect the blurayplayer and the dune hd to the realiser. Would this work?

 
On a recommendation earlier in this thread, I tried using this Monoprice 4x2 Matrix Switch along with my Yamaha RX-V863 which only had one HDMI output.  At the time I also had an Oppo BDP-83 which also only has one HDMI output (for audio and video combined).  I had the Oppo configured to put out LPCM audio over HDMI.
 
So I sent the HDMI output from the Oppo to one of the four HDMI inputs on the Switch.  By sending input 1 to both outputs 1 and 2, this switch really acts as an "HDMI port multiplier", so I connected HDMI output 1 to the AVR (for video use only) and HDMI output 2 (for audio use only) to the Realiser.  Note that this is really exactly how things work now for me, since I have purchased a BluRay player which itself has two HDMI outputs, one for video and a second for audio.
 
Anyway, I tried it briefly, and while I was able to get it to work perfectly it didn't quite work for me as conveniently as I'd hoped.  The problem comes because depending on the power-on sequence and connections in-place at the time the BluRay player is powered on (way back at the start of the device "source chain") the HDMI audio handshake that takes place between the source player and the multiple HDMI-enabled devices in the relay chain going all the way down to the Switch and beyond (where there are now two end-devices on the chain which can accept audio via HDMI: (a) the HDTV via the AVR, and (b) the Realiser), the BluRay player source device has to make a decision about the format of digital audio delivered via HDMI.
 
And as is the rule, the "lowest common denominator must be supported", i.e. the HDTV which in my case can only accept 2-channel PCM stereo via its HDMI input.  No multi-channel can be accepted.  So the BluRay player forces its digital audio output to only be 2-channel PCM stereo, rather than the desired multi-channel LPCM (which of course CAN be accepted by the Realiser which is connected to output 2 of the Matrix Switch).  It wasn't sufficient to simply have the HDTV powered off when the BluRay player was powered on.  There seemed to be some "memory" of the attached HDTV in the Matrix Switch as long as the HDMI cables were still connected, and now the BluRay player always sent its audio output in the undesired 2-channel PCM stereo mode.
 
I found that if I temporarily disconnected the HDTV from the Matrix Switch and turned the BluRay player on, with the Matrix Switch initially powered off but then powered on after the BluRay player had been powered on, that the HDMI audio handshake occurring between the Oppo and the Realiser through the Matrix Switch would work properly and multi-channel LPCM was the negotiated result.  And then, if I now plugged the HDTV back into the switch, the Oppo would for some lucky reason not re-negotiate the HDMI audio handshake and drop down to 2-channel PCM stereo!  Instead, it would continue to deliver the originally negotiated multi-channel LPCM!!  So I was now able to listen to multi-channel audio via the Realiser's HDMI input (through output 2 of the Matrix Switch, from the BluRay player still delivering multi-channel LPCM audio via HDMI output) as well as watch video on my HDTV via HDMI from output 1 of the Matrix Switch).
 
So I had to do this anytime I wanted to start watching a BluRay movie session.  I felt it inconvenient and unacceptable.
 
Instead, I re-purposed my Oppo BDP-83 BluRay player (with its single HDMI output) to a second location in my home, and bought a new BDP-93 with two HDMI outputs... and which was obviously the true 100% for solution, for both function and convenience.  Today, the current model is the BDP-103 if you wanted to buy one new, as the BDP-93 is no longer made.
 
If you're interested in buying that Monoprice Matrix Switch from me (which is currently back in its box, on the shelf in my "parts graveyard") just let me know.

 

[mirohh]

I think a HDMI switch is too much hazzle.
An other idea, - the dune hd has 7.1 analog outputs. Would it be possible to connect the dune analog and the blurayplayer by HDMI to the realiser?

 

[darinf]

Quote:

I think a HDMI switch is too much hazzle.
An other idea, - the dune hd has 7.1 analog outputs. Would it be possible to connect the dune analog and the blurayplayer by HDMI to the realiser?

If you are OK with analog input to the Realiser from a media player, then you have a lot more options. You can even use an AVR with analog pre-outputs. The licensing issues are much less when it comes to outputting analog multi-channel audio, so you can find analog outputs on more devices. I have some older CinemaTube media players with 8 channel analog outputs.
 
So you could use an AVR with 8 channel analog outputs and connect analog to the Realiser. Then you could use your AVR to switch between devices and decode multi-channel audio. Then you could go direct from you Blu-Ray to the Realiser via HDMI and compare the difference in sound quality. Maybe you'll find analog is good enough for movies.
 
Plus it's a lot easier to check to see if any give AVR has 8 channel analog outputs since you can just look at a picture of the back of the AVR.