Faux K signal path - can it get any weirder?

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JonFo

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Thought some of you might get a kick out of the crazy things I wind up doing in my system, but some pointers as well if you are trying to address similar issues.

This is about the video chain in my home theater, where a few years ago a I deployed a JVC 4810 4K projector. This thing is not 'really' 4K, but rather Faux K, as it wobulates the 1080P panels to create 4K worth of pixels on the screen. This is fine, as I have a perforated, acoustically transparent screen, and the higher fill-rate helps mask the holes. It's also only accepts 1080P inputs, as it predates the HDMI specs for UHD.

I also recently upgraded the theater to an Atmos setup, with four overhead speakers, so I'm looking to buy as many movies with Atmos soundtracks as I can. The problem is that the studios want to push the sale of UHD BluRays, so they only put the Atmos soundtrack on the UHD disc, and even if you buy the UHD set, the included BluRay does NOT have Atmos, only the UHD disc has it :mad:

So I have a growing stack of UHD discs with Atmos soundtracks and no way to play them back. I really want an Oppo BD-203, but until I have an true 4K PJ (waiting on Laser to come down in price), doesn't seem like the time to make that investment. So on a lark, looked at UHD players on Amazon this week, and the Sony UBP-X800 was on sale at $149, so I snagged one to be able to play back these discs.

But as I get ready to deploy it, the path from film master to my screen seemed pretty funny, so here it goes:

Film Master (often actual film, but anything with CGI is usually a 2K DI)
Upconverted to 4K for UHD
UHD BluRay with 4K and Atmos Content - Played back on UPB-X800 and downrezed to 2K 1080P
Marantz AV8802A preamp (1080P)
Video splitter (PJ and 21" LCD monitor)
Darbee (1080P)
JVC PJ, 1080P input -> Upconvert to 4K

So true Faux 4K :D

But hey, the video is sometimes a tad bit better than the 1080P BluRay, and the main goal, Atmos soundtracks is achieved ;)

So what are you guys doing for immersive audio and 4K video?
 
What, no Altitude?!!??? The 16's are shipping now.:music:
 
Still fat dumb and happy with my 5.1 surround system and 75" HD TV. I have no urge to upgrade any of it, audio or video.

I'm amazed that manufacturers are starting to push 8K TV's. There is really only ONE very useful way to use 8K resolution, and that is splitting it 4K per eye with high resolution VR displays.

I watched just enough UHD content on my 65" UHD TV to decide I don't care that much about it. The extra dynamic range is nice, but I have no UHD player at this point and streaming sources are compressed down so far that 4K is almost pointless when you stream almost everything you watch.

I don't rewatch enough movies to bother buying that many of them. There are very few movies that are fun to watch a number of times. They just don't have the longevity of music.
 
I don't rewatch enough movies to bother buying that many of them. There are very few movies that are fun to watch a number of times. They just don't have the longevity of music.
Whereas I own thousands of movies, 1930's to present day, and re-watch them all the time. Chacun à son goût.
 
Whereas I own thousands of movies, 1930's to present day, and re-watch them all the time. Chacun à son goût.

I have a friend with a super massive collection that he keeps on a video server. I call it a super massive because there is no way that he could ever watch everything he has in his collection if he watched them back to back for the rest of his life. I think he wants to collect anything that he might ever want to watch, just in case he decides to watch something.
 
What, no Altitude?!!??? The 16's are shipping now.:music:

Heh, would love one. But it will have to wait a bit more. In the meantime, that Marantz does a fine job.

We watched the new Spiderman movie last night, and the soundtrack was amazing. Good use of the overheads in that one.

I still need to deploy side speakers and have a full 7.2.4 layout. But those will need to be custom jobs like my center.
 
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BTW- one tidbit about players in general: Check the audio settings and ensure you are getting the right bitstream output and your processor is actually getting Dolby TrueHD or Atmos streams for it to decode.

The new Sony would just not deliver the Atmos soundtrack, just multichannel PCM, which meant the player was decoding the audio. So after diving through the menus, found the culprit: the 'BD audio mix' setting was on

Whatever it's called on your brand of player, if you hear audio feedback when navigating the discs menus, you probably have that (or similar) setting. That needs to be off for it to pass the actual bitstream to the processor.
 

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