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Audio Comparisons

Dissecting these players' audio support is a mess. (For specifics on the best audio output these players support, see "Chart: High-Definition Players.") If you thought DVD's sound terminology was arcane--with Dolby Digital, Dolby Surround, DTS Digital Surround, and PCM--you ain't heard nothing yet. To that jargon add Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD Master Audio, and Linear PCM.

To find out what all that will sound like to your ears, we attached each of the players to Pioneer's Elite VSX-82TXS audio/ video receiver and NHT's Classic series 5.1-channel surround-sound system. We configured the players to handle their own audio processing.

In the first two chapters of The Phantom of the Opera, we listened for the sounds of birds flying, the clatter of the crystals on chandeliers, and the strains of instruments in the orchestral score; all sounded crisp and clear on the Sony BDP-S1 and on the two Toshiba players. We compared the 5.1-channel Dolby Digital sound tracks; the Blu-ray version of this film lacks the HD DVD version's Dolby TrueHD track.

Linear PCM blew me away in informal tests I performed using the Blu-ray version of The Last Waltz, a 1976 concert film recorded in high-quality analog. As heard piped through our test setup, from either the Sony BDP-S1 or the Pioneer, the film's music hit me with the full force of a live rock concert; every inflection by the individual musicians was perfectly clear. The same Linear PCM sound track played through the Philips and Samsung players, and to a lesser extent the Panasonic model and the Sony PlayStation 3, sounded muffled and muddy.