Going to movie theaters provide the very best in film viewing experience; one that we try to replicate in our homes. When we are trying to build our very own home theater systems, we always strive to replicate the feel of being inside a movie theater. The sound is one of them. For this we have two choices, Dolby digital, or DTS (Digital Theater Systems). These are the two sound systems that can provide high quality 5.1 audio.

Originally developed for movie theaters, the system can now be implemented inside your homes specifically for watching DVD movies. But which one is actually better? According to experts at DTS, the DTS system utilizes a lot more bandwidth that allows them to create audio tracks with a lot less compression; less compression usually means less of the sound information is lost. But experts at Dolby insist that they have a better codec that could compress sound while preserving its quality. They have further added that tests confirmed that there was no discernable difference between the two.

Although the bigger bandwidth and lesser compression have been confirmed, the difference in sound quality is still pretty much under debate. But looking at it on paper, DTS certainly has an advantage. Dolby also has a few advantages over DTS, especially when we bring the discussion out of the movie theater and into the home theaters that are installed in our homes.

With DVDs that have much bigger capacities compared to the standard CD, it is easy to see how these high quality audio tracks are brought into our homes. And in this domain, Dolby seems to be king. A lot of the industry players have adapted to Dolby digital, making it the acceptable industry standard that most player and DVD makers support. DTS software are also more expensive compared to Dolby and are also very limited. There is also the issue of the DVDs that support each format. Although a lot of people say that concert sounds on the DTS are better compared to Dolby, there are only a handful of these DVDs in the market. You are more likely to find the disc you are looking for with Dolby sound rather than DTS.

Although there is some backing to the fact that DTS is better than Dolby, there is still the issue of usability. What use would there be for a very high quality sound system if you can hardly find the media for that format. Despite all this, DTS supporters continue to campaign for it. More audio is being encoded in the DTS format, although not as many as for Dolby.

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