TIDAL Magic with Dolby Atmos Surreal Sound

[OCDC]

Have you checked the Tidal App and/or website for the answer to question #1?

I have. It seems to dance around the Atmos quality. They indicate up to 24-bit/192kHz rates for the MAX subscription, but those are for the stereo recordings.

 

[Babyrocko1908]

I have. It seems to dance around the Atmos quality. They indicate up to 24-bit/192kHz rates for the MAX subscription, but those are for the stereo recordings.

It's higher than that way higher.

 

[OCDC]

It's higher than that way higher.

Agreed. Multichannel makes a higher bit-rate necessary. My question comes from how the Dolby+ codec only uses a 48kHz sample rate per channel. The TrueHD codec is 96kHz per channel.

 

[Bunnylebowski]

Two questions to the members:

1. Does anyone know if Tidal is using the Dolby Digital+ or TrueHD codec for their Atmos streaming? (I'd wager the Digital+ since that's geared for streaming.) I'm having trouble finding a definitive answer.

2. Has anyone bought or downloaded Atmos TrueHD music recordings? There are a few music publishers (mostly classical) that sell them in uncompressed MKV format alongside their WAV/FLAC/MP4 files, and I wanted to know if those would play from a thumb drive. You know, for academic reasons...

My friend is an audio engineer who mixes in Atmos regularly, he confirmed that Tidal is using DD+ JOC MP4 @ 768kbps. TrueHD is too high bandwidth for streaming as you’ve got to accommodate a minimum of 12 discreet channels if not more (7.1.4). Dolby had a head start on the rest of the world for encoding multichannel digital audio in lossy formats by about a decade, and they sucked at it for awhile but with Atmos they really seem to have figured it out as what I’ve heard in the car for Atmos sounds damn near identical to the lossless 24bit/96khz studio source material. Up until Atmos pro music and film mixers used to view Dolby as the pain the ass default format they’d have to run through the proprietary codec that would invariably make their mix sound less full and weak. Ever since Ang Lee’s Life of Pi (one of the first wide release films natively mixed in Atmos) however every mixer I know is a convert to the format and prefers it.

I’ve never heard Atmos TrueHD format outside of the cinema.

 

[Bunnylebowski]

Agreed. Multichannel makes a higher bit-rate necessary. My question comes from how the Dolby+ codec only uses a 48kHz sample rate per channel. The TrueHD codec is 96kHz per channel.

Multichannel actually makes a lower bit rate necessary, 768kbps to be exact as far as Atmos goes. You’ve got to fit a minimum of 12 discreet channels into the Atmos stream so you’ve gotta lower the bit rate to pull that off but have a really good codec to decode it so it doesn’t sound lossy.

 

[Bunnylebowski]

Also the higher resolution formats Tidal lists are not Atmos, but a version of their MQA or “lossless” format. Those are all two channel audio files.

 

[OCDC]

My friend is an audio engineer who mixes in Atmos regularly, he confirmed that Tidal is using DD+ JOC MP4 @ 768kbps. TrueHD is too high bandwidth for streaming as you’ve got to accommodate a minimum of 12 discreet channels if not more (7.1.4). Dolby had a head start on the rest of the world for encoding multichannel digital audio in lossy formats by about a decade, and they sucked at it for awhile but with Atmos they really seem to have figured it out as what I’ve heard in the car for Atmos sounds damn near identical to the lossless 24bit/96khz studio source material. Up until Atmos pro music and film mixers used to view Dolby as the pain the ass default format they’d have to run through the proprietary codec that would invariably make their mix sound less full and weak. Ever since Ang Lee’s Life of Pi (one of the first wide release films natively mixed in Atmos) however every mixer I know is a convert to the format and prefers it.

I’ve never heard Atmos TrueHD format outside of the cinema.

Ah, I didn't know about the 7.1.4 requirement for the TrueHD codec. That would be prohibitive to stream over cellular. Still, I'm curious to see if Lucid can play the format via thumb drive.

Some folks publishing Atmos music in at least 48kHz lossless:

All releases

Music in immersive audio on Pure Audio Blu-ray, Hybrid SACD and HD audio files. Worldwide delivery. The Norwegian label 2L have garnered no less than 43 GRAMMY nominations since 2006, 35 of these in craft categories Best Engineered Album, Best Surround Sound Album, Best Immersive Audio Album and...

shop.2l.no

9.1 Spatial Audio

48kHz/24bit Lossless Speaker- and Binaural Headphone playback with DA decoder

spiritofturtle.com

Shop | IAA

Download surround sound and immersive audio albums in lossless formats. Offering 5.1, Dolby Atmos, and Auro-3D albums from artists you love.

immersiveaudioalbum.com

 

[Bunnylebowski]

I don’t think any Atmos file outside of the native Tidal app is playable in the car in actual Atmos via USB or other app at this time. I’ve heard rumors of coming native Apple Music app Atmos support like the Maybach has, but it’s just a rumor. As far as audio on USB, I have yet to see anyone play back anything other than 24 bit/96khz 2 channel audio off the USB in the car. It doesn’t mean the car can’t do it, I just don’t know how or it’s not enabled, or maybe it really can’t do it

 

[OCDC]

This is more an experiment than anything. I'm sitting here listening to the Tenet soundtrack now and thinking, if the MQA stream is this good, how great would it be in full lossless Atmos?

(I'm cuing up your friend's mix next. Looking forward to what you think is a high quality mix/recording. )

 

[julianevjourney]

This is more an experiment than anything. I'm sitting here listening to the Tenet soundtrack now and thinking, if the MQA stream is this good, how great would it be in full lossless Atmos?

(I'm cuing up your friend's mix next. Looking forward to what you think is a high quality mix/recording. )

The Tenet soundtrack is one of my absolute favorites. I really wish it was available in Dolby Atmos. That would be amazing!

FYI, one of my composer homies did a lot of the synth sound design for Tenet. I’ve actually gotten a behind the scenes look at how some of those sounds were made. It makes listening to the soundtrack even more amazing.

 

[borski]

I don’t think any Atmos file outside of the native Tidal app is playable in the car in actual Atmos via USB or other app at this time. I’ve heard rumors of coming native Apple Music app Atmos support like the Maybach has, but it’s just a rumor. As far as audio on USB, I have yet to see anyone play back anything other than 24 bit/96khz 2 channel audio off the USB in the car. It doesn’t mean the car can’t do it, I just don’t know how or it’s not enabled, or maybe it really can’t do it

Throw this on a USB stick https://immersiveaudioalbum.com/product/catch-a-corner-cinque-atmos-mkv-mp4/

(It plays atmos, as I learned from @GoFast)

 

[Bunnylebowski]

The Tenet soundtrack is one of my absolute favorites. I really wish it was available in Dolby Atmos. That would be amazing!

FYI, one of my composer homies did a lot of the synth sound design for Tenet. I’ve actually gotten a behind the scenes look at how some of those sounds were made. It makes listening to the soundtrack even more amazing.

Thanks for the tip I’m gonna give it a listen. I was irritated by the movie which made me pay less attention to the score but that composer Gorannson is great so I’ll add it to my playlist for sure.

 

[Bunnylebowski]

The Tenet soundtrack is one of my absolute favorites. I really wish it was available in Dolby Atmos. That would be amazing!

FYI, one of my composer homies did a lot of the synth sound design for Tenet. I’ve actually gotten a behind the scenes look at how some of those sounds were made. It makes listening to the soundtrack even more amazing.

This score is phenomenal, thanks for the recommendation!

 

[Bunnylebowski]

This is more an experiment than anything. I'm sitting here listening to the Tenet soundtrack now and thinking, if the MQA stream is this good, how great would it be in full lossless Atmos?

(I'm cuing up your friend's mix next. Looking forward to what you think is a high quality mix/recording. )

As luck would have it, my friend just published this article on the differences and nuances of all these formats and what Spatial Audio is and what you can do with it as well. Very informative article:
Look at this post on Facebook https://www.production-expert.com/p..._I2hmOLifAUDU-_LWADhcix14QT2YuZt6JQlXJhy9NMgY

 

[SaratogaLefty]

Not really my style of music but I did just hear Psycho Killer (Atmos Mix) by Talking Heads in my Lucid and I have to say the quality of the sound was outstanding.

 

[stratus]

Not really my style of music but I did just hear Psycho Killer (Atmos Mix) by Talking Heads in my Lucid and I have to say the quality of the sound was outstanding.

All the Atmos Talking Heads songs are absolutely booming with rich bass and full sound.

 

[Big Boss]

As luck would have it, my friend just published this article on the differences and nuances of all these formats and what Spatial Audio is and what you can do with it as well. Very informative article:
Look at this post on Facebook https://www.production-expert.com/p..._I2hmOLifAUDU-_LWADhcix14QT2YuZt6JQlXJhy9NMgY

Very good article. I had no idea you could "hear" Atmos on headphones. But it works great using the Tidal app on iOS with my Fiio wired headphones. Apparently, iOS does the binaural remix to output to headphones. After all, we listen to 7.1.4 Atmos in our Lucids, but we still use only two ears to hear it - so headphone Atmos makes sense.

 

[joec]

Very good article. I had no idea you could "hear" Atmos on headphones. But it works great using the Tidal app on iOS with my Fiio wired headphones. Apparently, iOS does the binaural remix to output to headphones. After all, we listen to 7.1.4 Atmos in our Lucids, but we still use only two ears to hear it - so headphone Atmos makes sense.

This is what Apple refers to as "Spatial Audio." It works on their AirPods Pro and Max. Basically it's Atmos applied to headphones.

 

[Big Boss]

This is what Apple refers to as "Spatial Audio." It works on their AirPods Pro and Max. Basically it's Atmos applied to headphones.

Yes, with Apple devices they can do custom spatial audio and head-tracking, but with non-Apple headphones it sounds great without those extras.

 

[Bunnylebowski]

Very good article. I had no idea you could "hear" Atmos on headphones. But it works great using the Tidal app on iOS with my Fiio wired headphones. Apparently, iOS does the binaural remix to output to headphones. After all, we listen to 7.1.4 Atmos in our Lucids, but we still use only two ears to hear it - so headphone Atmos makes sense.

One thing I appreciated that Nat did is he actually took identical Atmos mix files from both Tidal and Apple, and phase flipped one of them and played them in sync together and found they cancelled each other out. This is a clever objective way to prove that at least for Atmos mixes, Tidal and AppleMusic are likely identical in terms of the sonic information they contain, removing the subjective listener from the equation and any fuss about “lossy” compression. At least for Atmos, Apple Music and Tidal are the same. I think otherwise Tidal sounds better than Apple Music for 2 channel audio, but I’d be curious to see a similar test against the 2 channel versions of tracks in Tidal Max resolution and Apple Lossless and see if there’s any difference.