Surround-sound formats
Via its analog outputs the 540D V2 can playback CDs in stereo and DVDs in either stereo or up to 5.1 output when they have been encoded with Dolby Digital or Dolby Pro Logic / Pro Logic II formats.
Dolby Digital EX 6.1 discs can also be played back but only 5.1 output will be available (the 6th channel will be shared between the rear surround left and right speakers).
The Stereo outputs of the 540D V2 always output stereo whether the material is a stereo CD/DVD or
The 5.1 outputs can be set for downmix (in which case the front left and right only will be active) or 5.1 output (downmix off).
Note: If Downmix is set to ‘Off’ the default playback system is Dolby Digital. If Pro Logic II is preferred this needs to be set to ‘On’ in the 540D V2 Setup menus.
The optional DTS soundtracks on some discs cannot be decoded by the 540D V2, however the machine is able to send a raw bitstream version of any soundtrack via its digital outputs for decoding by an external AV Receiver and this is actually the preferred setup even if just Dolby Digital decoding is required. This allows the decoding of the many other
We naturally recommend our own AV Receivers which offer many decoding options and other facilities for the processing of surround sound.
Below is a brief guide to common
Dolby Digital EX
Known also as DD (3/3) or DD 6.1, an enhanced form of Dolby Digital. On top of the discretely encoded 5.1 channels DD EX provides an extra 6th channel (Surround Back, giving 6.1 or 7.1 with mono rear surrounds) matrix encoded into the rear surrounds. Decoding Dolby Digital EX requires a Dolby Digital EX encoded DVD disc and a digital connection from the 540D V2 to a suitable AV Receiver that can decode this format as the 540D V2 itself cannot decode DD EX. If a DD EX encoded disc is played back on the 540D V2 however 5.1 output will still be created as
DDEX is backwards compatible with DD 5.1 decoding. The 6th Surround Back signal will be present in both Left and Right Rear Surrounds (forming a phantom rear centre).
DTS 5.1,
Various DTS technologies that provide (up to) 5.1/6.1 (and 7.1 with mono rear surrounds) output from suitable encoded DTS material.
Some newer DVDs carry both the mandatory DD and an optional DTS surround encoding on alternative audio tracks.
The 540D V2 cannot decode these optional DTS formats itself but can pass them via its digital outputs for decoding externally by a suitable AV Receiver. Decoding DTS requires a suitably encoded DTS disc and a digital connection from the 540D V2 to an AV Receiver capable of decoding the appropriate DTS encoding type.
Dolby Digital (5.1)
The mandatory soundtrack encoding for DVD movies. Known also as DD (3/2) or DD 5.1, DD provides (up to) 5.1 output from suitable encoded Dolby Digital DVD's. There are 5 main channels (Front Left, Front Right, Centre, Surround Left, Surround Right) and a Low Frequency Effects Channel for the subwoofer, all discretely encoded. Decoding Dolby Digital requires a Dolby Digital encoded DVD disc (nearly all DVDs) and either a digital connection from the 540D V2 to a suitable AV Receiver (preferred method) or the 540D V2's own built in decoder can be used in which case a 5.1 analog connection from the 5.1 Audio outputs to a suitable amplifier/speaker package is required.
Note: Dolby Digital and DTS formats can sometimes carry less channels than their maximum such as Dolby Digital (2/0) which means a Dolby Digital encoded signal which is actually only carrying a two channel stereo signal (other channels inactive).
Pro Logic II
Pro Logic II is a Dolby technology where 5 channels (Front Left, Front Right, Centre, Surround Left, Surround Right) are encoded into a Stereo mix by an analog matrix process.
Dolby Pro Logic II is also compatible with the earlier 4 channel (Left, Centre, Right and mono Surround) Dolby Pro Logic system (which was the decoding counterpart to Dolby Surround encoding) which was used widely on TV material and earlier films. PL and PLII are present on many early films and often also in the stereo soundtrack available as alternative alongside the DD 5.1 on many newer films.
The 540D V2 can decode PLII via its own decoder or an external AV Receiver can be used. Because the encoding process is analog an AV Receiver can usually decode PLII from either an Analog Stereo or Digital connection from the 540D V2 to the AV Receiver. Consult your receivers manual.
If it is desired to use the 540D V2's own built in PLII decoder a 5.1 analog connection from the 540D V2's 5.1 Audio outputs to a suitable amplifier/speaker package should be made, downmix should be set to ‘Off’ and Pro logic II decoding set to ‘On’ in the 540D V2 Setup menus.
Video formats
DVDs are encoded using the MPEG 2 lossy video format giving over 2 hours of
Note: Dual layer discs always exhibit a small pause or delay in playback when the layer transition is made.
As well as the video itself DVDs are also capable of storing up to 8 alternative tracks of digital audio, 32 subtitle tracks and 9 camera angles (where used by the film producers).
DivX is an even more compressed (than normal DVD) digital video format a bit like MP3 for video. DivX compresses the video data to a fraction of its original size using the more lossy MPEG 4 Part 2 compression. DivX enhances the basic MP4 encoding by allowing extra features on the disc and various levels of quality/compression to be applied at the encoding stage.
DivX or straight forward raw MPEG 4 files are supported by the 540D V2 on either CD or DVD discs.
The 540D V2 MAY also be able to play MP4 type files created with other CODEC programs (such as Xvid®) but playback of these is not guaranteed.
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