Is Sony Giving Atmos Fans the Shaft with PlayStation 5?

With the launch of a new generation of video games consoles comes the expectation of a huge leap forward in technology. After all, a single console generation currently lasts around seven years. And yes, there were hardware revisions in the last generation to try and keep up with the world's technological advancements (namely 4K), but it's still just a new coat of shiny paint on the same house. And sometimes that paint doesn't even dry properly and instead looks a bit of a mess (Xbox's Dolby Atmos implementation, anyone?).

[rlow1]

Interesting, I know Sony in the past has always tried to push their own standards. Will be interesting to see what happens as things unfold.

[crazyCoconuts]

this article is worried that Sony's new standard would make receivers out of date or require new firmware. There's no way - Sony would do all the encoding on the PS5 and output linear PCM to the receiver, and every receiver accepts that. Sony would bypass Atmos because it's doing all the heavy lifting itself - it doesn't need Atmos. I don't know how good it will be and such, but the concerns this guy has are kinda silly.

[Bathyj]

What you said. Cerny said they wanted hundreds of sound sources not the thirty or so Atmos has, so I can only assume it's better.

He also said it's great sound for everyone not only those with licensed sound systems. so whether you've got a receiver headphones or even just TV speakers PlayStation 5 is going to give you great sound.

[TheScotsman]

Free great audio with no extortianate license fee to pay to dolby. ITS A NO BRAINER, and you don't need branded atmos hardware to listen to it, no Sony has done the right thing here and saved us all money. Atmos wasn't great anyways, and compared to the new audio Sony is building in, Atmos will be forgotten soon enough.

[883]

I have little doubt SONY will deliver here, but to say that "Atmos will be forgotten" and/or more-so, that it "wasn't great anyways" is, to put it very gently, questionable. Atmos done right (and especially on UHD discs with good audio tracks) is astoundingly fantastic. I never want to go back to 2D sound if I have the option. Where gaming is concerned and licensing fees are a worry, SONY's option delivered the LPCM may be a brilliant option, but saying Atmos wasn't great... While you are obviously entitled to your opinion, many AV specialists as well as consumers with properly done Atmos setups can verify that if 3D audio immersion is what you desire, Atmos is extraordinary.

[TKCMuzzer]

It’s simple and cheaper just to get the 3D headset, it will sound better anyway and be far more immersive. My surround is good but gaming is always better through a headset.

[rdgneoz3]

Gaming is always nice with a headset. My gf especially agrees with I play a bit while she gets some sleep...

That said, around 5,000 sound sources vs Atmos with (what they said) a few hundred?

[883]

"Gaming is always better through a headset"... If you are talking about that only in relation to your setup, fair enough. Good sound systems can do so much more than even good headphones... My headphones are brilliant, but they will NEVER shake my room. When I can use headphones and literally feel the shockwaves in my body/sofa/walls of in game explosions/gunshots, I will realize that I'm not using headphones and I'm using my home-theater setup. A great home theater setup is definitely more expensive than even excellent headphones, but on most levels, a 3D headset still cannot do what a well put together Atmos setup can do --other than cost way less. 3D headsets are DEFINITELY a more pracitical (for many), MUCH less expensive, and easier option. That said -- a VERY respectable home theater setup can be had for relatively little money (considering that most of us in this hobby already put a good bit into our other hardware).

[rainslacker]

Atmos had to be licensed. It's an added cost to every user regardless of if they use it, and most dont need it. Consoles are capable of bit streaming the same thing that atmos does without paying for it, and any atmos enabled receiver can decode it to the proper channels.

However, if the system has a uhd drive for movies, atmos is probably going to be in the system. Whether its enabled for games I couldn't say

[RazzerRedux]

I don't even know what an "Atmos fan" is.

[TheScotsman]

That's because there aren't any.

[badz149]

anything to paint Sony in a bad light. this is like saying AMD is ignoring GSync fans because they implemented FreeSync which doesn't require any fee to be paid to nVidia just like Atmos here.

yeah...it IS as dumb as it sounds!

[morganfell]

They meant Atoms fan. Its a small bladed rotating device that keeps components properly cooled at the molecular level :P

[Neonridr]

An audiophile. Atmos can deliver height channels that regular sound systems cannot. I'm surprised though, I have a Sony receiver that fully supports Atmos.

[morganfell]

Sure but DTS X can be encoded at a higher bitrate. And DTS X, royalty free doesn't require a set speaker configuration.

[Good-Smurf]

Their goal is great audio for all not just those with Dolby Atmos licensed products.
I bet those Atmos fans are worry that they might lose that superiority of spending thousands on their Dolby Atmos setup or something.
And Those who can afford Dolby Atmos are so much better off financially than gamers that this is more of a fake concern than anything,they can just buy another system if they hate the Playstation approach to 3D audio so much.
Kinda like the PC masterace in gaming we have the same equivalent snobs in audiophile community.

[one2thr]

To be fair not all Dolby Atmos capable sound bars systems, cost $1000.

A dirt cheap one will almost always output better sound when compared to internal Tv speakers.

I'm no audiophile, my understanding of dedicated hardware is that it usually do a better job, than a secondary feature, such as Tv speakers.

[rainslacker]

Then those atmos fans arent really aware of how receivers work to decode atmos, or it's possible to provide the same thing through bitstream audio.

[TechnoGoat]

Nobody is getting true ATMOS from a console anyway, who cares.

[xX-oldboy-Xx]

No - people without Home Theatre setups will have better sound from their TV's.

[gigzamillion]

Whats an Atmos Fan? lol. This sounds like hyperbole to try and create an issue where there isn't one.

[P_Bomb]

Is Sony giving HDDVD fans the shaft with Playstation 3?

[boing1]

It has started. Just shows how good of a reveal Sony had. Articles about Atmos support where in reality <1% of people care about it? Why pay for licensing if their own tech is clearly better and works with normal headphones?

[kindi_boy]

Get off your high horses, Sony and Microsoft are using AMD TrueAudio tech back in 2013. There is no tempest or whatever Microsoft is trying to call it. I can't believe that whatever AMD is doing let alone Sony or Microsoft be on par or better than Dolby. Fandom on this website is disgusting.

[vivid83]

You mean Sony the company that started out building radios,invented the Walkman and many other audio breakthroughs can’t match Dolby ?....... ok

[kindi_boy]

no they can't because that Sony is not today's Sony. Playstation is something else that fools people like you.

[Spicyram]

@Kindi_boy
"PlAystAtioN Is sOmeThiNg ElSe thaT foOls peOplE liKe yOu"

https://za.pinterest.com/pi...

[rainslacker]

Sony has several audio codecs which are better than Dolby. Including their 3d audio. Dolby is just well known and fairly well supported.

Most 3d audio processes in home electronics that arent dolby branded come from Sony or jvc.

[plmkoh]

The situation with HDMI is one shitstorm. Not many will have the equipment to play both 4K HDR and Atmos in a single stream.

People don't know how bad it is until you start maxing out your HDMI bandwidth.

[rainslacker]

I honestly think the average person who buys a surround sound receiver nowadays is really kind of clueless on what they're getting. Hell, I even researched that stuff before getting mine, and even then, half the stuff I still didn't know what it was, and half of the rest wasn't what I thought it would be. This was especially true when 4K just started up, before HDCP was finalized, which rendered my 4K receiver useless for actually passing through 4K.

The entire 4K and all the audio codecs available, are all over the place, and everyone is vying to be the standard, and it's just making it all overly complicated.

I like my set up now, and all I need to complete my Atmos set up is the heights, which I currently have a front high, but want actual highs. Sony having Atmos or not is irrelevant to if they'll be used in the games though, because Bitstream or DTS:X can support the high channels if they want to, and the rest is basically just 5.1 or 7.1 or varients thereof.

That said, if by next year they come out with some new standard to screw everything up again, I'm going to be really annoyed. 4K had me annoyed with my first receiver, and it was a good receiver otherwise, but having to upgrade to a new receiver well before I thought I would want to made me less interested in keeping up with the trends. As of now, I'm moving more in the direction of quality sound, as opposed to more channels...and brought some new amps for my fronts which is the start of that. night and day difference between using the receivers built in speaker outputs.

[Angrymorgan]

Itll be interesting to see how good it sounds on standard tv speakers

[purple101]

Even more interesting... How it will sound on a pair of decent headphones. I think we're in for something special.

A £200 headphones is like spending thousands on a massive system afterall.
( not quite the same but you get the idea)

[Angrymorgan]

Hope so, wonder if the effects will show through a sound bar

[Hakuoro]

Atmos is designed for cinema. Tempest is specifically designed for games and can track and process in real time nearly unlimited sources. The Tempest sound chip is far more powerful that what is put in Dolby Home Theater systems. And Tempest isn't a proprietary feature it will work on what ever device you own.

[sprinterboy]

Stupid question but I'm getting a expensive soundbar for launch with ps5 and I'm now wondering do I really need the dolby atmos? Or what best speaker to get now

[rainslacker]

No, you dont need atmos. Sound is able to be directional, even with static speaker set ups. Sound bars already do some of this based on which one you buy, but so long as your device can accept bitstream or dts:x, itll be fine. Atmos for the most part adds high channels if you set it up like that, the rest is something on the back end you dont have to worry about. Game engines have been able to do dolby like sound encoding before atmos was even a thing, but not many receivers supported it since it still output in 5.1 most of the tine

[sprinterboy]

Cheers

[Deathdeliverer]

Atmos is limited as heck right now PERIOD. I have a Q90 tv and it doesn’t even support atmos. There’s more to this Atmos thing that we aren’t seeing because unlike virtually any other audio Type, atmos is hardly supported these days.

[Sadist3]

Uh, Almost every television has atmos support. That is, if you have a good tv. LG, Samsung, probably even Visio supports atmos.

[one2thr]

Every PS system supported the latest versions of Dolby and DTS at the time of their release. I doubt Sony will release a device capable of playing 4k UHD disc, without Atmos or DTS X support in 2020.

[Shuckylad]

Can’t beat a good 2 channel Stereo set up.

[jjb1981]

Sony specializes in sound so the lack of Atmos is insignificant.

[MustangGirl]

This is hugely disappointing news I was so expecting the PS5 to include Dolby Atmos

[Jayszen]

Sony built some cracking amps in the 70's and 80's before the Walkman era and have come up with benchmark sound formats over the last three decades. At present some of the best headphones and HD audio devices also come from Sony. My point is that Sony is both a hardware and software manufacturer and I suggest that Sony can deliver 3D Audio that will do the business as well as Atmos if not better. Cerny did say ..."but we wanted 3D audio for all, not just those with licensed soundbars or the like." Which means the encoding will be done by the PS5 itself and then output to every and any kind of receiver, Sony branded or otherwise. Everyone gets that same quality.

[rainslacker]

I think a lot of people's experience with Sony speakers or receivers is from their low to mid range consumer level products. Most people don't realize that they play a big part in reference sound quality and codecs for all levels of sound production, and are not just making this stuff up as they go along. Even a lot of the companies that make soundbars, or receivers license, or use, Sony's codecs, or JVC's, along with Dolby licensed stuff.

Dolby is indeed a well recognized standard, and I won't dismiss what they do, but they aren't the end all be all of sound re-production, and Atmos, for the consumer at least, is more about position rather than quality.

I wouldn't say Sony would be at the top of any audiophiles list of great equipment, but that's more home consumer level stuff, not back end or studio reference stuff which has different requirements.

I just brought a little $90 Fosi Tube amp for my front speakers, and the sound quality it produces blows away any low-mid range receiver I've ever heard. Even my Pioneer Elite Atmos receiver isn't as good....although I will admit it's maybe upper mid-range in terms of quality. Now, I just need Amazon to send me the second amp I ordered so I can bi-amp my front speakers, as when I did that through my receiver...which removed my front highs which were useless in my set up anyways, it also sounded better. I'm even considering adding the amps to the rear and center channels....but now I'm rambling about off topic stuff.:)

[Jayszen]

@rainslacker

I agree with all your comments here. I think, though, that since Kazuo Hirai took over the reins from Howard Stringer, Sony started back on its old values which under the latter had changed to competing at lower to mid-range across the hardware range and R & D was pushed to the minimum. I was surprised that Hirai did not stay at the helm longer but his presence has done much to revitalize Sony.

Talking of the Fosi Tube, is it the T20?

[rainslacker]

Sony had a while there where their low-mid range consumer stuff really wasn't the best. They weren't terrible, but for the price, better could be had. Generally, their speakers are pretty decent for anyone that isn't too fussy, and it would cost more to go the next level up. Sony always seemed to have good studio type headphones, although their cheap walkman type headphones were usually pretty abysmal...as they all were anyways. I won't even get started on buds nowadays.

They lost some of the consumer market, particularly in TV's because they had to pay for the R&D that most companies ended up licensing from them anyways. Samsung now makes Sony displays though, but Sony has their own internal hardware.

I can't speak to Sony receivers anymore, but the consumer one's I always considered low end to middle of the road. Nothing wrong with them, but I've been into pioneer, kenwood, or Denon for over 20 years now. Onkyo was also good, but now I guess Pioneer owns them, or vice versa, I can't remember, so there's no advantage to paying extra for the Onkyo as they use the same parts for the most part.

I was also surprised that Kaz didn't stay longer. But I guess what he needed to do to get Sony back on track, because they turned things around pretty well given the circumstances. I kind of wish I had brought Sony stock around that time.

As far as the amp. Yeah. the 6J4 T20 Tube Amp

https://www.amazon.com/gp/p...

Was worried it wouldn't work as a separate amp with my pre-outs, but it handles great. It's only 50 watts per channel at 4ohms(my speakers are 6ohm), which I was concerned about, but I have Klipsch R-28F front channels, and they have really good efficiency. They're plenty loud without stressing my receiver or amp. My dad had an old tube amp, and until recently, I never realized how they affected the sound, but the difference is night and day, and I considered the my Pioneer VX-503 to be pretty good already, and I'm quite happy considering I was looking at buying a couple non-tube amps in the $200-300 range to do the same thing.

I'm sure there are better amps out there, even at reasonable prices for the non-audiophile such as myself. I like quality sound, but I'm not going to be super fussy about it like some people are. But since getting the amp, even without bi-amping the speakers, I never realized how much I was missing. You can actually hear the individual instruments in symphonies, and some music with lots of overlapping vocals you can make them all out without distortion, and it keeps the bass and midrange smooth without distortion. I probably will add on a powered subwoofer though....which isn't something I bothered with considering my front speakers can already shake the house, even at modest levels. I figured for the price, it was worth giving a try...at the very least, I could use them to run 4 high channels at some point.

After I get the amps set up, I may play around with using different tubes, as I've come to understand that they can change the sound qualitiy.