In early December, we ran a news story reacting to a press release from Analog Devices promoting the addition of DTS 96/24 capabilities to their family of Melody™ decode engines.
In the opinion of High Fidelity Review, the following excerpt could be considered both misleading and inaccurate – “When encoded in the video zone of DVD-Audio discs, DTS 96/24 delivers 96/24 audio resolution on any existing DVD-Video player, eliminating the need for a separate DVD-Audio player…” since DTS 96/24 is a lossy system and in no way is to be considered the equal of or a substitute for Meridian Lossless Packing (MLP), the loss-less system employed by DVD-Audio.
See the original news story here.
Today, High Fidelity Review received an official reaction from Analog Devices.
“As an audio decoder supplier certified by the leading audio format vendors (DTS, Dolby, THX, SRS Labs, etc.) we must convey the attributes and benefits of their
audio formats using their terms,” said Ms. Colleen Cronin, Group PR Manager for the DSP and System Products divisions of Analog Devices, Inc. “For the announcement in question, we used the statements previously used by DTS, Denon and Pioneer regarding the benefits of the DTS 96/24 format.”
Ms. Cronin continues by stating that they, Analog Devices, “…understand the differences between MLP, PCM and DTS and have posted this information on our website.” The links are as follows:
Analog Devices DVD-Audio Information
Understanding Audio from Video DVDs
Hopefully, by bringing this matter to the attention of all those involved, we will see less blurring of the line between the claims made for lossy CODECs as against those made for true, loss-less DVD-Audio and SACD technologies.