I've purchased about 6 DVD-Audio discs. Most sound great. However the two that I just got (kd lang "Summer Fling" and "A.I." Soundtrack) sounded pretty flat and "conventional." I moved the fader back to the rear and could only hear very soft, muffled sound. I tried this maneuver with a couple of the good-sounding discs and the rear speakers were loud and clear.

I also played the two that didn't sound great on my home theater system and they sounded great with clear/loud rear channels.

Anyone have similar experiences with other discs?

 

This is just a theory because I have neither of these discs, but perhaps these discs have the stereo presentation as Group 1 on the DVD-A instead of the surround presentation?

Do you have a DVD-Audio player in your home theater? If it's a DVD-Video player, then you are hearing the Dolby Digital track from the DVD-V portion of the disc, which is not the same source as your TL will play.

Mike

 

How a DVD-A, an SACD, or a CD for that matter, sounds is totally in the hands of the recording engineer and the artist themselves. Don't be surprised to find DVD-A discs that sound like this.

A movie music score soundtrack usually doesn't utilize the surround tracks for anything more than ambiance information.
And some recording engineers and artists prefer to do the same to keep the performance in front of you but recreating the accoustics of a live venue, utilizing the rear channels to reproduce the reflected sound information you'd hear.
Others elect to mix the tracks so the listener is "inside" the performance.

It's purely a matter of taste and artistic choice.

In as much as Elliot Scheiner tuned the system in the TL, expect that DVD-A discs engineered and mixed by him will sound the best and others will vary from that standard to a greater or lesser degree.