HDTV Forum

I have recently switched to Direct TV with HD. I have a Sony projection LCD 42".The video in HD is great but the audio is terrible.Commercials come on blasting which forces us to be decreasing and increasing the volume on my Denon receiver constantly. It almost makes HD unusable. What is the problem and is there a fix
Viejo

The problem mostly lies with the channel, I think. Some up the volume on commercials more than others. I have DirecTV too, and not all channels act the same. TNTHD seems to be the worst. One thing that I have tried to smooth things out is playing around with the different listening modes on the receiver. If you are using something like "all channnel stereo", the commercials may be louder. I think cable and OTA channels can also have this problem. It is called greed.

Maybe not much you can do about it except send a nastygram to DirecTV.

Send your nasty gram to the national broadcaster, they are the ones doing this or allowing it. Yet another area where they need to grow up and stop playing childish games with the signals.

The only other thing you could do is turn on a compression/night mode if your receiver supports it. While you will lose your dynamics it will also even it all out for the most part.

I bet you are watching a lot of NBC. Their HD channel audio level is all over the place. It seems to be a nationwide NBC problem. -Ken

Funny Ken, I was going to say ABC...

I agree that the different volume levels are a pain. I think they're more noticeable on digital because most stations aren't using compressors and limiters there as much as on the analog channel. You get much more dynamic range in the program material, but then you have to suffer with the different levels from source to source.

The commercials and promos aren't really louder. The audio peaks are the same as for the program material, but the audio is much more compressed so it sounds a lot louder. If you have a meter where you can watch the audio levels, you can see where the average level is much higher on commercials and promos than on program material, but the peaks are the same.

Another thing I notice about audio levels is the different levels you get going from channel to channel. Here in San Francisco, CBS always seems to be louder than any of the other networks. NBC is lower than average.

Larry

I've found that DD programming volume will be much lower then the non DD commercials. But the larger question is why you are watching commercials in the first place? TiVo man!