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Topic: Audible effect of high SRD error rate?

Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99

posted 02-17-2002 10:56 AM

The problem with both cement (aka wet splice) and UltraSonic is the loss of 2 frames every time the print is made up and broken down

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Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

posted 02-17-2002 02:25 PM

As a dealer with alot of customers in remote areas I'd also like to express my concerns of what seems like more than normal the amount of prints with high SRD error rates, or even plain defective prints that are bad for sections then go on playing fine. We are considering selling DTS players exclusively for this very reason. We feel that the possibnility of not getting a disk for a day or two is way less hassle for any of our customers than the SRD stuff has been.
Mark @ Home

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Gordon McLeod
Film God

Posts: 9532
From: Toronto Ontario Canada
Registered: Jun 99

posted 02-17-2002 03:09 PM

Mark a while ago your policy was SRD only because you couldn't get disks and bad drives what gives

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Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

posted 02-17-2002 03:34 PM

Gord,
This area has received an onslaught of bad SRD prints lately. Its a come and go thing and U never know when its going to come. My change in stance is the result of all the problems that I have had with SRD Digital only based processors and the manufacturers lack of cures for the problems at hand. SRD units are THE only equipment that I sell that I get frequent complaints about from our customers. I had no probs. with CP-500's till a few years ago when all of a sudden they started having alot of problems. Some you know about, and some of the problems have been experienced by yourself as well. I guess that I'd have to say that I too got caught up in the this SRD digital package is the best bang for the buck thing too. But all they've done is to go bang and in all the wrong places!

Yes, I still have alot of DTS units come in for upgrade too, some with other problems as well. And some customers still do not receive disks with the films. I have an upgrade kit on order right now, and a cabinet fuull of drives, boards and cables that I've replaced from other units. Someday I'll weld them all together for a nice artsy display. However, once the DTS units are upgraded I never see them again, or get complaints from our customers about them. Having been a DTS Authorized Service Center since I came to GTS I can also say that DTS is also way ahead of the game with dealer/customer service and they seem to be more into into rectifying a problem when it comes into being. There is ALWAYS someone at the other end of the phone that can help solve a technical issue! Other cinema equipment manufacturers could learn a lesson or two from them and I commend them on their service and support to their dealers. On another note....Would I ever sell a DTS 6AD? NO! Never!
Mark @ Home

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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 02-17-2002 06:22 PM

>>"Would I ever sell a DTS 6AD? NO! Never!"<<

And yet amazingly enough, I would! It actually has many rather nifty features in it.

Steve

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"Old projectionists never die, they just changeover!"

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Ray Derrick
Master Film Handler

Posts: 310
From: Sydney, Australia
Registered: Sep 2001

posted 02-18-2002 07:28 AM

Ken said "If the processor cannot read 3 blocks in a row, it will revert to SR (3 strikes and you're out!)".

Maybe Dolby should revise their software by also including "3 block repeats and you're out"!

------------------
Ray Derrick
President/Chief Engineer
Panalogic Corporation Sydney, Australia
Phone: 61 (0)2 9894 6655 Fax: 61 (0)2 9894 6935

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Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 02-18-2002 08:36 AM

I'm not sure Ken's statement is entirely accurate. Since a 1" opaque tape can be used without a reversion, more than 3 blocks are obstructed, in theory, every splice should cause a reversion in the 3-strikes and you are out scheme.

Steve

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"Old projectionists never die, they just changeover!"

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Ken Jacquart
Film Handler

Posts: 82
From: San Francisco, CA, USA
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 02-19-2002 05:05 PM

You guys don't miss a thing!
You are correct, I mispoke or should I say, mistyped...
What I should have said was, The processor will revert if it cannot read 4 blocks in a row... The three strikes and your out rule referrs to another reversion scenario where if there have been three reversions in a short period of time, the processor will remain reverted for a time before it attempts to come back to Dobly Digital (it assumes there may be a bad section of film and doesn't want to irritate the audience with many reversions). Sorry about the confusion.
Here is another one for you... Many films today have "splice caching". Throughout part of a given reel, audio data relating to several feet of film around the splice, is read into memory. Upon reel change, the processor will revert to internal memory backup of these few feet (if need be... if it would have reverted) instead of reverting to SR. So, if a given film has this feature enabled, then we don't care how bad of a splice you make, it will playback good data from its memory.

ken

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Brad Miller
Administrator

Posts: 17775
From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall)
Registered: May 99

posted 02-19-2002 05:31 PM

Ken, is that done only at reel changes, or continuously throughout the reel?

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Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

posted 02-19-2002 06:12 PM

Steve,
You can go ahead and sell all the 6AD's you want to. They are all over the Edwards chain out here and its the ONLY piece of equipment in their theatres that regularly suffers from the hickups. As I stated before, in the interests and well being of GTS's customers, I will stick to an analog processor with outboard digital whatever they want. That way their show will always go on.
Steve, All processors out there have at least some "nifty features", even a CP-50 does for that matter, but its not those extra nifty features that sell the tickets.
Mark @ Old GTS

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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99

posted 02-19-2002 08:13 PM

I would assume that the splice cache feature is only for reel changes as it would take quite a bit of memory to buffer everything in a particular reel. Though with some tricky programming on the encoder's part it COULD be done, I am betting.

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Steve Kraus
Film God

Posts: 4094
From: Chicago, IL, USA
Registered: May 2000

posted 02-19-2002 09:08 PM

Joe espoused:
>I would assume that the splice cache feature is only for reel
>changes as it would take quite a bit of memory to buffer everything
>in a particular reel. Though with some tricky programming on the >encoder's part it COULD be done, I am betting.

No because you could not send that much data in background. By the same means that data can be delivered to update the Dolby Digital playback firmware, they will slowly build up in memory the data necessary to cache the entire reel change. I've forgotten the bitrate for Dolby Digital on film...320kbps comes to mind. They'd probably want to cache a few seconds on either side of the splice. Whether that data is sent in background slowly over the entire course of a reel (along with updates and other goodies) or just in the minutes before someone else will have to explain.

At least that is how I interpret it. As always, reality may be at variance with anything I say.

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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today

Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99

posted 02-20-2002 01:15 AM

Dolby Digital needs huge hard drives installed in every unit that you can load the digital sound on from CDs so it can revert to that if it fails. Oh wait.....

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Phil Hill
I love my cootie bug

Posts: 7595
From: Hollywood, CA USA
Registered: Mar 2000

posted 02-20-2002 02:33 AM

Joe, Get ready for the new DTS systems. It will have hard-drives loaded from CD's. Trust me, I know. Of course I now will be killed!

>>> Phil

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Steve Kraus
Film God

Posts: 4094
From: Chicago, IL, USA
Registered: May 2000

posted 02-20-2002 09:31 AM

No reason the other two digital systems could not incorporate HD's as well. Continue to read the track for synch purposes and if subsequent reads produce a block of data with less errors then swap it for the one already stored but presuming that, in general, the best read is the first one when the print is brand new you'd be mostly playing from the stored data. While we're at it let's add a LAN so that when prints get moved the system can check if any other CP at the site has the data and can import it. All possible of course but at a significantly increased price.

Now, more seriously, a couple of questions for Ken that I forgot to ask: When a film with the caching feature comes along, is this feature invoked immediately on the first run or does the initial run just set up the software so that it then happens on subsequent runs? And how does this technique apply to changeover situations? I'm curious whether my own setup benefits given that it's a screening room and generally a film does not screen more than once in a row.

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