OK, the title is poorly worded. Sorry. What I mean is I’m watching a movie right now. When they’re speaking, I have to turn the volume up,but as soon as there’s any sort of special effect sound I pretty much go deaf because it is so loud. For the record the movie I’m watching is beauty and the beast put out in 2017 with Emma Watson. Speaking I have to set the volume to approximately 45 out of 100 on my home theater. As soon as they start singing, it is so damn loud it’s insane. Why would they do this and how do I fix the problem?
I’m using a Roku for Disney plus and a Denon receiver AVR-E400. I’ve tried going into the settings for Audyssey and strong dynamic volume to medium but that only helps a little bit. Maximum is a possibility, but then the audio doesn’t even sound correct it’s like I don’t know how to explain it, but it sounds strange at that point.
Any ideas on how to fix this problem because the dynamic range that I’m having is insane. I’m glad I live in my own house an apartment otherwise the neighbors would be pissed off at me.
Edit: I have a 5.1 system
The core problem is that many movies have the audio mixed for a movie theatre with multiple separately controllable audio channels. You might see this marked as 5.1 ; DTS; etc. In a typical home environment, you only have stereo sound. This means that the multiple audio channels have to be mixed down to two unless there is a separate stereo audio mix channel provided - basically never except commentary tracks. The shitty way to do it is to just take the left and right front channels which are mainly meant for sound effects and not bother to mix in the center channel which covers the dialogue. It’s still hard even if you mix in some of the centre channel.
Short version: asshole movie makers mix only for movie theatres, not stereo.
Sorry should have clarified. I have a 5.1 system
5 speakers and a sub
It helped me to turn up the volume on center speaker directly on the speakers. Using the speakers infrared remote control. It goes -4 to 4 for all speakers and on +4 i can usually understand what are the actors saying.
This is one of the primary reasons I use captions. I do not and never will have the equipment necessary to maximize the audio experience. Even if I did, I think I’d still struggle for many other reasons.
So captions it is. I feel lost without them if they are missing. I very regularly look at them to catch missed words and such. They also reveal a lot I would not have never heard in the first place anyway. My kids grew up with them and also get irritated when captions aren’t available. You just sort of come to rely on them without realizing it.
A bunch of reasons:
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High dynamic range - I.e. the difference in volume between quiet and loud sounds, means that e.g. explosions have to be loud for speech to be audible. This is a good thing on the mastering of things, but players should support dynamic range compression, and they often don’t.
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Poor quality speakers/headphones, usually without room correction. If the signal isn’t reaching the ears with a relatively flat frequency response (especially if midbass is higher than it should be) that can make speech difficult to hear.
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Stereo tends to result in a relatively unstable center “image” which can make speech muddy. Center speakers help here, and there are some audio processing technologies that may help.
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Poor mastering. Some movies are mixed in such a way that it makes dialogue difficult to hear.
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Simple solution: turn on closed captioning.
You can still curse the morons that balance sound for movies/TV etc. while still getting all the dialogue in a movie.
If you have a 5.1 system then I’d question the centre speaker or settings. A good centre speaker and you definitely won’t have this issue.
Back when I had just a soundbar I was experiencing the same issue. I added a centre speaker to my now 3.1 setup & haven’t looked back since
You went from a soundbar to a 3.1 by adding a centre speaker? Did you saw your soundbar in half?
At no point did I say that “I added a centre speaker to my soundbar setup”
I ditched my old setup for a new
It’s optimized for people with 90" televisions and $5000 surround sound systems. I forget how I did it, but I turned off some surround sound setting on my Roku and it helped a lot.
Probably true.
I spent over $600 on just the receiver and then some more in the 5 speakers plus the subwoofer. Yeah I’ve spent quite a bit.
Sad that I still can’t fix this.
I have a sound bar/subwoofer combo that I got for free from work lol it sounds great now though! I think it had to do with turning off 5.1 surround which I think was in the advanced sound settings
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Either adjust audio levels or invest in a better system that allows you to limit the range of audio with better resolution.
Bought a $600 denon receiver. Thoughts on a better one?
For watching movies, there aren’t really any. Most any receiver is going to be more than capable of handling film surround sound. Don’t get the “upgrade fever” lol.
Your issue seems to come from mixing. Do you have any EQ? That could help a lot.
No. Guess I should look into one
Run the room correction
Did. When I first bought the receiver
I have a denon 2700, it has a lot of the settings and adjustments as the higher models, but at a better price. I think it’s a gen or 2 old at this point. Unfortunately, most receivers under a grand are missing some features to really customize the sound. Most will add a feature to measure the sound in the room and adjust accordingly too.
I haven’t read other comments but it is worth checkjng your TV audio setup. You might want to set the sound output to cinema or speaking mode. Thus changes the sound and optimizes it for easier listening. If the audio is set to music, it will be amplified and nice to hear but difficult to decipher.
My guess is you your brain puts too much work to decipher the sound and construct words. You can make your brain do leaa work just by changing how the sound is output so it becomes easier to distinguish word, thus not need to compensatory with higher volume.
Of course you may need to experiment with you TV settings to find what is suitable for you. Obviously an audio setting ibtized for speach would reduce quality of music out put.
If you use MS Teams, you will notice that when you start a phone call but still have music playing then out will change in tone. For the same reason, Radio presenter in the past would speak a certain way so they can be heard correctly over the radio.,
Turn off the sound and used closed captions.
