Audio Video News

Dolby Digital Plus will make its broadcast debut in France's recently launched HDTV platform.

Télévision Numérique Terrestre will use both Dolby Digital Plus and Dolby Digital on the TF1HD, France2 HD, ARTE HD, Canal+ HD, and M6 HD channels.

Although Dolby Digital Plus and Dolby Digital are both included in North America's ATSC HDTV broadcast standard, the French move is the first use of the newer Plus in a national broadcast medium. Plus is also used as the audio codec for Vudu's video-on-demand service, has been used in HD DVD disc releases, and is supported as an option by the Blu-ray format specs.

Dolby Digital Plus and Dolby TrueHD are the two newest surround codecs from Dolby Labs. While TrueHD has gotten a lot of attention, thanks to its use in Blu-ray releases, Plus is often overlooked. Plus is lossy, like old-style Dolby Digital, as opposed to lossless, like the higher-quality TrueHD. That means it uses perceptual coding to eliminate less crucial audio data. But it is still an improved lossy codec with audible improvements over its lossy precedessor. Let's hope we see (and hear) more of it in situations where TrueHD is not used.

See press release and backgrounder on Dolby Digital Plus.