Surround sound fields

Could someone please explain to me what the differnt sound fields do? As in pro logic ex, pl11, neo, dts ex and all that.
I have a kick ass reciever, but no manual.

My approach to things is to just play waht sounds best to me. Doesn't answer your question but experiment away til you get what feels right to your ears.

here's a link that might help

http://www.hometheaterfocus.com/basics/

actually this is the better link and check out surround sound formats links at bottom

http://www.hometheaterfocus.com/surround/

I thought this was going to be about something really awesome like force fields made out of sound or sonic warfare or that kid who does DIY sonar and can totally find rubbish bins on the street without looking.

Pro-Logic/Pro-LogicII - just take a stereo feed and try and apply it's own surround logic.
Dolby Digital/DTS - directly encoded at source as to what sound comes from what channel. ]
DTS-EX - adds another channel (centre rear IIRC)

Anything else - wankery from your reciever to mess with it. Should be able to set it so that it plays DTS or Dolby Digital if avaialble (digital connection from DVD/BR/Gaming only) or reset to PLII if only a stereo signal available (TV)

Cheers all, pretty much what I thought.

I didn't realise that 7.1 was bullshit marketing.

How so?

Well, it's bullshit marketing...

... and I didn't realise that...

heh sorry I'm in a stupid mood.

Um, somewhere in those descriptions it says that there is no format that has 7 discreet channels, but Dolby Digital EX & DTS ES are referred to as 7.1 because they output 7 channels... But the extra channels are just matrixed from existing channels.

There are a couple of true at-source 7.1 styles (DolbyHD I think one of them is called) - but yeah, everything to date has been added in by the receiver. Doesn't necessarily make it bullshit (it can do a nice job of height for the front sound stage and better immersion in the rear) but yeah, is not an at-source thingy.

Not true - DTS ES has a true 6.1 (i.e. 7 discreet) variant.
And there are now Dolby HD and a DTS equivalent that have true 8 discreet

And how would you take advantage of it? I suppose 8 channel audio is found on Blue Ray?

Wouldnt this require a large listening enviroment?
I mean your average lounge isnt going to be big enough for everything to be seperated properly.

Yup, DolbyHD can be found on some Blu-Ray but is rare. Need appropriate decoding and ampls to as it's all uber high-rate lossless stuff...

Re lounge size, I don't think it matters too much. You're just getting two speakers in each corner effectively (one side, one back) rather than one. It's just filling in that 360 degree sound field - in some ways a smaller room will make that more seamless