Low dialog volume

[Pad]

I have to put the subtitles on any film I watch on sky, even with the volume set at its highest. 
if I watch on terrestrial TV it can be heard three streets away on full volume. 
what am I paying for?

should I choose an alternative supplier?

[mike+simmonds]

Morning @Pad 

Typically this is likely to be something to do with the audio mix of the movie you are watching, the audio setting of your Sky box (so, normal stereo, Dolby digital, Dolby Digital plus)

and your TV audio setting 

Are you using Sky Q ?

What do you find when you go to your Sky Q settings / setup/ audio visual 

and then depending on if your cable is HDMI or optical, play around with the audio options 

Sometimes (and I know this is not ideal) I get clearer sound when I change from Dolby digital - to Normal (which is Stereo)

I think this is to do with my TV speakers disagreeing with the specific audio mix of certain movies. 

With regular TV shows, it rarely happens. 

I notice it with some Marvel / Disney films where the audio mix is maybe very complex and my TV can't cope. 

If you are not on SkyQ there will be similar settings for your own platform but I've no experience of those. 

Hope this helps a bit 

[Mark39]

@Pad I agree with @mike+simmonds : your Sky box's sound output needs to be set to Normal. Most TVs can't adequately replicate a Dolby Digital signal with their speaker setup - typically 2 speakers. 

[mike+simmonds]

Just going off on a tangent @Mark39 , why do you think the following is happening for me ....

I watch a movie with a complex audio track and I change my SkyQ audio HDMI output to Normal and the dialogue soundtrack is clear. 

I don't finish the movie and plan to watch more the next day 

I don't change any setting  myself on my SkyQ box - the next day I'll sit down to watch the second half of the movie and by itself (overnight) the SkyQ  HDMI audio setting has reverted back to Dolby Digital ? 

[Mark39]

@mike+simmonds odd. Does it do the same thing if you manually restart your Sky box? I'm wondering if it's anything to do with the auto restart that takes place overnight. Even if that's the cause, I don't know why it would reset your audio output setting, sorry Mike.

[mike+simmonds]

Hi @Mark39 

Yes it does it both on an eco setting and not eco. 

I'll experiment a bit with seeing what happens if I turn the box off for say an hour (rather than overnight when it always changes)

So 5/6 days a week I am happy with the system in either Dolby Digital or DD+ (I try both) but then once or twice a week (perhaps similar to the experience of @Pad ) I can just tell the dialogue mix on a programme is rubbish and I know my easy solution which is to change to "normal "

My TV is actually meant to cope with Dolby Atmos (it's an LG OLED C from 2021) but clearly (no irony intended) it doesn't cope well with certain mixes.  The Marvel movies are examples but there are some recent TV shows (series) that are the same.  

I'll post back if I work out what's going on 

[mike+simmonds]

---

@mike+simmonds wrote:

Hi @Mark39 

Yes it does it both on an eco setting and not eco. 

I'll experiment a bit with seeing what happens if I turn the box off for say an hour (rather than overnight when it always changes)

So 5/6 days a week I am happy with the system in either Dolby Digital or DD+ (I try both) but then once or twice a week (perhaps similar to the experience of @Pad ) I can just tell the dialogue mix on a programme is rubbish and I know my easy solution which is to change to "normal "

My TV is actually meant to cope with Dolby Atmos (it's an LG OLED C from 2021) but clearly (no irony intended) it doesn't cope well with certain mixes.  The Marvel movies are examples but there are some recent TV shows (series) that are the same.  

I'll post back if I work out what's going on 

---

Hi @Pad @Mark39 

If anyone is interested I got to the bottom of this through a bit of trial and error. 

I was watching Billy Joel live on BBC2 and this was a great example of the audio mix disagreeing with my TV speakers with the Sky Q box set to Dolby Digital.  So I changed my Sky Q box HDMI audio to "normal" - and the sound was fine.  

I turned the Sky Q box off and then on and immediately the SkyQ audio changed itself back from Normal to Dolby Digital. 

I looked around settings and found the issue - sort of obvious - I have HDMI control on my SkyQ box audio set to ON. 

Amongst other things, what this seems to be doing was deciding the best audio setting for my SkyQ box based on the signal coming in. 

In my case- this is what was changing the SkyQ HDMI audio back to DD each time

I've turned HDMI control to OFF and now if I want to, I can keep my Sky box HDMI audio setting as normal. 

I know it was a few days ago but I wonder if this would help @Pad when watching movies which disagreed with their TV ?