New sound immersion processes

+1 on ceiling treatment, look at the pics in my virtual system, I have absorbers in the front. a combo diffuser/bass trap above the MLP, and an acoustic "cloud" near the back.

The new immersion processes are NOT "surround" sound. Surround sound was based on channels and many people who have not adopted immersive audio dismiss it because of their misunderstanding about "object based" audio.

Immersive audio is new and still finding its way. When I decided to adopt immersive audio I took the same care in speaker selection that I did with two channel. If I wouldn't use a speaker in my immersive audio setup for two channel I wouldn't use it as a surround speaker. Dolby has specs available for speaker setup. I followed them and chose to use front and rear height channels using bookshelves. Simple, you can aim them at the sweetspot. It made no sense to me to use the speakers that bounce off the ceiling or drill holes in my ceiling to have speakers aimed at the floor. The floor is not a sweet spot. Once setup properly immersive audio is breathtaking. I still listen to two channel at low to moderate levels on some content, mostly in the morning with my coffee. But if you want to replicate a live music experience immersive is much more lifelike than aiming a pair of speakers at your head. 

I encourage you to check out the threads I started here on atmos. One is how to setup an atmos system based on dolby specs. The second is on atmos music.

I find Sony 360 a headphone based upmixer and use it with my Tidal subscription. I wouldn't build a home theater around it though.

If you are thinking about setting up an atmos system make sure to check out this thread:

If you are spending $$$ on two channel stereo it is like investing in buggy whips. Yes, you will have a great buggy whip but in five years you will need to invest in Atmos if you want the best streaming experience available. When Apple started offering Atmos the industry changed overnight.

The good news is Atmos is backward compatible, Atmos sounds great through two speakers or headphones. Objects sound different than channels even through two speakers.

Stereo sound is for senior citizens who still pine for their 8 track tapes.

@cleeds 

You're joking, right?

Fact:

This isn't a codec, its a movement and dolby atmos is being adopted by the music creation community:

but two-channel stereo listeners are looking for fundamentally different things than an action director or cinematographer

There are no "two channel stereo listeners", there are only "music listeners".

There are "two channel music creators", the mixing and mastering engineers. Can you sing in two channels? Nope, the engineer needs to mix it that way.

“We’ve been waiting for a replacement for stereo for decades,” says Jan 'Stan' Kybert, the engineer responsible for installing the Dean St. Studios facility. “It’s an ancient technology. With music you want to feel something, like with a Saturday night or Sunday morning record. They make me feel ‘Saturday night’ or ‘Sunday morning’. That feeling has been lost with stereo now, and it’s not stereo’s fault, but with Dolby Atmos that feeling is there. It’s bigger, more exciting and wants to make you move, be more intimate, more relaxed or whatever. Everything it does it does it on a richer level.

Check out:

There are 3 types of people in the world, those that make it happen, those that watch it happen, and those like @cleeds who ask, "Hey, what happened?"

The Audio Engineering Society is NOT a hype machine. Anyone remotely interested in what is happening can experience atmos :

@erik_squires 

Atmos sounds fine through two speakers, I don't see why you can't have both? I have a very nice DAC for streaming stereo, I can upmix to Dolby Surround if I want.

I have a very nice processor for Atmos, I can play Atmos mix through two speakers if I want.