Voice tone circuit

[gary350]

I like to watch foreign TV shows and movies they are much better than, fighting, killing, blood & guts, no story, American TV. British TV has a very low frequency sound tone is there a way to change the sound tone to a different frequency?

Some TVs have sound settings I have tried all 6 settings, voice, music, movies, etc, but not getting much better on British TV.

 

[Nigel Goodwin]

I like to watch foreign TV shows and movies they are much better than, fighting, killing, blood & guts, no story, American TV. British TV has a very low frequency sound tone is there a way to change the sound tone to a different frequency?

Your post makes no sense at all?

 

[KMoffett]

First have you hearing tested. I had the same problem with TV. My high frequency hearing drops off drastically above 1kHz. I now have hearing aids, and the TV sound problem went away.

Ken

 

[gary350]

I already did hearing test and have hearing aids that work good. I have had the hearing program adjusted better and better many times. Now I hear things I have not heard in 30 years but I can not understand what people on British TV say. Do British people actually sound different or does the sound studio make it sound like that?

Music friend of mine that knows a lot about audio told me to replace large speakers with smaller speakers you get a different sound. He is right I built a selector switch for, 2", 4", 6", 8" 10" speaker flip the switch from 1 speaker to the other and chance nothing else there is a very noticeable sound difference.

Living room TV has different sound than the other TV and wife with very good hearing notices it too. When we switch to a British TV show she has trouble knowing what they are saying too. I am talking about the sound not the different words they say like, if you get nicked in England = you get arrested in the USA. A car park in England is a parking lot in USA. British words seem to have less contrast than American words.

 

[gophert]

1) Higher frequencies are more directional while lower frequencies are room-filling. To maximize your capture of the high frequencies, sit directly in front of the tv.

2) if you have a 5.1 surround system (or 6.1 or 7.1), try removing the center channel in your recever's software selection. Some production companies do not mix the Dolby sound the same way. Most American production companies heavily weight the dialog on the center front channel and the Dolby decoding software does not like when it is expecting dialog for front channels but the missing is weighted to left and right front channels. BBC shows ARE weird - Downton Abbey had terrible audio on my system and we did have to turn up the volume to about 60% when we normally watch at 30 to 35.

 

[gary350]

1) Higher frequencies are more directional while lower frequencies are room-filling. To maximize your capture of the high frequencies, sit directly in front of the tv.

2) if you have a 5.1 surround system (or 6.1 or 7.1), try removing the center channel in your recever's software selection. Some production companies do not mix the Dolby sound the same way. Most American production companies heavily weight the dialog on the center front channel and the Dolby decoding software does not like when it is expecting dialog for front channels but the missing is weighted to left and right front channels. BBC shows ARE weird - Downton Abbey had terrible audio on my system and we did have to turn up the volume to about 60% when we normally watch at 30 to 35.

The big most expensive TV in the living room has the worse sound. I have not taken it apart to see what type speakers it has but if I plug in different speakers it has better sound. Wife bought a cheapo $65 Walmart sound bar it is junk but it sounds better than the TV speakers. I took the sound bar apart it has several tiny 2" x 3" speakers inside. I had some good quality computer speakers on the TV for a while but wife does not like them they are not beautiful. LOL.

Smaller flat screen TV in the other room has much better sound but still British TV is very hard to understand, other programs are easy to understand.

 

[AnalogKid]

The big most expensive TV in the living room has the worse sound.
Wife bought a cheapo $65 Walmart sound bar it is junk but it sounds better than the TV speakers.

Both of those things are because of bass frequency response. Clearly you do better with sound sources that have the bass "turned down" either mechanically (smaller speakers) or electronically. That is because, in *very* round numbers, the lower frequencies are the vowels and the higher frequencies are the consonants, and it is the consonants that carry the meaning. Acoustically, the differences among B, C, D, and T are higher-frequency effects, harmonics, etc. Vocal chords are doing the exact same thing for all four.

BTW, smaller speakers are not automatically better for you, especially for products like sound bars that have internal amplifiers tuned to compensate for the deficiencies of small, cheap speakers.

For the set with different preset voices, hunt for the config screen with straight treble, midrange, and base adjusters. This might be on the preset menu under "other", or something like that. Boost the midrange a little, cut the bass a little, and re-evaluate.

Of course, another cause is that the dialog in some British programmes is just plain hard to decipher. I love Jodi Whittaker as Doctor Who, but some of her more rapid speech might as well be chinese.

ak