cross-posted from: https://piefed.social/c/nonpolitical_comics/p/1657114/mr-lovenstein-volume
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What does your audio system look like for your TV?
We're expected to have separate audio systems now?...
No, but the solution is different if you were to have a sound bar or are using the build-in speakers.
Always has been. 🌍👨🚀🔫👨🚀
Yes. TV speakers have gotten incredibly cheap and low quality. It's audio/visual. You've invested a fair chunk into half of the experience with a TV, but ignored the other half.
Gotten? I never knew any TV set with at least respectable audio and I knew CRT TVs.
I think they were better at least, and mostly because there was space for them. In a CRT you had enough volume inside the TV to have even just little 2" drivers, now with ultrathins it's hard to fit any even moderately okay speaker in there.
I didn't, really...I can barely afford a 1080p TV. I'm not buying a sound bar, screw that, rather do something else.
K, like I said your personal finances are your own, but that's why you don't have good sound. Asked and answered.
I thought it was obvious that it was a rhetorical question, man
Yes, because there’s a limit to how thin a screen can be and still fit decent speakers, and that sailed by 20 years ago.
If you're watching movies mixed for surround sound on the stereo speakers on your TV, you're gonna have a bad time
I would know, I do it all the time
I'm glad I'm no avid of movies. Wasn't enough that TV's are so locked down and spying on me, now I'd have to buy extra stuff too... Screw that noise...
I appreciate TVs not wasting resources on putting decent speakers in it that I'll never use because I did buy a soundbar over a decade ago that has decent sound and has outlasted the TV I bought it for. Plus TVs are so thin these days that they probably can't even drive decent bass, and the speakers they do have are rear facing, so they don't even drive the sound towards you.
Modularity isn't a bad thing IMO.
Okay this I can completely agree with actually, good take. You changed my mind and you're right.
I kinda wish some things would be simple but eh it is what it is.
Oh yeah, I understand the sentiment entirely. With so many dark patterns dominating the world we live in because we live in a society that decided to embrace greed instead of seeing it as a primary motivator of evil, I can't blame anyone that looks at the state of things with suspicion anytime there are downsides. And while it isn't realistic to expect as good audio from a built-in system as a separate dedicated audio system, I do think it's ridiculous that the standard is so dysfunctional that you either can't understand what people are saying or explosions are way too loud. Especially in this digital world where mixing separate audio channels isn't a difficult task. Streaming services should just have a stereo and mono version of the audio that is mixed well for that format if it is actually a harder problem than I think it is.
Some of it is practicality, but I don't doubt that greed also plays into it. I mean, even on the modularity side, I don't have the option of easily finding a TV without any speakers at all, or a TV without smart features that a) aren't as good as other options I have to access those features and b) were actually thrown in to spy on data, as your previous comment mentioned.
So yeah, I don't blame you at all for being suspicious of the companies that absolutely are trying to fuck their users because their real customers are data buyers, even if I do prefer my soundbar.
you've had to buy 'extra stuff' for decades. The TV is only half the equation.
Its buying a DSLR camera, and being upset it didn't come with the best lens. It comes with one that works, but you arn't going to have good results.
Buying a consumer TV is nothing like buying a DSLR camera...
Are you unfamiliar with the concept of an analogy?
Home theatre systems have been a thing for decades. Soundbars are the cheaper and simpler new alternative.
Alternatively you can just use a media player thay compresses audio. This is easier if you use a PC connected to your TV but I'm sure some TV apps allow it too.
"Whatcha doing housemate?"
"Rigging 5.1 surround-sound that I can't fucking afford, so that the bass and explosions absolutely rip through your walls, but at least I can hear the whispering."
Yeah fuck that. I've had surround sound before. It's not remotely the issue I'm complaining about. It's about audio volume mixing for home screens for average people who just have a TV and thin walls.
So, you haven't invested in your audio. You have a TV, great, but tv speakers are basically phone speakers.
You don't need a big surround sound system, but you need something. Even the cheapest sound bars will likely solve this problem for you.
I choose food and rent.
Your personal finances are your business. I am here saying why you can't hear anything. If the audio is bad, the invest in better audio, simple as that.
Yah I am dying to continue to feed the system that requires us to spend more money than we already did for stuff we own to get decent experience from it rather than add one fucking toggle that balances audio for people who aren't interested in chasing optimization by feeding corporations more of our labor. Go play with your lootboxes.
"The system" is physics. You can't have tiny speakers embeded in a flat screen sound as good as a dedicated sound system due to how sound works. Same goes for phones camera, the tiny size just cannot compete against bigger, dedicated hardware due to how light works.
So go ahead and go fight the universe if you want, I'll be here enjoying my audio on big ass speakers you can find in a thrift shop since those things existed for decades.
Pretty sure the "corporation" that made my speakers in the 70's are well fed with the non-existant money I sent them.
I summarily block people who take any opportunity to brag about their possessions instead of making any attempt to understand others.
You apparently didn't even bother to read anyway so have a good day.
How dare you sir, talking about things you got at a thrift store. Mr moneybags over here not diving through dumpsters for his speakers. You in your ivory tower buying things second hand while we're out in the streets buying things fourth and fifth handed. For shame, for shame.
(/s although I hope that was obvious)
K. You asked why your sound was bad, I gave an answer. Your opinions on if it should or shouldn't be that way are not relevant, this is the way it is. If you want good sound, you have to buy it. I can't change society or manufacturers for you, I am only a guy explaining how you can get good sound.
They actually didn't ask, just stated modern audio mixing was shit.