Sony’s ‘360 RA’
At CES 2019 in Las Vegas, Sony announced ‘360 Reality Audio’, describing it as an object-based spatial audio technology which is based on MPEG-H 3D Audio. But to understand what’s on offer, it’s important to separate two different elements of delivery by 360 ‘RA’.
The first is the application of object-based audio mixing to music.
The second is the delivery of a promised surround effect even in stereo listening.
We’re excited by the first of these, but rather cynical about the second.
What is MPEG-H?
MPEG-H (our separate and earlier primer article is at avhub.com.au/mpegh) has been slow getting out of the blocks compared to the object-based audio formats we know from home theatre — namely Dolby Atmos, DTS:X, and Auro-3D.
But the focus of MPEG-H on streaming,
