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The new technology developed by Lake Technology and licensed to Dolby Laboratories in June this year was unveiled today at the World PC Expo in Tokyo.   Dolby Virtual Speaker (DVS) was created by Lake Technology in conjunction with Dolby’s R&D team. Sony has already announced the availability of the new feature in their flagship PC’s.

DVS is a surround-sound “virtualizer”, which provides listeners with the surround-sound experience of a multi-speaker system from as few as two speakers. In other words, sounds coming from PC or TV speakers seem as if they actually emanate from behind and to the side of the listener, as well as from the front.  The algorithm at the heart of Dolby Virtual Speaker is based on advanced psychoacoustic parameters that include an understanding of sound from both a technical and a human, experiential perspective.

“Delivering a surround-sound experience to consumers who have products that have two speakers unlocks an immediate new market opportunity for Lake Technology through its partnership with Dolby,” said said Chris Gilbey, Chief Executive Officer of Lake Technology.

“Lake is now in a position to expand its licensing revenue opportunities beyond headphone solutions to the overall consumer electronics audio market. Dolby Virtual Speaker is anticipated to provide product differentiation for consumer electronics branded goods manufacturers making DVD-Video players, digital TV sets, set-top boxes and multimedia speaker systems.  This will enable Lake to build its licensing revenue streams exponentially in coming years. Our goal is to make all audio devices sound better and to take advantage of the burgeoning surround sound market that can only accelerate as a result of the specifications mandated by digital broadcasting legislation ”  he added.

Sony has already announced the availability of DVS in two of their Vaio multimedia entertainment PC’s, and other leading PC vendors are expected to follow in the near future. This will result in a new royalty source for Lake Technology in the next financial year and beyond. DVS is also being integrated into software DVD players from Cyberlink and InterVideo, which already feature Lake-developed Dolby Headphone.

 “InterVideo has integrated Dolby’s Virtual Speaker technology into our latest version of WinDVD, the world’s most popular DVD-playing software,” said Steve Ro, founder and CEO of InterVideo. “The simple fact is that most PCs ship with only two speakers. By adding Virtual Speaker technology to WinDVD, these consumers get a natural surround sound when watching DVDs. It sounds incredible—you really have to hear it to believe it.”

The official launch of Dolby Virtual Speaker is part of Dolby Laboratories’ broader “Dolby in PC” initiative. “Consumers are increasingly using their PCs for entertainment—watching DVDs, listening to music, and playing games—but the audio experience on a PC could not match that of a good home theater unless users added multispeaker configurations,” said Ron Vitale, director of consumer marketing at Dolby. “Dolby Virtual Speaker technology replicates a rich, immersive multichannel audio experience, using just two standard PC speakers. With Dolby Virtual Speaker technology, PC users can experience new levels of entertainment when a surround sound speaker setup is not practical.

Dolby is working closely with Analog Devices and Texas Instruments to incorporate Dolby Virtual Speaker technology in their digital signal processors. Soon Dolby Virtual Speaker technology will be available in traditional entertainment-based products such as DVD, digital televisions, D-VHS players and multimedia speaker systems. 

“Analog Devices is proud to be the industry’s first to implement Dolby Virtual Speaker technology,” said Mike Haidar, general manager, software & systems technology, Analog Devices, Inc. “This bears testament to the ultimate flexibility of our Melody® audio processor, since it makes it possible to deliver this new audio format in addition to its wide complement of industry standard formats, including Dolby Digital, Dolby Pro Logic®, Dolby Pro Logic II, AAC, THX Surround EX, Dolby Headphone, and Dolby Digital Consumer Encoding.”

“We believe speaker virtualization is a key technology in the consumer audio space,” said Curt Moore, WW business manager of the performance audio business at Texas Instruments (TI). “With optimized, cost-effective implementations of Dolby Virtual Speaker technology on TI’s DA610 Aureus™ audio DSP, OEMs will be able to offer a more enveloping surround sound experience beyond the traditional 5.1 multi-speaker home theater market.”

John Bell
Director
Lake Technology Ltd

Source: Lake Technology