Sound quality on TV films & American programs very bad ????

A._Badger

At least a part of the problem is poorly designed equipment at the consumer end.

I endured this year's NYE at a neighbour's house who insisted on leaving her new TV switched on throughout the evening. The sound quality was so bad that in the end I offered to see if she had set it up properly. In fact she had - in so far as there was any setting up that could be done at all.

Surprisingly, the offending piece of junk wasn't a Tesco or Aldi 'bargain buy' but a Panasonic and I have always found Panasonic equipment at least to an acceptable standard in most respects and usually near the top end in terms of its price/performance. Not this one. It was a flat screen model with speakers as poor as a cheap laptop's.

So, yes, there is an issue with mumbling actors (the BBC's SS GB was notably poor in this respect). I also believe that sound engineers are not mixing to take into account the decreasing audio quality of consumer equipment. That's the nub of it - flatscreen TVs with inadequate amplification and speakers.

The simplest and cheapest remedy for most is to plug the signal into a domestic hi-fi system as many of the soundbars on sale aren't really very good, either. That way you can get a reasonable level of sound and adjust the EQ to take account of aged ears, if need be.