Dolby Volume is the most significant new AV receiver feature of the year, according to Harman Kardon’s marketing manager and resident audio guru Mark Hockey.
Talking exclusively to Home Cinema Choice, Hockey says that while Dolby Pro-Logic IIZ and Audyssey DSX, both of which offer additional height and width front channels, were interesting, Dolby Volume 'offers more practical benefits for most users.’
Major benefit
‘Removing the need to adjust the volume during every ad break and even switching between channels is a major benefit,’ Hockey enthuses. ‘It’s only when you’ve been using a Dolby Volume-equipped AV receiver that you realise what a big difference it can make.’
Harman Kardon currently has an exclusive range of four Dolby Volume AV receivers, led by the highly-regarded HK 990.
Also new this year is a white highlight on the volume knob, which has changed from last year’s blue. So why the change? ‘We had to move from blue,’ explains Hockey, ‘because LG and Samsung started putting blue lights on all of their equipment. We didn’t want to be compared to those brands so we went for a white highlight instead. It looks rather nice, doesn’t it?’ 
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Audio leveling
Old dude (not verified) - 16 September 2009 - 12:07pmAudio leveling technology has been around for years yet has never been adopted by consumers or OEMs. Interestingly the most resistance comes from advertisers who spend big $s on trying to make their commercials stand out. As a retired audio engineer, the process of increasing the overall percieved volume of a 30 or 60 second spot is of prime importance to advertiser's competing in a crowded and highly competitive environment. More to the point is the fact that many of the volume issues that occur, particularly relating to broadcast have to do with the poorly thought out methods for matching audio levels at various workflow stages during the building of the broadcast stream. Current standards help a bit, but backend producers will look for any way they can fool process technology into allowing 'percieved' levels to remain higher than leveling technology would allow. Thatswhat they get paid to do by the advertisers. Also, there are better leveling technologies out there than Dolby's, which has had problems from day one.
Dolby Volume
Robert Follis (not verified) - 16 September 2009 - 4:50pmAs pioneered in the ARCAM AVR600 and now featured in the new ARCAM AVR500 Hi-Def AV receivers. Have to agree with Mark, the new height and width features demanding more speakers are shamelessly daft and are unlikely to be used by more than 0.05% of the unmarried population (-:
Dolby Volume
SEG (not verified) - 16 September 2009 - 7:46pmIt is probably true that only a small portion of users will deploy wide/high speakers in their systems. But my next AVR will have DSX or something similar (I'm looking for wide more than high, but both would be fine). I'm an HK guy, but if HK is not offering those features when I am making my next AVR purchase decision, then I will be looking elsewhere. Yes, my wife will think it is ridiculous, but she will get used to it.