Matrix Formats
With matrix formats, the four channels are converted (encoded) down to two channels. These are then passed through a two-channel transmission medium (usually an LP record) before being decoded back to four channels and presented to four speakers. The systems were based on the work of Peter Scheiber, who created the basic mathematical formulae used to matrix four channels into two.
This 4:2:4 process could not be accomplished without information loss. That is to say, the four channels produced at the final stage were not identical to those with which the process had begun.
In 4-2-4 matrix four channel stereo the rear speakers should be of the same or almost same size quality and have the same or almost same frequency range as the front speakers.
Read more about this topic: Quadraphonic Sound
Famous quotes containing the word matrix:
“As all historians know, the past is a great darkness, and filled with echoes. Voices may reach us from it; but what they say to us is imbued with the obscurity of the matrix out of which they come; and try as we may, we cannot always decipher them precisely in the clearer light of our day.”
—Margaret Atwood (b. 1939)