Due to Dolby Digital's flexibility, it can be enjoyed on a basic system, or for maximum impact, a sophisticated home theater system. The more channels the playback system has, the more realistic and enveloping the sonic experience will be. The idea behind surround sound in films is to recreate the entire atmosphere of the contents of the image being presented. For example, with a scene where people are talking on a street corner, the moviegoer would hear the sounds of the people talking coming from the front while the sound of cars may come from the sides. The better the recreation of surround sound, the more enveloping the experience with the film.
Discrete channels can play sound independently of the other channels.
Dolby Surround One of the early forms of surround sound in home theater came from the company Dolby Laboratories. It was called Dolby Surround. Dolby Surround was a 3-channel surround sound that contained information for the left speaker, right speaker, and mono rear channel surround sound. While the surround sound played out of two rear speakers, the same information was reproduced out of both. It was a mono signal played by two speakers.