Newbie question about volume

Hey guys, I'm kind of new at this home theater busineess and I had a question about volume. First a little background.
I have a Denon AVR-1905, 2 Polk Rti-4 front speakers, and a Polk PSW 10 sub. I plan on adding a center channel and surround speakers later. My question is this: When watching regular TV or listening to music I usually set the volume on around -35. However, when I watch a DVD movie, I have to set the volume up to around -20 to -15 to really hear, especially the dialogue. Is this just because I don't have a center channel speaker? I did the setup through the receiver and it knows I don't have a center channel speaker. Shouldn't it route all the dialogue through the front speakers? Sorry for the newbie question. I'm sure this is obvious to most of you guys. I would really appreciate some help. Thanks.

it's not uncommon to have different volume settings for different sources

don't worry about it

My XM radio listening level is around -40
Cd level -35
DVD level -30 +

Normal I think.

Welcome to the club phileth.

Hi, you could check your dvd player´s setup. My Sony´s dvd has an audio attenuation feature that I set to off.
However is not unusual that dvds require more level to sound equal that tv or music.
Good Luck

Welcome Phileth. Yes you will need to boost the volume to hear movies. It's normal.

Sometimes DVDP-to-DVDP changes affect this as well. I've noticed that my Denon 2910 takes quite a bit more volume knob than my Panasonic did. Just a difference in output voltage between components.

How have you connected the DVD to the reciever, analog or digital?

RT1

I think it may have something to do the with compression. We do the same while watching movies. Heck even HD TV I boost the volume more than I do reg TV.

As a good example, Linkin Park Live in Texas when played thru my Panny required just shy of 12 o'clock volume to rock the house. With the Denon it almost takes 3/4 volume! to reach the same level. (I use analog out).

It bugs the **** out of me.

Thanks for the help. The DVD player is connected with a Toslink cable to the receiver. Video is S-video.

Another couple things to try until you get the full surround set-up are

1) make sure the DVD player's digital out is set to PCM
or
2) try using the analog outs from the DVD player
and
3) make sure you are listening in stereo mode one the receiver, not any DSP or surround formats.

seems normal, same on my system. But instead of using straight Dolby Digital (the volume culprit) I either use DTS or if it's a Dolby disc only, try using the "Dolby VS 5ch. Wide" mode if your receiver has it. Imo it's great, ups the volume to DTS quality (surrounds, dialogue, etc.), yet doesn't have the usual DSP characteristics. Meaning- it doesn't sound like $hit.

Every A/B comparo i've done with it vs. plain Jane Dolby Digital is like night and day.

"A product with a Dolby Digital/Dolby Virtual Speaker logo decodes 5.1-channel Dolby Digital soundtracks, then applies the Dolby Virtual Speaker process to the multiple channels. Because the soundtrack has already been encoded with Dolby Digital 5.1, each channel is discrete."

http://www.dolby.com/consumer/techno...eaker_faq.html