The first commercially available digital sound-on-film system for theatrical motion pictures, CDS is gone now. Today we have DTS-Digital, Dolby Digital, and Sony Dynamic Digital Sound. In fact SDDS was designed by some of those who pioneered CDS.

What went wrong? Well opinions here vary. Some would say that the choice to use minimal data reduction and the resulting very small bit (pixel) size made the system much more susceptible to every type of problem including print wear, film lab errors etc. Others will point out the fact that the lack of a backup analog track (In 35mm CDS sound was printed in the same area were the analog optical track would normally go) would forever make CDS a premium process, requiring dual print inventories, not to mention making the occasional breakdown catastrophic and reputation destroying. Some have said the electronics simply wasn't reliable enough for hot projection booths. But everyone agreed on this: When it worked and it really DID work quite well the vast majority of the time, IT SOUNDED GREAT!

CDS Advertising Brochure
The Spec Sheet
Closeup of a CDS track(Pink Noise on 35mm)
Comparison of Dolby Digital, SDDS, and CDS tracks

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