Audio synchronization for two dimensional and three dimensional video signals

An audio system, comprising:

• circuitry for receiving audio-video signals. where the video signals comprise metadata;
• circuitry for transducing audio signals to provide sound waves that are synchronized with a video image;
• circuitry for examining the video signal metadata and determining if the video signals are in standard definition or high definition format, and if the video signals are in two dimensional format or three dimensional format;
• circuitry for delaying the audio signals by a first amount if the video signals are in two dimensional format, wherein the circuitry for delaying the audio signals by a first amount if the video signals are in two dimensional format comprises circuitry that provides a first range of time delays to be applied to the audio signals, where the first range of time delays is bounded by a first minimum delay and a first maximum delay, and is broken up into a first series of audio delay steps, where each step represents a fraction of the first range of time delays;
• circuitry for delaying the audio signals by a second amount, longer than the first amount if the video signals are in three dimensional format, wherein the circuitry for delaying the audio signals by a second amount if the video signals are in three dimensional format comprises circuitry that provides a second range of time delays to be a shed to the audio signals where the second ran e of time delays is bounded b second minimum delay and a second maximum delay, and is broken up into a second series of audio delay steps, where each step represents a fraction of the second range of time delays;
• wherein the second minimum delay is longer than the first minimum delay and the second maximum delay is longer than the first maximum delay;
• a display for visually displaying the number of audio delay steps which when selected, represent the audio signal time delay;
• a manually operable control to allow for user selection of the number of delay steps;
• circuitry that, after the user selects a number of delay steps, determines an audio signal delay based on the selected number of steps;
• circuitry that applies the determined delay to the input audio signals and then applies the delayed audio signals to the plurality of acoustic drivers, to create the audio output from the input audio/visual signals;
• and
• circuitry for transmitting the video signals to a video reproduction system that operates independently of the audio system.