Ray Dolby
Born Jan 18 1933

Noise Reduction Systems
Dolby Noise Reduction
Patent Number(s) 3,846,719

Inducted 2004

Ray Dolby revolutionized the audio industry in the 1960s by inventing the Dolby System, which electronically reduced the pervasive "hiss" from analog tape sound recording, thus creating a clearer, crisper sound.

Invention Impact

With the Dolby System, sound is passed through an encoder as it is recorded, then played back through a decoder, dramatically lowering background noise and hiss with none of the side effects inherent in previous attempts at noise reduction.

Inventor Bio

Ray Dolby was born in Portland, Oregon. He received a B.S. in electrical engineering from Stanford University and a Ph.D. in physics from Cambridge University. He founded Dolby Laboratories in 1965 to develop his ideas about noise reduction.

The following year, Decca Records became the first recording company to use the Dolby System. By 1967 major record labels such as FICA, MCP, and CBS followed suit. The 1970s saw the use of Dolby technology in film production and exhibition, in movies such as Apocalypse Now and Star Wars.