[nonoitall]

I'm transcoding some AC3 anime soundtracks, and am wondering, what's the 'standard' practice for dealing with DRC? Do people usually just transcode the unaltered soundtrack, or do they apply DRC to the audio as it's being transcoded? Is one way objectively better or 'truer' to the original than the other?

I've heard that unaltered audio is good for good sound equipment and DRC'd audio is good for weak equipment, which makes sense, but what's the best choice if you just want a happy medium? Is it easier to make DRC'd audio sound optimal on high-end equipment or to make unaltered audio sound optimal on low-end equipment? Obviously, I'm sure there are a lot of variables that come into play that could sway the case-specific decision one way or another, but are there any general guidelines I should follow when making the decision?

EDIT: Just to be clear, I am referring to AC3's custom varying DRC metadata which is obviously lost when transcoding to another format. I'm aware you can always apply more general DRC.