Quote:
Originally Posted by GoinAllTheWay
A couple of general question for you guys:
With recievers these days, I've noticed that they can have up to 4 HDMI in and 1 out. TV's have up to 4 HDMI in as well and it got me thinking, how are recievers setup these days? Say you have 3 devices (Xbox, HDTV Box, Blue Ray), would you send all of those devices to the receiver via HDMI and then one HDMI from the reciever to the TV? If this is the case, the additional HDMI slots on the tv are used by people not running a reciever?
For sound, which is superior, HDMI or Optical?
BTW - If anyone is interested, Costco is selling the Logitech Harmony 600 for $25. Very entry level I know but solid, solid remote for $25.
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- Receivers:
Yes, your assumptions are all correct. Some people choose not to run certain devices through their receiver and instead go straight to the TV via HDMI, but this is rarely useful, especially now that more and more receivers support HDMI fully, including audio pass-thru, etc. It is also increasingly common, however, for peripheral video devices to be equipped with HDMI connectivity; in many cases it is easier to plug said devices directly into the TV, rather than into the receiver (due to laborious connector placement and device configuration). I'm thinking PCs/laptops/cameras/camcorders. A free HDMI port is also handy if a friend brings over his PS3 or 360 to play for an afternoon.
- Sound... HDMI vs. optical:
The easy answer is HDMI is better. HDMI was designed to accommodate more types of data and high rates of transfer than optical, plus the addition of exclusive future technology compatibilities (ie. 3D), as popularity increases.
In reality, they're quite similar. Both are fully digital and allow for very high data transfer rates, so both will theoretically make CDs and DVDs sound as good as possible.
The main difference right now can be heard in some (mostly new) Blu-ray releases, where so-called HD audio ("advanced lossless multi-channel audio") encoded tracks are present. Generally speaking, HDMI is the only way to transmit these audio types wholly. [When we're talking about HD audio codecs on Blu-ray Discs, we're specifically talking about
Dolby TrueHD and
DTS-HD Master Audio. Dolby and DTS are rival sound companies competing for supremacy in the home entertainment realm with these similar codecs. It's not to say that one is
better than the other, just that they're not one and the same.]
These codecs provide incredible surround sound reproduction natively, meaning they're really only useful for those with 5 or more speakers in their home theater setup. The traditional Dolby and DTS stereocodecs are amply good for those with 2/3/4 speakers, and would therefore sound just as good thru optical as HDMI, even on the newest Blu-ray productions.