HDMI Audio Vs. Optical Audio For Shaw HD Receiver

[fundmark19]

Wow great info thanks guys! This would make sense as to why I won't really notice any 7.1 sound dif and then all of a sudden one sound will get placed soley in one of the surrounds as it should always be and scare the pants off me because I am not expecting to hear it from there.

Would I be having the same problem with my ps3 then as well? Since my reciever doesn't support audio pass through I am using the analog adapter for sound when I should be using optical out

[MickMcGeough]

Originally Posted by fundmark19

Would I be having the same problem with my ps3 then as well? Since my reciever doesn't support audio pass through I am using the analog adapter for sound when I should be using optical out

Yes.

[fundmark19]

Oh wow I am in for a big surprise it seems in quality. It sounds so good with just 2 channel being spread can't wait for it to be proper. (I am no audiophile by anymeans as I am sure you all know now)

[rayne008]

Does anyone know if the Motorola DCT 6416III PVR's have the optical out enabled? My plasma does not have an optical audio port. I thought these did not work, but it sounds like people have them set up this way. (HDMI to TV, optical out to stereo)

Thanks.

[MickMcGeough]

Originally Posted by rayne008

Does anyone know if the Motorola DCT 6416III PVR's have the optical out enabled? My plasma does not have an optical audio port. I thought these did not work, but it sounds like people have them set up this way. (HDMI to TV, optical out to stereo)

Thanks.

I would be completely shocked if the optical out was disabled. Not all TVs have HDMI inputs.

Mine worked on my 6400, but there was no HDMI on that.

[Rathji]

Originally Posted by rayne008

Does anyone know if the Motorola DCT 6416III PVR's have the optical out enabled? My plasma does not have an optical audio port. I thought these did not work, but it sounds like people have them set up this way. (HDMI to TV, optical out to stereo)

Thanks.

I recently upgrade my PVR but I am pretty sure my previous one was a 6416 III, I had it hooked up via optical.

[Burninator]

So is it really the HDMI cable that is causing the signal to black out and/or audio to stop?

That seems like a strange problem, I don't know if I buy it. I've had it happen on two different TV's. One of them had a receiver in between the TV and the cable box and the other didn't.

[Rathji]

Originally Posted by Burninator

So is it really the HDMI cable that is causing the signal to black out and/or audio to stop?

That seems like a strange problem, I don't know if I buy it. I've had it happen on two different TV's. One of them had a receiver in between the TV and the cable box and the other didn't.

I have always had optical from my box to my receiver and for the longest time had the cut outs. Shaw claimed they were working on the problem and recently they have drastically reduced (maybe in the last 8-10 months?).

Maybe it only reduced because I was using the optical cable, who knows.

[NiklasSundblad]

Originally Posted by onetwo_threefour

The problem is that it is faking it. On my 7.1 receiver, the best qulaity I get is from my 5.1 analog hookup from my Blu-Ray Player, to my receiver, then to my 5.1 speakers. That is a pure flow of each speaker's intended sound to that speaker. However, if you use HDMI/Optical, all 5.1 channels are separately encoded in the digital signal and your receiver can convert them back to 5.1 signals, one for each speaker (although there is usually some compression unless it is TRUEHD or similar (I believe)). When you use the red/white, there is only information being sent for two channels(speakers), so your receiver basically has to guess how to translate that into something like surround sound. This is where Dolby Pro-logic II and the like come into play. It's basically insctructions to tell your receiver how to make two channel sound play over 5.1 with some surround effects.

Beaten to the punch by photon. On Shaw cable, at least on the HD channels, the Program Guide tells you if a show is 5.1 or not.

most TV being broadcast in 5.1 in "faking it" to begin with. They just use similar (or even identical) processes as a receiver to achieve surround sound. Rarely is anything but real films properly mixed by a human.

DolbyTrue HD, DTS-HDMA etc (the high-res audio formats available on Blu-Ray) are uncompressed and cannot be sent through a optical or digital coax cable, only through HDMI, or if you're BDP does the decoding, each channel can be sent analogue with a rca audio cable.

[Vulcan]

Originally Posted by rayne008

Does anyone know if the Motorola DCT 6416III PVR's have the optical out enabled? My plasma does not have an optical audio port. I thought these did not work, but it sounds like people have them set up this way. (HDMI to TV, optical out to stereo)

Thanks.

The TV optical out will likely give only 2/1 digital audio from a set top box. It's mostly there to give digital audio from an over the air signal although some TVs will give 5/1 sound (my LG will but it also has bad audio video sync problems), it's rare.

The best setup is HDMI to audio receiver to TV. If your receiver won't accept an audio signal this way, use a toslink (optical) connection.

[MickMcGeough]

Originally Posted by Vulcan

The TV optical out will likely give only 2/1 digital audio from a set top box. It's mostly there to give digital audio from an over the air signal although some TVs will give 5/1 sound (my LG will but it also has bad audio video sync problems), it's rare.

The best setup is HDMI to audio receiver to TV. If your receiver won't accept an audio signal this way, use a toslink (optical) connection.

My Samsung does DD5.1 passthrough. It's actually better in my case to hook up the HDMI to the TV, then optical audio out to the receiver. My TV has A/V sync issues, the video lags behind the audio by a quarter of a second or so unless I go through the TV.