HDMI Setup Help Please.

[churchi]

Hi All,

Well hot on the heels of getting my H1 unit, i am setting up all the components today.

A few questions i have run into.

The devices that i would like to plug up are:
- LCD TV: samsung la40r71bdx
- DP-H1
- Panasonic BMR-EH55

So i was hoping to get all of these devices hooked up into my home theatre system.
The Amp i have is a Yamaha RX-V361

So how i had it setup was, the TV was connected to the Amp via Optical for the audio out, the H1 was connected via HDMI cable from the box to the TV. The DVD player was connected via Component for video to the tv with an optical connection to the AMP.

So when i wanted to watch TV, i would change the Amp to the correct input, and use the tv. Same with the H1, i would put the TV onto HDMI, then change the AMP to the correct input (TV Optical), as well with the DVD, i had the TV on AV1 and the audio out on the AMP through another input channel.

So this all seems to work ok. I can get audio and video out on the screen for the TV, H1 and DVD player.

Now, when i took a look closer, i noticed that when i was on the DVD player, i could see 5 channels displayed for the output on the AMP, but when i was on the H1 settings, i can only see 2 channels being out putted to the speakers. (There is an icon on the AMP to show which speakers are active at any one time).
So when i have the H1 connected via HDMI only to the TV, the TV doesn't seem to be passing the HDMI 5.1 (when on a HD channel of course) through to the AMP to output the 5.1 on the speakers.

So i am sure i have something connected up wrong or settings on the TV/H1 are not correct.

When i changed it around so that the H1 had the HDMI connected to the TV and an optical cable coming out from the H1 to the amp, i set the amp to the new optical input from the H1, and the TV is set to HDMI for the video, i now get 5.1 on some of the HD broadcasts.

So it looks like the TV is not passing the 5.1 sound through to the AMP when just using the HDMI cable. all i get is 2 channel.

So a few questions:
1. Have i hooked up the equipment wrong?
2. With the HDMI cable connected from the H1 to the TV, do i still need the optical out from the H1 to the AMP connected to get 5.1 when broadcasted?
3. Is it not possible to have all the inputs into the TV, then just the one output of optical to the AMP for all the devices connected to the TV?

Just on a side note, i was in JB today buying the HDMI cable, and the guy in there said that in an ideal world all things would input to the TV, then the TV would have the one output to the AMP for the audio. Is this possible? Or do i have to have all the devices audio on a separate input to the amp?

I hope you all understand what i am trying to get at.

cheers

[tonymy01]

TVs will NEVER pass multichannel HDMI input to anything but PCM stereo. Use the optical out on the Wiz to your amp and you will get DD5.1 whenever it is broadcast (and in your media files).
The salesman is blowing it out their butt as usual. HDMI cannot be decoded in anything that will pass multichannel audio out of it. It can only be decoded in a TV or in an amp (and then not passed through to another output other than HDMI). This is to maintain the copy protection of the signal.
Regards

[churchi]

thanks mate for the very quick reply.

dam i feel so silly for just believing them. i was questioning myself, however since i didn't know any better i just took it on board.

ok so next question is, is the optical connection on the back of the H1 the same quality output as the coax? i have a spare coax port on my amp and would like to use that if possible.

will i notice any difference?

cheers.

[tonymy01]

Digital is digital. So no difference between optical, coax and even AC3 over HDMI (if your amp had a HDMI input). The only difference between HDMI and toslink/spdif is that HDMI is a 2 way communication protocol link that can negotiate 2 channel when you don't want it (e.g. the Wiz powers up before all your appliances for a timer, you switch on the amp and switch on the TV and find only PCM stereo on material you were expecting to be 5.1 until you resynch the HDMI by either toggling the amp HDMI input, or toggling the Wiz HDMI output). So definitely stick with toslink/spdif optical/coax, you won't have a problem.
My Yammie amp has a programmable remote with it, it is really cool actually, when you select the input on the Yammie remote, the programmable "appliance" mode of the remote switches to what you programme for that input. So with one button, when I switch the Yammie to the "Beyonwiz" input, the remote will control the Beyonwiz, then when I switch the amp to the "Topfield" input, the remote will control the Topfield. Of course I had to compromise the buttons as it doesn't have anywhere like the number of buttons on the Wiz remote, but I have made the number keys various features and memorised them.
This is the 3800 Yammie I am talking about, I love it actually, a fairly recent acquisition.

So ultimately I have only a single HDMI going to the TV, and the amp is the "hub" of the whole setup, where I switch between various devices with one button and never have to touch the TV remote (the Yamaha remote has TV ON/OFF, current AV appliance ON/OFF also). No need to muck about with switching to different TV inputs as the amp is doing all the switching.

You can get yourself a decent programmable remote to do similar, have macros to switch everything on/off and toggle inputs, so you can control the TV or amp inputs fairly well. The Samsung TV's have discretes for input, as does most amps including the Yamaha. So with discretes it becomes very easy to have a programmable remote pop you to a known input (my Pioneer had discretes when looking on the web for JP1 info for generic Pioneers, the original Pioneer remote only had an input toggle that would toggle thru all 5 or 6 inputs).

Regards

[churchi]

cheers Tony,

Thanks for your help on this. Yesterday i picked up a Coax cable and installed it. Everything is working correctly now.

While i was purchasing the cable, i saw the upgraded model of Yamaha amps that you were talking about. heaps of HDMI inputs, and you use that to switch between your devices. That will be next on the shopping list when this current amp fails.

thanks again for your help.

[tonymy01]

Ok, I had a look at your amp online and the remote that goes with it, and you can use component switching of all your appliances to the TV. So you could use component instead of HDMI and simply use one TV input. Or if you want to go HDMI to the TV, you could still use component for those of your things without HDMI, and use HDMI leads from the appliance straight to the TV. The Yamaha remote does have discretes for every input which is nice, and it even has a "TV Input" button that will let you at least toggle the TV to the correct input for whatever you want to watch.
So hookup example 1:
*Wiz SPDIF to "DVD/(1)" input, Wiz YUV/YPrPb component to DVD compnent video input
*DVD player optical to DTV(2) input, DVD player component to DTV/CBL component video input
*TV SPDIF to "CD" input.
*Monitor Out to your Television component input.
This will let you simply press one button on the Yammie remote and you will be able to watch DVD/Wiz without picking up the TV remote or changing the TV input. If you press the Yammie "tv channel" buttons, most TVs (well, my Samsung certainly) will switch away from the HDMI/component input and to the tuner when you do the channel changing buttons.

If this model Yammie lets you map any of the audio inputs & any of the video inputs to any of the "devices", then I guess having the Wiz in "DVR" video and TV in "DTV" optical input might make more sense, and have your DVD player audio on DTV/CBL(2) with DVD component video, then your Yammie remote buttons for DVD/DTV/DVR will match a bit better to what you expect.

Hookup example 2:
*Blueray HDMI to tv HDMI input 1, blueray optical out to Yammie Optical CD(3) input.
*WIz HDMI to tv HDMI input 2, wiz coax to Yammie coax DVD(1) input.
*TV optical output to Yammie DTV(2) input.
This will let you watch any of the appliances with 2 button presses on the Yammie remote. 1st button press to get the correct audio option, and the TV-input button to toggle to the correct television input. This is where a programmable remote might help, as it can setup discrete codes for each TV input so you only need one button press.

Hope this helps!