I just decided to simplify my parents life by buying them a hometheater in a box and switching everything to HDMI and ONE remote control for DVD, HD CABLE, and LCD HD TV.

Their TV is about 3 years old with a DVI input that claims be HDCP comliant. It's a Viewsonic 27"LCD, N2750w (http://www.viewsonic.com/support/tventertainment/lcdtv/n2750w/index.htm).

I hooked up all the 5.1 hardware, and DVD, via HDMI and ran one HDMI-DVI cable out to the TV. Nice and easy. Right? WRONG.

The Sony HT would not output sound to its 5.1 speakers from ANY HDMI source no matter what. The picture on the TV was gorgeous from the HD Cable box and the DVD player BUT no SOUND.

If I unplugged the TV from system, BINGO we have sound! but no picture. :-(

I can't win. It's a 3 year old $1000 TV that won't play with an HDMI/HDCP system. EVEN THOUGH Viewsonic says that the TV has a (HDCP)DVI input, it is not compliant with a current HDMI(HDCP) system.

I had to hook it all up in a roundabout way, sending all the video directly to the TV and the audio to the Surround system. Now I have to re-train my parents to switch inputs on the TV and Theater depending on what they want to watch. UGHH!

What a complex, antiquated, counterproductive way of hooking up a modern system!

Vent Complete!

Here is my sig.

DVI receivers (your Viewsonic) do not have the capability for audio. It has nothing to do with HDCP. The problem is that your hometheater in a box should have a setting that forces it to send the audio to its speakers instead of muting it and believing that the downstream HDMI (actually DVI) device is going to take care of the audio.

Hopefully, hopefully you can find a setting on the home theater in a box that will set the audio to play even if you have a display connected to the HDMI output.

Yes, thanks for the idea but I tried every available option via both the Cable Box and the DVD player. There is a setting to send the audio to the TV, to the 5.1speakers, or both. I tried all three even though I knew that the DVI port would not send audio to the TV.

Fact is that, the HDMI Out port on the Sony Theater shuts down all audio if it does not see an HDMI(HDCP) connection on the other end. That must be part of the HDCP "ethics" code.

I see. It seems the Sony is incorrectly shutting down the audio because the TV's HDCP information shows it is not capable of audio. I am fairly sure this is not an HDCP law. I'll bet the Sony might be overly cautious about copy protection issues and defaulted to a worst case scenario. This is a lame thing to do. The other audio outputs should operate continuously regardless of the HDMI output connection.

I have an old Sony HDTV with a DVI + HDCP input and my Motorola set top box continues to send audio over the TOSLINK connection to my receiver even though my TV is not audio capable over HDMI. Note: I do send the video to my HDTV over the HDMI - DVI cable link.

Any signals input to the Sony Theater via HDMI can ONLY be output via HDMI out. The analog and other digital outs become dead if you input on the HDMI. It's a real invasion of my cableing liberty. :rolleyes:

That sucks. Buy them a programmable remote with macros that simplifies it for them.