Why do I have to run an optical out from my display as sited in the manual on pg 70 when using multi channel surround when using hdmi? I thougt I could run hdmi from my direct tv receiver and dvd player to my Sony Receiver to receive sound and video and than run the video through hdmi from the AV receiver to the display.

What is the purpose of running optical from the tv out to the A/V receiver TV IN?

Receiver is a Sony STR-DG720.

Thanks for your help!

You can run everything direct to the receiver, and in fact it might be more beneficial, since many TVs downmix a lot of surround formats to stereo unless it comes over their internal tuner. (The tuner is the reason the TV even has an optical out. You can use it to get surround sound encoded in many HD broadcasts.)

Many people run things through the TV to cut down on cables, but I don't think the tradeoff of losing 5.1 from DVDs and such is worth it.

It is only for listening to signals received by the TV directly. Should not be necessary in your case.

THANKS!!!! This was driving me crazy!!! YOU GUYS ARE THE BEST!!!

My personal set up is a NAD T753 (no hdmi) and a Panny 50" plama display with no hdmi. I simply run dig coax and toslink from my direct tv and dvd to my NAD receiver along with component video and then component video out to display. For the life of me I couldn't figure why in the heck i would need to run audio back from the tv to the receiver when using hdmi!

thanks again!

Another question. Is there much difference in running the hdmi through the AV receiver versus running hdmi directly to the display. the display I'm hooking up has 3 hdmi inputs so logicaly I'm thinking bybassing the AV receiver would be better but is it really?

(I know I would still need to run dig coax or toslink the AV receiver for sound but if the video quality is far better it would be worth it to me since I'm running 30 feet of hdmi cable

I run that setup because I don't have HDMI on my receiver, only on my display and players.

However, an HDMI receiver, even those that have video-only pass-through, can enable one button video and audio switching. Might be a convenience you want. Although you can also buy a programmable remote to do that, too.

I don't think there's much, if any, video signal loss going HDMI through a receiver. It's digital, so if there was a loss in quality, you'd see it immediately and know that something is wrong.