I'm trying to plan out how I'm going to wire everything before my wires and cables get here on Thursday. I currently have all of my components hooked up to the inputs in my Aquos LCD. I currently have a DVD connected by composite audio and component video and a PS3 connected by HDMI to the TV. Is there any downside in leaving it like this and just running an optical audio cable from the LCD to the receiver or am I better off connecting all of the components into the receiver and buying another HDMI cord to go from the receiver to the LCD? The only reason I hesitate in doing this other than the cost of buying more cables is that the Onkyo TX-SR505 that I got doesn't carry/send sound through the HDMI like my PS3 can currently send to my LCD. I'd also like to have to convenience of not having to use or turn on the receiver to have sound coming through my LCD. So, are there any downsides to running nothing but the optical audio from the LCD to receiver such as sound quality loss or delay, etc.

You'll have to run the digital audio cables from the equipment to the receiver. The digital audio out on the TV is for the built-in ATSC tuner.

How is it a hassle to turn the receiver on? Everything sounds much better going through the audio system than crappy TV speakers....

How is it a hassle to turn the receiver on? Everything sounds much better going through the audio system than crappy TV speakers....
- I've never understood this either. ;)

If you really want ease of use, consider getting a programmable universal remote. You'll get one button setup of all your components.

Since your 505 doesn't do sound via HDMI, you won't be able to enjoy the new hirez codecs with the PS3, anyway, so you can just leave the PS3 connected to the TV's HDMI input. If you just want to pass-through the PS3's HDMI signal, the 505 will pass-through the audio and video to the TV via HDMI (I don't know if the receiver has to be ON to pass-through HDMI or not. Some receivers will pass-through when they're not ON.). But, unless you have another HDMI device, and you'd like to use the 505 for HDMI switching, there's really no reason to pass-through the PS3's HDMI signal through the receiver.

For the DVD player's component video, you can also connect directly to the TV, or you can pass-through the component video through the receiver, but again, there's really no reason to do this unless you have another device to connect via component video and you'd like to use the receiver for component video switching.

So, if you leave the PS3's audio/video connected to the TV via HDMI and the DVD player's component video and R/L analog audio (I presume that's what you mean by "composite audio") connected to the TV, just like they are now, you'll still be able to continue using the PS3 and the DVD player with the TV without turning on the receiver.

At the same time, though, you'll still want to use digital connections (either optical or coax) for the PS3 and the DVD player to get the multichannel audio into the receiver for when you want to use your full system's audio.