[titus1971]

I'm new to the whole HDTV surround world and I had question, first the basics.

I have a new HDTV

New HD Cable converter

New HTIB (minus DVD)

Existing DVD

I am wondering what is the best way to hook up the surround sound so I don't have a gazillion cables/remoted to deal with.

Can I just use the audio out on the HDTV so no matter what the source (HDCable/DVD/games) the surround sound will work?

Thanks

 

[rvanya]

Give us some specifics on your equipment for exact recommendations.


Overall, you will use your receiver as the main switcher for the whole thing- given you have the proper and enough inputs for all of your sources (that's why we need more specifics, model #s etc...)


If everything is up to speed, you will run audio and video to the receiver, then run video out to the tv and audio out to the speakers from the receiver.


When you look at the back of a receiver, it can look frightening. In case you have never hooked this stuff up before, remember that many of the connections on the back are redundant and just make for flexibilty of connections. For example, if you have a receiver that has video switching- which most do- you will have at 3 different choices of connection options: plain yellow, s-video, and component (red,blue,green). Same with audio. You will have red and white for analog and then optical (fiber optic) and coaxial (orange) for digital audio connections. In the end, you won't have near as many connections plugged as are present. These are the main choices for each source (dvd player, video game, cable box, etc...)


I'm probably already confusing you. Let us know what you have specifically and we can try to help.

 

[titus1971]

HD Cable receiver is a Motorola DCT6200, HTIB is an RCA 2760, HDTV is a sanyo HT30746, DVD is a cheap DVD/VCR combo (still on the fence about BLu-Ray/HD DVD).

Anyway I was trying to use the Motorola as my core unit, specifically I was trying to use the composite outputs from the DVD to the Composite Audio and Video Input connectors on the receiver and I could NOT get it to work. There were no onscreen menus that I could find and I didn't see anything in the manual about how to route your signal through these inputs, the only thing I saw in the manual was a teeny tiny disclaimer that said "Not all inputs/outputs may work on your receiver" - nice

Thanks for taking the time to respond to me.

 

[rvanya]

Okay, for some reason I can't find the description on the htib that I'm looking for. What exact audio input does it have. Does it have optical, coaxial digital inputs and how many if so. I see that it has a usb port- useless. And I believe it has analog inputs for audio (r,l,c,sr,sl,sub). Is this right? Either way, unless you have a source with 5.1 analog outputs, you won't use those analog inputs on the receiver.


Here's the deal. The tv will have to be the switcher for video. You have enought inputs on the back of the tv that should work with the equipment you have. It looks like the cable box has component out (which is perfectly fine for what it does), and the tv has 2 component inputs- so there is one. Next, for the dvd/vcr combo- if that has component outputs, use that. If not, s-video will work. Again, plug that directly into the tv.


You can try to run the audio to the tv and then run the audio out to the receiver. I personally have never tried that and don't like the thought of it. The receiver should be the brain of the system. It doesn't appear that yours has video switching capabilities which won't hurt you one bit because the tv you picked has enought inputs to feed it everything you have.


Let me know about the specific audio inputs on that receiver.

 

[jerkin]

Titus, I found your htib on the web and it looks like it only has composite connections, which are the worst of all available. If it's not to late to take it back you might be better off to pick up something a little better that will do your tv justice. Yamaha and Onkyo both have systems under $300 that have plenty of connections to hook everything up to and video switching so you can just use the receiver to choose which video input you want to use. Other than that you will probably have to hook everything up to your tv and just use the audio out to the receiver.

 

[rvanya]

That's the impression I was getting but I thought I saw on one site that it had a digital connection as well.


But he is right. If this system only has composite connections, which is really rare, then you need to try to take it back and get one that will have some more features as far as audio inputs.

 

[Tulpa]

Is this it?

http://reviews.cnet.com/RCA_RT_2760_...8.html?tag=nav

http://www.buy.com/retail/product.as...=0&dcaid=15889


Yeah, it's not looking good for inputs on it.


You know, this thing might need a DVD player with onboard DD decoding. My Panasonic CV50 DVD changer has that.


edit: Well, the RCA says it does DD decoding, but wouldn't it need at least a digital coax on it somewhere?

 

[titus1971]

Yeah, I got bit on the receiver (guess that's why I'm a newbie). If I just use the audio out on the TV then will I still have Dolby 5.1 for everything that's broadcast with it (TV, DVD, etc)?Provided of course that the audio is fed intoit.

What I'm trying to ask is whether the tv will process the surround sound to the output jacks regardless of the source? I'm trying to avoid having to set the input source on the tv AND on the surround receiver as well(since it doesn't have a remote-another point I overlooked).

I appreciate all the feedback, you guys rock!

 

[rvanya]

Honestly, the stuff you are talking about doing isn't worth the trouble. Look at some alternatives in a similar price range. They should all have the inputs to make your configuration work.

 

[Tulpa]



Quote:
Originally Posted by titus1971 /forum/post/0


Yeah, I got bit on the receiver (guess that's why I'm a newbie). If I just use the audio out on the TV then will I still have Dolby 5.1 for everything that's broadcast with it (TV, DVD, etc)?Provided of course that the audio is fed intoit.

What I'm trying to ask is whether the tv will process the surround sound to the output jacks regardless of the source?

I don't think you'll get true Dolby 5.1 out of that without a digital connection between the source (TV, DVD) and the receiver. It might do Dolby Surround if the TV or whatever sent a stereo signal, but that's kind of limited.


I think I echo the others in getting an upgrade on the receiver, like a Yamaha or an Onkyo.

 

[titus1971]

Well, like I said this is my first foray into HD Home theatre and I'm not unhappy considering I have less hat a grand in my entire system. I was going to use this beginner system as a learning experience so that maybe by the time 1080p TV's and the Blu-ray/HD DVD thing got hashed out I would know what I was doing when i built my next system (yeah and maybe Muslims and Jews will live peacefully as well).

At any rate I appreciate all the feedback. I'm sure I'll have more posts as i progress

 

[Tulpa]

Can you post a picture of the back of the unit? I'd like to see what connections it actually does have (couldn't find one online.)

 

[titus1971]

I decided it was worth a second look so I crawled back there to take another peek (I'll try to post a pic tonight) and it DOES have a digital audio coax input and a optical audio input as well. Also , the unit did ship with a remote (dang kids).

 

[Tulpa]

Okay, I looked up your cable box and your TV. Is your DVD/VCR combo one of those GoVideo types?


I see only an optical out on the cable box, so I'd run an optical cable from there to the receiver, and a component video cable (red, green, blue) from the cable to the TV. You have a second component input on the TV, so you can connect the DVD/VCR to that, and run a coaxial digital audio cable from the DVD to the receiver.


If the DVD doesn't have component, use an S-Video cable. If it doesn't have S-video, then composite (although I'm sure it at least has S-video. I haven't seen one that does only composite in years.)


You'd basically have four cables between them, not counting speaker wires.


Here's my crude diagram.

Black line = component video, red line = optical, yellow line = coaxial.

 

[Tulpa]

Oh, you may have to run an additional composite audio cable from the audio out cable box to the receiver. I just realized I had to do that on mine to get sound on some channels.


So think of a fifth cable running from the cable box to the receiver.

 

[titus1971]

The HD cable box came with a Monster cable that had the component video and audio cables so that's going into Video2 IP on the TV, I bought another set of component cables to put the DVD into Video 3. My DVD/VCR is a cheap Magnavox but it had digital audio coax and the surround sound came with a audio coax cable so I'm gonna plug that in there. I've got several composite audio cables lying around so if I don't get sound on all channels I'll hook that up from my cable receiver to the audio receiver as you suggested.

My wife is picking me up a optical audio cable as I'm writing this so by the end of the day I should be able to have it hooked up like your diagram (pretty snazzy by the way

. I'll let you know how it goes!

Thanks

 

[rvanya]

Perfect so far. After all is wired up, go to the audio set up menu in the dvd/vcr player. Some players have a setting for dolby digital. The choices could say pcm, bitstream, raw, etc... Raw or bitstream is what you want when running optical out. Then you will get true dobly digital out. Awesome to here those digital inputs were on there.

 

[titus1971]

I was pretty stoked about it too! Everything seems to be working great. Thanks to all who replied and helped me along the way.