Hooking up DVD player and TV to Home Cinema system

LucianH

I have just got a new HD TV (Samsung 46D7000) and would like to know if I will loose any audio quality if I just connect the TV to the Home Cinema System via the Optical Digital Output when viewing DVDs via a DVD player connected using HDMI.

I could rig the sytem up using two optical audio cables (one from DVD player and the out from the TV) or I could just connect the DVD to the TV using the HDMI cable and just use the Optical Audio out from the TV. I would prefer to do this since all I need to do is switch the Home Cinema System on and off and not need to worry about selecting a different input source depending on what I'm watching.

I don't know anything about HDMI but I assume that the audio is sent digitally so is there any possibility of the audio degrading between the HMDI in and the Optical Out of the TV.

Myser

The best option would be to use two optical cables so that the surround signal from your DVD is correctly decoded to your Home Cinema System.

Relying on the HDMI will not give as good sound quality as it has to go through multiple conversion stages and may not give you the full decoded suround signal from the optical output on your TV.

almillar

Yes you will lose quality. HDMI carries the same audio signals that optical does, that's not the problem, the problem is that TVs seem to only pass through (I think they're only ALLOWED to pass through) 2.0 or 2.1 sound. So those 5.1 lovely surround channels are 'downmixed' from the TV out to the surround sound. You don't mention what this is, but if you've got 2 opticals I'll assume you've got something decent.
Anyway, you've got the system the wrong way round. The TV is really a dead end, and the amp should be in the middle - at the minute you've got the amp as a dead end.
If you went out and bought an AV amp today, it would have HDMI switching - so you've one HDMI led from amp to TV, and everything else plugs into the amp. Amp outputs the sound, and passes on the picture to the TV.
I'll assume you don't have HDMI switching, and therefore you should stick with the 2 optical cable solution.

LucianH

almillar wrote: »

Yes you will lose quality. HDMI carries the same audio signals that optical does, that's not the problem, the problem is that TVs seem to only pass through (I think they're only ALLOWED to pass through) 2.0 or 2.1 sound. So those 5.1 lovely surround channels are 'downmixed' from the TV out to the surround sound. You don't mention what this is, but if you've got 2 opticals I'll assume you've got something decent.
Anyway, you've got the system the wrong way round. The TV is really a dead end, and the amp should be in the middle - at the minute you've got the amp as a dead end.
If you went out and bought an AV amp today, it would have HDMI switching - so you've one HDMI led from amp to TV, and everything else plugs into the amp. Amp outputs the sound, and passes on the picture to the TV.
I'll assume you don't have HDMI switching, and therefore you should stick with the 2 optical cable solution.

Many thanks - unfortunatly I don't have HMDI switching in the Amp. I'll stick with the two optical.