Pvr To Avr Via Hdmi: Problems With Audio

[Eth Nick]

Hey,

Got an LG LST-5402 PVR which was hooked up to an Onkyo603 AVR via optical.

I've just replaced that AVR with a Yamaha 1900 & now have the PVR connected via HDMI.

Problem is I can't get anything playing through the PVR to come out of more than the front left & right speakers.

The surround speakers & sub do work - i've got a PS3 connected via HDMI to the 1900 & movies/games work through all the speakers they should, when i've got the AVR set to "surround decode" mode (ie. no adjustments to the actual bitstream). It initially didn't work, but after changing the PS3s audio output to "bitstream", everything was fine.

But the problem with my PVR, is that the audio output options are only "Dolby Digital" or "PCM", bit of which don't transmit a signal that uses more than the front two speakers.

I've even tried my recorded programs on the PVR, all of which were shown as "Dolby Digital" & came through 5.1 speakers on my Onkyo, but they also only come through front left & right only (no sub even).

I've emailed LG, hoping that a firmware update might fix things (i've only got the firmware it came with - x006 or something).

I'm going to try to hook the PVR as I did with the Onkyo tomorrow - via Optical, with HDMI straight to Plasma & see if things return back to normal, but it'd be a shame if I couldn't connect it to the AVR via HDMI as it makes things easier switching between components.

Any ideas?

[tonymy01]

What shows are they that you have recorded? There isn't all that much 5.1 on HD TV at the moment (well, now Nein and 7HD are broadcasting 5.1 fulltime now with audio upscaling type arrangement for the non 5.1 progs, this isn't quite the case any more). Perhaps the Onkyo was telling you that you were decoding the stereo audio to 5.1 with one of the surround processing strategies, the front panel on the amps can confuse a bit like that?

To get stereo audio out 5.1 (or 7.1) speakers on the Yamaha, you have to select a surround decode option.

edit:

Ok, it appears you asked the question differently in different threads, and failed to mention in this thread that the amp only reported PCM...

My advice in the other thread:

hmm, could be the LG only negotiates this with your amp for some reason (LG=lucky goldstar). The Beyonwiz does this sometimes with my Yamaha 3800 and so I have to cycle the Wiz thru the TV-OUT settings on the remote back to HDMI and it re-negotiates Dolby Digital (assuming you have setup the STB to passthru/bitstream rather than decode).

I have now given up on this, as the icons for PCM/DD are tiny on the Yamaha, and sometimes I don't notice I am missing out on 5.1 source (as the THX-Neural 7.1 processing is great.. enabled this the other week in the service menu... mind you, the speaker icons are a dead give-away normally, if you look :-). It is just with the very mixed bag of 2 channel surround vs 5.1 channel stuff on HD still, sometimes it is easily missed/forgotten that the show is 5.1. Case in point, the other week "Bones" on 7HD was in stereo and I thought "huh, this is usually always in 5.1, Seven must be having probs today"... and nope.. was the Beyonwiz HDMI negotiation with the amp), so now just have the amp setup to take the audio from the Beyonwiz SPDIF instead, no silly HDMI negotiation junk, and there is no need for HDMI for DVB-T audio anyway, and it is only one extra cable going to the back of the amp :-)

Regards

[Eth Nick]

The recorded shows are Heroes, Prison Break, clips of a few movies (Tears of the Ssun ect), which I know appeared as proper Dolby Digital & came out of all speakers.

If the shows weren't proper DD, then the Onkyo would show them as Pro Logic or DTS EX when i'd select "Surround" mode, but when I went back to 2-channel stereo, then 2.1 could be heard.

With my current setup, I can't even get the sub working, so it's just 2 channel PCM (as indicated by the speaker logos), when in "Straight" mode. But when I select "Suround Decode" (which i'm thinking is the same as the Onkyos "Surround" mode), all I get are the Pro Logic & DTS EX modes, no proper Dolby Digital indicator.

I'm about to try hooking the PVR to the AVR via Optical to see what happens.

Oh, & i've got no idea how to tell the PVR to pass through bitstream. It seems the only two options are Dolby Digital (which I thought would work properly) & PCM (no change).

edit...

Optical made no difference. Seems as if this Yamaha AVR isn't getting a bitstream signal from either the HDMI nor Optical coming from my PVR....it's going to be annoying having to select which Pro logic/PLII/DTS NEO 6 setting to use when a Dolby Digital broadcast is coming in - I preferred it when my Onkyo opted for Dolby Digital (5.1 or 2.1) automatically as I knew it was the best surround (or stereo) format for the broadcast....know what I mean?

Edited November 15, 2008 by Ralfi

[tonymy01]

I reckon it isn't even a negotiation thing. I reckon the LG just won't send anything but 2 channel PCM down HDMI. They probably did this to stop all the people going LG->TV with no amp complaining about why there is no audio on HD channels (i.e. AC3 channels, as 99% of TVs with HDMI only decode stereo PCM over HDMI, not AC3 over HDMI). Given you have a very capable amp, simply have both the HDMI (for video switching) and Toslink/SPDIF/optical/coax (for the audio from the LG) hooked up and you will get your AC3/DD sound back. Luckily the yamaha will let you map any HDMI and any optical/coax input to the setting you have your LG setup in, and don't choose "auto select" for the audio selection type in the setup menu (you can even swap between HDMI, Optical/Coax and Analogue with the "audio-sel" button, to hear the differences).

There is one more setting you need to change. The "Audio Select" setup option with choices of "auto" and "last". You need to change this to "last" or else the amp will keep detecting "yep, I see audio PCM on HDMI, I will use that", and it will ignore that full AC3/5.1 is on SPDIF. So choose "last" and then the last option you choose for the audio preference for the LG setup input (either via the menu or via the audio-sel button on the remote) will be remembered next time you power everything up.

Regards

[Eth Nick]

Just got off the phone with LG - yeah, this PVR won't transmit anything more than 2 channels via HDMI, so they recommended I go back to Optical (this may have something to do with "HDMI standard, type A" as mentioned in the manual?).

Anyway, I went back to Optical, changed the settings you mentioned, tony, & things didn't work, until I realised i'd left the PVR output on PCM, instead of Dolby Digital from prior testing....it's now working, as in detecting Dolby Digital broadcasts as it was with my other AVR.

Thanks Tony!

8]

Edited November 15, 2008 by Ralfi