Spoonsey Posted October 26, 2010 Posted October 26, 2010 So I've finally got myself an AV receiver with HDMI connectivity (the new Yamaha RX-V667). I had seen some positive reviews for this unit and picked one up for around $1200. Seems like pretty good value to me. I hooked everything up over the weekend and went through the on-screen set-up process (nifty) with YPAO, then played a few Blu Ray discs to test things out. Avatar seemed like the obvious first choice. The sound quality is definitely a step up from my old Denon AVR-1906, but I'm still not 100% sure if what I'm hearing is "HD audio" (be that TrueHD, DolbyHD or whatever). Should the display on the Yamaha show when it is outputting HD audio? I've set my Panny BD-35 to "Bitstream" as I understand that this lets the Yamaha do the work.:confused: I suppose I could have a look at the full Yamaha instructions that came with the unit (on CD, rather than the usual weighty tome) but I was hoping someone here could give me the "101" version. Does it matter that I've only got a 5.1 speaker set-up, rather than 7.1? Cheers!
Ariki Padlie Posted October 26, 2010 Posted October 26, 2010 Nice unit there. You should have some sort of indicator on the display when it is decoding the bitstream from your Blu-ray player. As long as you have set the HDMI out on the player to Bitstream,the Receiver should automatically decode it. The amount of 7.1 software is pretty rare so i wouldnt put too much into it. Im downloading the manual as i type.
Mycenius Posted October 26, 2010 Posted October 26, 2010 ...yep - On my Onkyo for example it will display DTS-HD Master, or DolbyDigitalHD or similar... Your Yamaha should do similarly... Watch you have a valid HDCP HDMI handshake - your source may not be transmitting the HD data stream over the HDMI and only the SD (i.e. DD or DTS) one...
Ariki Padlie Posted October 26, 2010 Posted October 26, 2010 Hmmm...just looked at the manual....cant see anywhere where the surround format actually shows up on the display? Weird? Looks like it says "Straight" when no soundfields have been applied and names such as "Sci-Fi" when they have been applied. Doesnt seem to just indicate Dolby True HD etc?.
Spoonsey Posted October 26, 2010 Author Posted October 26, 2010 ARIKIP;136664 wrote: Hmmm...just looked at the manual....cant see anywhere where the surround format actually shows up on the display? Weird? Looks like it says "Straight" when no soundfields have been applied and names such as "Sci-Fi" when they have been applied. Doesnt seem to just indicate Dolby True HD etc?. Interesting - that's almost the conclusion I had reached just by playing around with the settings. I'll check the manual tonight and do some more experimenting. As for the potential handshake issue that Mycenius mentions above, is it possible to have an audio handshake issue distinct from a picture issue? I would have thought the two go hand-in-hand?
Mycenius Posted October 26, 2010 Posted October 26, 2010 ARIKIP;136664 wrote: Hmmm...just looked at the manual....cant see anywhere where the surround format actually shows up on the display? Weird? God - that'll be annoying if it's the case - there must be an indicator LED or something... :eek: Spoonsey;136665 wrote: As for the potential handshake issue that Mycenius mentions above, is it possible to have an audio handshake issue distinct from a picture issue? I would have thought the two go hand-in-hand? You are probalby right - but just tossing that out there - the HDCP Handshake will affect the HDMI per se - another is does your BD definitely do bitstreaming of HD audio?
Spoonsey Posted October 26, 2010 Author Posted October 26, 2010 mycenius;136667 wrote: God - that'll be annoying if it's the case - there must be an indicator LED or something... :eek: You are probalby right - but just tossing that out there - the HDCP Handshake will affect the HDMI per se - another is does your BD definitely do bitstreaming of HD audio? I believe so - I made to sure to select "Bitstream" in the set-up menus. I've got a Panasonic BD-35.
MVT Posted October 26, 2010 Posted October 26, 2010 heard of this issue before. first thing, make sure secondary audio is turned off on the Bluray Player. Then, On the front of the Receiver, just below the Display is a button that says info, that will scroll through on the display DSP, Input and Audio Decoder. they def do say DTS-HD when you do this and everything is setup correctly, as i just confirmed it instore with a BD65. Nice Receiver by the Way!
Electra Posted October 26, 2010 Posted October 26, 2010 MVT beat me to it - the info button scrolls through all the different things its doing. Mode, data rate, etc.
Spoonsey Posted October 26, 2010 Author Posted October 26, 2010 MVT;136680 wrote: heard of this issue before. first thing, make sure secondary audio is turned off on the Bluray Player. Then, On the front of the Receiver, just below the Display is a button that says info, that will scroll through on the display DSP, Input and Audio Decoder. they def do say DTS-HD when you do this and everything is setup correctly, as i just confirmed it instore with a BD65. Nice Receiver by the Way! Cheers guys - I'll check out the info button tonight. I'm well pleased with this unit. I initially thought it would be best to get the next model up with two HDMI outputs but realistically I can't see myself getting a PJ any time soon, in fact I'll more than likely just get a bigger plasma (in time for RWC '11), so the 667 will more than suffice. I have a passing interest in 3D so I guess it's nice to have some future proofing but what appeals to me with the 667 is the relatively small footprint (roughly equivalent to my old Denon) and the 7.1 connectivity should I ever go down that path. All up it's a very tidy piece of gear and I love the user friendly on-screen display. Out of the box the sound is great, so well done Yamaha.
Spoonsey Posted October 26, 2010 Author Posted October 26, 2010 All sorted! A combination of using the info button and, erm, actually selecting the HD audio format from the disc settings.:rolleyes:
Ariki Padlie Posted October 26, 2010 Posted October 26, 2010 Glad you got that solved ....so what is the "default" setting before pushing the info button? Is there any way of making the surround format info the default? Great unit though...6 HDMIs...WOW!!!!! And i thought my 4 in was WOW!!!! at the time i brought it....and it was the top model of the time. RWC 2011 in HD and 5.1 audio woohoo!!!!!
Mycenius Posted October 26, 2010 Posted October 26, 2010 Spoonsey;136744 wrote: All sorted! A combination of using the info button and, erm, actually selecting the HD audio format from the disc settings.:rolleyes: Gosh! I think many of us have heard (or said) that before! :rolleyes: Good thing is you are now all go - with or without a red face!
Spoonsey Posted October 26, 2010 Author Posted October 26, 2010 mycenius;136748 wrote: Gosh! I think many of us have heard (or said) that before! :rolleyes: Good thing is you are now all go - with or without a red face! Indeed! I tried out a few heavy action scenes from The Dark Knight, Kung Fu Panda, Transformers 2 and Iron Man 2 and I'm more than happy. The kids were in bed so I couldn't really crank it up. More tonight... ARIKIP - when I first pushed the info button it just said "Dolby Digital". My BD-35 has an "audio" button on the remote and I ended up pushing that in desperation after a fruitless search through both the Panny BD-35 and 667 manuals. The display on the 667 then came up with to "TrueHD" and I was in business! It seems you can set the audio using that button on the BD-35 remote or by choosing the audio format in the disc settings. Newb errors, yet satisfying to have figured it out.
Mycenius Posted October 26, 2010 Posted October 26, 2010 Spoonsey - Note that many BDs default to Dolby Digital NOT the HD Soundtrack when put in the player - its just how the disc menus/settings were engineered... (either deliberate or a bug with the discs config not being correctly implemented). I find it so frustrating - every time you play a BD you always have to double check the Audio settings... :mad: It's especially bad on TV material as opposed to Theatrical titles - I recently purchased Sanctuary S1 & S2 and both box sets have every blu-ray disc defaulting to standard Dolby Digital despite having DolbyTrueHD as the primary audio track (and first in the set-up menu's list of audio tracks)! :rolleyes: As a studio disc engineer, why would you think the majority of people buying a blu-ray would be only using Dolby Digital? You can either check this in the disc's setup menu on screen when first loaded - or as you describe use the players audio select function to scroll through the audio tracks to the HD one once you start playing the disc...
Spoonsey Posted October 27, 2010 Author Posted October 27, 2010 mycenius;136760 wrote: Spoonsey - Note that many BDs default to Dolby Digital NOT the HD Soundtrack when put in the player - its just how the disc menus/settings were engineered... (either deliberate or a bug with the discs config not being correctly implemented). I find it so frustrating - every time you play a BD you always have to double check the Audio settings... :mad: It's especially bad on TV material as opposed to Theatrical titles - I recently purchased Sanctuary S1 & S2 and both box sets have every blu-ray disc defaulting to standard Dolby Digital despite having DolbyTrueHD as the primary audio track (and first in the set-up menu's list of audio tracks)! :rolleyes: As a studio disc engineer, why would you think the majority of people buying a blu-ray would be only using Dolby Digital? You can either check this in the disc's setup menu on screen when first loaded - or as you describe use the players audio select function to scroll through the audio tracks to the HD one once you start playing the disc... He, he...my first thoughts were: "The Mrs is going to just LOVE this when she's trying to get a Blu Ray on for the kids". Then I realised that the kids probably won't give a rat's if they're listening to DD rather than HD! The other half has already been doing a lot of sighing and eye rolling over the new toy. No surprises there. I tried to explain WHY we needed it but methinks it fell upon deaf ears.
tkr001 Posted October 27, 2010 Posted October 27, 2010 yeah, who give a rats whether chick flicks have HD audio or not
Boris1553552671 Posted October 27, 2010 Posted October 27, 2010 mycenius;136760 wrote: You can either check this in the disc's setup menu on screen when first loaded - or as you describe use the players audio select function to scroll through the audio tracks to the HD one once you start playing the disc... I always check the audio settings as soon as a disk starts as well. A lot of movies play automatically without going to a menu screen. I'm also connected via 5.1 analogue, so no whiz bang AVR to tell me what signal it's receiving. My Panasonic BD80 has a display screen that shows both the audio and video format and mbs output. When audio gets up over 5mbs (compared to DVD 0.4mbs I think) things start sounding really good I don't recall any disks not starting in the HD codec, although many music blurays default to 2 channel PCM when DTS-HDMA is an option. Probably 50/50 which is preferred though I suppose. And welcome back Mycenius from me also. Not the first time you've slipped off the forum for an extended period Trust all is well, good to read your posts again. Cheers, B.
Mycenius Posted October 27, 2010 Posted October 27, 2010 Boris;136817 wrote: I don't recall any disks not starting in the HD codec... Can't be paying attention laddie but as I said 3 out of 4 times it's TV Material or Doco stuff rather than feature films (although I've had a couple of these do it)... As I said most recent is the 1st & 2nd Season of Sanctuary, all discs of which do it... Boris;136817 wrote: And welcome back Mycenius from me also. Not the first time you've slipped off the forum for an extended period Trust all is well, good to read your posts again. Cheers Boris & Thanks - yes all good now - and yep have gone AWOL before but usually only as I have "too many" hobbies/interests and run out of time/energy - although I must confess I originally took a breather back Nov/Dec last year as things were a bit 'hectic' in general and here some of the threads had got into feeling more like silly fanboy-ish stuff... Would have been back around early this year, but events transpired against me (family illness/loss) which resulted in a hard (and emotionally painful) few months followed by a hefty professional work load more recently 'catching up'... But back now, things back to normality and moving forward (and getting the urge for some new audiophile toys)...
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