I'm trying to look into purchasing a system whenever I scounge enough together.

I'm planning for a 5.1 setup because the room it is going in doesn't really allow for 7.1. So for it seems like most of the newer stuff with new features is all 7.1. Can you buy a 7.1 receiver but only use it for 7.1.

I know you can only hook up 5 speakers if you want, but can you tell it "hey 6 & 7 aren't there so do you magic and make 5 sound right"?

 

Yeah they have modes for 5.1.

 

Noob question #2.
One of the reasons I was saying 7.1 has more features is that it seems like the max hdmi # of ports on the 5.1 systems I've seen is 2. The tv I bought has 4, which of course is more.

Instead of hooking every component up directly to the receiver and then the receiver to the TV, could I just hook everything directly to my tv and then use "digital audio out / TOSLINK" jack on my tv to hook up to my receiver. And then the receiver does what it needs to do...just as well as if i plugged the components into the receiver?

If TOSLINK is the way to go then I don't necessarily need to care about how many hdmi ports the receiver has?

 

In order to do that, your tv will have to have an audio input for every video input being used. I know hdmi carries both video and audio signals, but even if your tv has an audio output, I'm not sure if it would pass all audio signals to your receiver. I think it would be simpler to get a receiver that will do all of the audio/video switching for you, and just feed one video signal to your tv. If in the future you want to switch to 7.1, only hdmi currently supports the bandwidth necessary to pass along 8 channels of audio. Toslink can only pas 6 (which what 5.1 is). Not to mention, more bluray discs are being released with a lossless audio track, which requires more bandwidth, so hdmi can only be used for the signal (but they also carry a 5.1 signal and 2 channel signal, so audio will be heard no matter what your setup is).

 

Any way for me to find out without buying a receiver first? Samsung LN46a650 (brand new model - mar 08.
I'm planning to use hdmi for each of my inputs: cable box, xbox 360, hd dvd

In the house I just bought 7.1 is overkill for the room size. So I don't plan on upgrading unless I move sometime down the road into a bigger place. Thanks for the info. And I'm an hd-dvd 'victim' who is not planning to buy blu-ray anytime soon.

 

I guess I'm SOL w/ that idea...why do they degrade the signal?

 

Well, here's the problem: If your tv has a composite audio output (usually two cables colored red and white), it can't pass a 5.1 signal. You would need an hdmi or toslink or 6 composite cables as an output to feed the signal to an amplifier. That's why receivers are essential to home theaters. They can provide amplification, signal processing, and switching all in one package. TVs aren't usually designed to handle all of these tasks. That would make them much more costly.

 

It has a toslink as output and R / L RCA. However as it said in my previous post the manual states:

When the TV is displaying a DTV(air) signal, the TV will
send out 5.1 channel sound to the Home theater receiver. When the source is a
digital component such as a DVD and is connected to the TV via HDMI, only 2
channel sound will be heard from the Home Theater receiver. If you want to hear
5.1 channel audio, connect the DIGITAL AUDIO OUT (OPTICAL) jack on the
DVD player or Cable/Satellite Box directly to an Amplifier or Home Theater, not
the TV.

So while it is capable for it to send out 5.1 over the toslink, when it comes to anything plugged in though hdmi it will only send the 2 channel audio...pretty crappy design.

 

There are several different ways you can go about it. If you do not want to purchase a receiver with a lot of HDMI inputs, then simply connect the equipment to your tv with seperate HDMI cables, and then to your receiver using either a optical cable (recommended) or even a digital coax. For your xbox and cable signal, you will not need to use hdmi for audio. I haven't really dealt with HD DVD to be honest and don't recall if it is capable of playing any HD Audio. It sounds like you probably will not utilize that anyway.

 

I bought a receiver with 4 hdmi inputs. I currently use 3 of them for all audio/video. I only have one cable to my tv and that is the HDMI out from the receiver.

The only things NOT via HDMI are my Wii and my Airport Express (itunes) because obviously they dont have HDMI as an option.

SEt up works great.

 

I have this set-up as well and it's so easy. You can switch inputs with one button on your receiver's remote without touching the TV (except for non-HDMI inputs like the Wii).

If you get a PS3 later on and want to hear uncompressed 5.1 audio (higher bitrate than Dolby Digital 5.1), you have to go with the all HDMI application and have a receiver that supports HDMI video and audio. There are Sony apps that have 3 HDMI. Worst case you can buy an HDMI switcher through monoprice.com if you need so many HDMI's.

Here is a list of receivers and home-theatre-in-box (HTIB) sets that support HDMI audio. Be careful as some older models only support HDMI video but you still have to plug in optical audio (meaning you have to input swtich on 2 remotes and don't get uncompressed audio).

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1019554

 

Related question: let's say I get a receiver that has all the requisite HDMI inputs and audio format support. Like the OP I'm pretty much limited to a 5.1 setup due to my room. Do most receivers have options for "mixing" the side channels into fronts and rears of a 5.1 setup? If so, is there any common term to look for when browsing spec sheets?

 

Not quite sure what you mean by mixing. There is no difference between the amount of sound generated by a 7.1 and a 5.1 mix. If a soundtrack is recorded with 8 channels (7.1), extra channels (which I think is what you're referring to as side channels) will be blended into fewer for 6 channel (5.1) or even stereo sound. In other words, you won't miss any sounds recorded in the original soundtrack, regardless of your setup.

 

I'm confused. What do you mean there's no difference in the amount of sound generated by a 7.1 and a 5.1 mix? Are you saying the two additional channels in 7.1 formats aren't discrete? The Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD MA specs both support 8 discrete channels.

 

Doesn't the xbox 360 do 5.1? I have one of the 'newer' ones with HDMI output, and I believe that you can get an optical out toslink, but that only shows up when you go to use the supplied component cables (it's on the plug).

HD DVD does have HD Audio so I know I need to hook that up.

 

Regardless if the 360 uses DTS-HD/TrueHD you should just use the HDMI even if viewing regular 5.1 Dolby Digital stuff.

 

Look at from a studio's perspective: You've recorded sound for a movie, and now you want to decide which sound gets sent to which channel. Whether you mix it into two discrete channels or 8 discrete channels, you'll still hear every sound produced. It's not like 7.1 systems have more sounds, they're just separated and sent to different channels, creating a different surround effect. If onscreen, you see a helicopter flying towards you, then flying offscreen behind you, the sound mixer will route the sound from the front channel to the rear channel to give you the effect. If you only have one channel, you'll still hear the helicopter, but the sound will remain in the front channel.

 

I see where you were coming from with your previous statement. Back to my question though (using proper front/surround/rear terminology this time).

Let's say I want to listen to the Dolby TrueHD or DTS-HD MA audio track on a Blu-Ray movie. Assuming the mix takes advantage of all eight channels, what's going to happen when the sound is supposed to be occurring off to the side? The signal is obviously going to get sent to one of the surround channels. Well what if I only have a 5.1 speaker setup that phyiscally has only front and rear? There's only two possible outcomes: A) I get no sound because there's no speakers connected to the outputs for the surround channels or B) the receiver has a setting that takes output destined for the side channel and "splits" it among the corresponding front and rear channel.

Option B is what I was asking about in my original question.

 

The receivers are very smart nowadays, and know which set up you have. My Yamaha knows that I am running a 5.1 system and handles the audio accordingly.

 

You still get DTS-HD/TrueHD with 5.1. You still get the higher bitrates than a DD 5.1. The 7.1 just projects more of a surround feel since it fills gaps around you.

 

The extra two speakers in 7.1 are just extra side channels for more fill.

 

Thanks for the info all.
So a 5.1 speaker setup is do-able and I just paid off my car. This could be bad news.