Going BLU

[Todd]

Yes...

...oh yes.

I recently purchased a Sony BDP-S350. I love it. I haven't had much time to watch anything, but THE FIFTH ELEMENT was incredible and the six minute intro to THE DARK KNIGHT was equally phenominal. Last night I popped in the John Mayer DVD I got for free and was really impressed.

Other titles I have yet to watch are BATMAN BEGINS, BLACK HAWK DOWN, SUPERMAN RETURNS, and the SPIDER-MAN and MISSION IMPOSSIBLE trilogies, as well as the DIE HARD COLLECTION.

To refresh, I am watching this all on my 65" Mitsubishi TV in full 1080p glory.

[Obiwan176]

Let me be the first to congratulate you. That must be fun. I don't even have 1080P and have seen it though. It is stunning. Batman Begins looks incredible in its full blown resolution. I am glad you took that plunge and I bet you will never look back. I have always said HD is just amazing and can not compare to an upcovert.

Welcome back, by the way.

[AKmaro1]

Yes Todd, welcome back! Glad to hear you're more than happy with your Blu-ray player, plaease keep us informed how the other movies look as well. BTW is the new player BD-Live capable, with the ethernet port and stuff, or is it still stuck with BD-Java? Inquiring minds want to know.

[Todd]

Well...the sales people say that the BDP-S350 is BD Profile 2.0 ready. I have yet to do a firmware update.

But also...

....I have a bit of a gripe. What's this all in one HDMI cable nonsense??? Sure if I like stereo decoded to a Dolby Pro Logic II...its great. What a load of crap. You need to make a seperate digital connection from the component, such as a BluRay player, to the receiver. Right.

Liars.

Not only that, but lets say I hook a Wii to the receiver with component. Do you think the HDMI works like a monitor out. Nope. You need to make an additional connection. HDMI is poop.

[Todd]

To clarify...I'm not sure if this is just the receiver that I'm using for my upconvert DVD player in the other room. The instructions specifically say to use an optical or coaxial connection to experience 'surround sound'.

isn't HDMI supposed to be the magic all in one cable?

[Obiwan176]

I have become the expert on this after many serious painful events. If you do not have a 7.1 surround sound system then it does not matter. You will get the full 5.1 Dolby Digital, DTS, ans so forth with the optical cable. If you do have a system that is 7.1 it MUST have an HDMI port that is NOT just passthrough. It must accept the signal and not just pass it on. In addition to get the full effect of any of the HD sound versions on the discs your receiver must be able to decode those codecs. I hope that all makes sense.

Bottom line: If you do not have a receiver that accepts HDMI then you will need a seperate connection for the sound. The HDMI then would just be used to get the full 1080P picture through your television.

[Todd]

So the new receiver I bought for the new group home I'm in (I don't have a projector anymore...sad...but I do have a 50" plasma Vizio...not sure if that compensates) is a POS Yamaha that just does a pass through signal. But if I take an optical from the TV to the Receiver, all I end up getting is a stereo signal.

Bastards. HDMI is the lie of all time. Either that or no one really understands it in sales.

Concluding note on the projector...the night we left that group home was the night the bulb burnt out. How freakin' poetic is that.

[AKmaro1]

Todd, you're pretty much right on the money about this one, but I'm sure Obiwan can jump in and help too. Yes basically speaking if the receiver states pass-through design, and is relatively cheap in price, below say $300 or $400, you're getting a crap design where you have to use the optical input to get any kind of good sound. To be safe, look for a receiver that offers decoding built-in for DD True HD, and DTS-HD MA, but some receivers do receive these signals without decoding built-in.

Also you will probably get better results running the optical cable from your Blu-ray player straight to the receiver, vs. running it from the back of the TV. Also if you have multi-channel analog inputs on the back of your receiver (like for SACD), you can use those if your player has the same time of outputs, and those are a great option. But I think Obiwan knows more about those last hookups.

[Obiwan176]

Todd use your hdmi cable for the television and put the digital optical cable from the bluray player directly to the receiver. Your tv will get sound and picture from the hdmi cable and the receiver will take the sound from the optical cable. And yes, passtrough is a bunch of BS.

Let me know if you have any problems.

Do not set the otical from the tv to the receiver to get sound from the BD player.

[Todd]

Yeah...I figured that all out. But its still the biggest crock.