Won't play Dolby 5.1 sound from HD-DVDs, only...

posted by kgivens on Aug 06, 2008

Hi. I've got a A-30 hooked up to a Sony Ht-CT100 system via HDMI. The player had the original 1.0 firmware, but the problem I describe below has persisted even after updating the firmware to 3.0. HD-DVDs produce no sound whatsoever, even though when the disk starts playing, the LCD display on the Sony briefly reads "Dolby 5.1". But when I insert a standard-def DVD, the same "Dolby 5.1" notice pops up on the Sony, and the sound plays perfectly.

The only way I can get sound with HD-DVDs is to change the Audio setting on the Toshiba from "Auto HDMI" to "Downmixed PCM." (The other audio choice---labelled just "PCM"---also fails to produce any sound with HD-DVDs). I'm not happy with this as a long term solution, since it does seem to downgrade the positional quality to the sound effects.

Seems to me that Dolby 5.1 encoding should be the same with HD-DVDs and standard def DVDs. Not sure whether the problem is with Toshiba or Sony on this one. Any ideas? Thanks in advance---

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Solution #1

posted on Dec 08, 2008

kgivens

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I tried that and it does work. However I hate having to run two cables (HDMI for the picture, optical out for the sound) to solve this problem---completely defeats the logic of having HDMI in the first place. Stupid.

Another drawback I'm seeing---with the optical out, I cannot get a great deal of volume out of the system, even on Max, when watching DVDs. TV audio can be made much louder. Irritating because I like to work out on various exercise machines when watching DVDs, and the equipment noise makes having a farily high volume desireable. Clearly something is being lost in the transfer.

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Solution #2

posted on Dec 07, 2008

drumbanger

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try running a digatal out cord instead

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