Surround Sound DVDs

[wjandrews]

I want to be able to play DVDs with surround sound.

I have, it seems, the necessary ingredients for this to happen.

I have some DVDs that say they can be played with surround sound.

I have a surround sound “Home Theatre” system. (An amp and 5 speakers)

I have a DVD player.

…

However, when I play my DVDs, and the amp is set to “6 channel” … no sound happens. It will work if the amp is set to stereo, and will... play stereo sound.

Why is 6 channel sound not happening?

My suspicion is this: My DVD player.

It’s made in 2000, and has a sparse backside.

It has: 1 S-video plug, 1 “Digital” plug, 2 yellow video out plugs, 2 red “R” (right) audio outs, and 2 white “L” audio outs.

It looks like it’s 2 sets of the classic “red, yellow, white” stereo sound and video- stereo, not 6 channel surround sound.

But, maybe not. There are, after all, in total, 6 “outs” Maybe all of them can be used for audio. Maybe more then one set of audio can travel though one plug.

Any help would be great.

-aaron

[Cornucopia]

wjandrews--

your player is like most lower and middle range players. 6 channel audio is only available through the digital jack, not the analog jacks. high end players actually DO have 6 additional audio jacks.

check your reciever/amp. does it only have surround input as 6 analog audio jacks or does it have a digital jack, or both?

if it has a digital jack, then just connect digital jack to digital jack (i'm assuming this is coax/rca/spdif and not an optical connection).

if is doesn't have a digital jack, or if the digital is coax on one side and optical on another, you either have to buy a new DVD player or a new Amp--one of which will have the right connections for the other. Or you could get a digital AC3/DTS decoder box (1 digital jack in/6 analog jacks out), but they aren't as easy to find nor all that cheap. And they are kind of duplicating what you already have in some form.

HTH,

Scott

[wjandrews]

My amp has a "Digital In" It's the same color jack.. and it says "coaxial"

It looks like I'll just need to find a cord to go from Digital Out to Digital In... unless there's anything else I need to know.

Thanks. If that doesn't work I'll ask again.

-aaron

[Cornucopia]

If you want to go the "Strictly-by-the-book/Snooty-Audiophile/Anal-Retentive" way, you could by a specialized cable which has better RFI/EMI rejection, correct Ohms (75 IIRC), silvered/goldclad ends, etc. You will probably get less Digital Pre-correction Errors, less jitter.

Otherwise you should be able to use any 'ole RCA cable and do just fine by most peoples ears.