7.1 reciever question

[hrustar]

I have an Onkyo HTSR-800. It's a nifty little system for very little cash. But I have one question/complaint about it.

It's a 7.1 system with HDMI passthrough. This means no audio using HDMI, just video. Which leads me to this question. What good is a 7.1 system if you need HDMI with audio to get 7.1 sound? From what i know, optical/toslink can only send at best a 5.1 DD or DTS type signal.


Is there a 7.1 CODEC that can go through optical? Or is the 7.1 I'll get really just a bogus version of 5.1 that's been matrixed up.

Seems dumb if so. Why even bother selling a 7.1 system.

[rmac694203]

You're just getting upmixed 5.1 with your system. Optical won't do the 7.1 . But, most of the stuff out there today is only 5.1 . So most people who have a receiver capable of getting true 7.1 are still only getting 5.1 and using PLIIx or something to matrix it.

If you want a true 7.1 receiver, it has to be able to accept video and audio via HDMI. If you want the next gen formats (true hd, DTS:MA etc) then the receiver has to be able to decode them, unless you have a player that does the decoding internally (Ps3 does this), then you just need a receiver that can accept multichannel PCM via HDMI audio.

I got the Onkyo tx-sr705 because I think it's the best bang for the buck. It accepts all the codecs, has HDMI audio, can matrix 5.1 PCM audio, etc.

[emacs]

Why even bother selling a 7.1 system.

for those who want eight discreet channels each having a dedicated speaker.