Dept of Sony F*cking Me

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So, the Heathen Central DVD deck has been misbehaving, mostly by not being able to play some less-than-pristine disks that play fine in other places.

We’ve not been convinced that Bluray is going to take off, so we went shopping for an upconverting DVD deck; the good news is that those are cheap. For $80, we picked up a Sony (dvp-ns77h) at Fry’s not long ago, but, foolishly, I didn’t test it thoroughly once we got it home.

Anyway, the primary appeal of this minor upgrade was “will play more disks,” but we were also pleased about the possibility of cable reduction; the deck we were using had 3-wire component video cables plus a coaxial digital audio cable, but the new one would, theoretically, run all that goodness over HDMI.

Well, stereo works fine. But for some reason the Sony and Yamaha won’t play nice with surround data over HDMI. Lovely. So, how about if I enable the digital out and use HDMI for video only (and therefore enjoy the best part of the video upconversion)?

Uh, no. With HDMI plugged in, I can’t get the Sony to spit out Dolby Digital signals. Unplug it, and we’re fine. So, back to 4 cables for the DVD, dammit.

Grrrr. Grrrr. Grrrr.

5 thoughts on “Dept of Sony F*cking Me”

  1. you running hdmi to AV box and then hdmi to tv? get a hdmi to dvi cable for tv I think this will solve it. This is how I run my PS3 (blueray) to tv and then I use a digi opt to AV box.

  2. Yeah, everything goes through the receiver, and then the receiver sends HDMI to the TV. That’s a big part of the point — it simplifies operation and cabling.

    Also, the problem is DVD deck behavior; it won’t spit out surround over any port but HDMI if HDMI is plugged in, and since its HDMI won’t work with the Yamaha, I have to use component video and separate digital audio. How does hdmi-to-dvi fix that?

  3. seems your dvd has some sort of override when hdmi is used. HDMI to dvi is only video signal so then the surround sound is allowed to work through other cables (digi coax, dig opt) this is exactly what was going on with my PS3, so I ran a hdmi-dvi and then the opt to my sound system. For some reason every time I have tried to use HDMI in my receiver some bullshit happens. So I go straight to the tv with dvi from my PS3 and DTV and run opt to the box. I guess there are some tvs that have surround sound capabilities that you can then route cables to different speakers. It seems this is the only time HDMI would be worth a shit. Component has as good a signal as HDMI/DVI. I also have my dvd player hoked into box with components and digi coax to box. I prefer Matilde use the dvd player than my PS3. I run my laptop hdmi/rgb-vga and quality is not quite as good as macbookpro screen but certainly good enough for SS and PPT work I do. And giant screen surfing rocks.

    How do you make the mac not sleep when you close the screen? Been wanting to use my tv as a monitor and a wireless keyboard from the couch. So as to not have to have the lap deal and the comp on my lap.

  4. Yeah, that’s the case. So taking DVD straight to the TV doesn’t solve anything for me.

    BTW, component tops out at 720p; it can’t do 1080i or 1080p, I don’t think. I think the HDMI problem is one of an immature standard with limited cross-brand applicability; maybe if I get a Yamaha upsampling DVD deck, it’ll work right.

    I don’t think you can keep a closed Mac from sleeping.