Sony HT-DDWG800 Home Theatre Sys REVIEW

[RottenFox]

Originally Posted by djkay1982

says i've got to paint the living room before putting it all up so it matches a bit better! bugger, best get myself to B&Q quick for the cheapest tub of magnolia i can find ha ha

had to paint our living room "warm magnolia", with a "raspberry blush" fireplace, from the B7Q colour collection.., not long before christmas

women eh!!

if you still arent happy with the speakers, hammerite works well on the speakers/sub, and the silver hammered finish paint looks pretty good, when put on with a roller, makes them look like mottled steel.
you get other colours too, like the usual suspects,black,white,etc..

[r4zb3rry]

Originally Posted by RottenFox

if you still arent happy with the speakers, hammerite works well on the speakers/sub, and the silver hammered finish paint looks pretty good, when put on with a roller, makes them look like mottled steel.
you get other colours too, like the usual suspects,black,white,etc..

Any pics, I would like to see these very much.

R4z

[djkay1982]

Originally Posted by RottenFox

had to paint our living room "warm magnolia", with a "raspberry blush" fireplace, from the B7Q colour collection.., not long before christmas

women eh!!

if you still arent happy with the speakers, hammerite works well on the speakers/sub, and the silver hammered finish paint looks pretty good, when put on with a roller, makes them look like mottled steel.
you get other colours too, like the usual suspects,black,white,etc..

ha yeah they always want something doing! i've just spent the the Xmas week decorating our other house bloody magnolia!

cheers for the advice bud, decided not to bother painting now lol, going to wait until we properly decorate the room (just bought the house, old womans before us, you can probably imagine what its like!)

speakers have grown on me now actually, i like them, going to leave them as they are

[djkay1982]

anyone one give me a bit of help connecting this kit up please?

what i have

Samsung 42" plasma

V+
Xbox 360
Tosh EP-30 HD DVD player
Sony SD DVD recorder

ideally wanted them all connecting via HDMI but the amp has only 3 ports, so what should i do?

V+
Xbox
HD DVD player

connect all the above with HDMI lead into the amp?

then connect the Sony SD DVD recorder to the amp via another method?
(scart-component into video 1 in?)
then would i need another component lead going from video 1 out to TV?

[lamboluke]

Shame to hear they're out of stock... i'm sure a good root around google will find some other retailers, but the link i provided was the best price i found for them online (never saw them instore anywhere).

Most universal speaker wall mounts should be fine, as long as they come with multiple sized screws.. unless you wait to order the b-techs.

Glad to hear it arrived, must say the mother had a bit of a shock with the size of the unit and sub but she was pleasantly supprised with the quality. Now crack on with the painting and get the unit on the go lol.

[lamboluke]

Originally Posted by djkay1982

anyone one give me a bit of help connecting this kit up please?

what i have

Samsung 42" plasma

V+
Xbox 360
Tosh EP-30 HD DVD player
Sony SD DVD recorder

ideally wanted them all connecting via HDMI but the amp has only 3 ports, so what should i do?

V+
Xbox
HD DVD player

connect all the above with HDMI lead into the amp?

then connect the Sony SD DVD recorder to the amp via another method?
(scart-component into video 1 in?)
then would i need another component lead going from video 1 out to TV?

As for the connections if you've got 4 hdmi connections then i'm stumped as to what to do with connections, still learning so i'll let someone who knows their stuff answer this for an alternative.

[djkay1982]

balls to the painting! i just want to get it set up! doing my head in having to get all these other bits in before i can set it up correctly

found some of them brackets now! company called tech solutions NI. got em for £23.95 inc postage, that il do me

yeah im not too up on it either, hopefully someone can point me in the right direction pretty sharpish so i can get the cables ordered n get it all done this weekend

[RottenFox]

Originally Posted by djkay1982

balls to the painting! i just want to get it set up! doing my head in having to get all these other bits in before i can set it up correctly

found some of them brackets now! company called tech solutions NI. got em for £23.95 inc postage, that il do me

yeah im not too up on it either, hopefully someone can point me in the right direction pretty sharpish so i can get the cables ordered n get it all done this weekend

lol..about the decorating, same here..old persons house.
"harvest vomit", woodchip, and "basket filled with rotten fruit" looking wallpaper from top to bottom..

as for your cables, hdmi's for these:

V+
Xbox
HD DVD player

and a single hdmi out to the tv.

for the sony dvd player, either connect the scart/component(better quality) directly to the tv, and connect its optical or digital coax audio out,to the 800.

[1dgaf]

I've been living with this system for a few months and I'm pleased with it.

However, I've just had an interesting problem - when going through my 360, using the 'TV' optical input doesn't produce any sound, but the 'SAT' optical input does.

Anyone else had this issue? When I plug the 360's optical cable into the TV input, the amps little screen seems to show that the left, right and centre speakers are working, but there's still no sound.

When I plug into the 'SAT' input, all four speakers are shown on the front and there's full sound.

ANy ideas? Had a look online and couldn't figure it out.

[super-saint]

Originally Posted by Geezer69

Well I have had this for three weeks now and I'd thought I would share my opinions for what they are worth. First off, it has to be said the kit is great value for money. I can only dream of Kef's and Onkyo amps - they are just simply way out of my league.

Set up was relatively simple, though I have been fiddling with AV for a while now. I had my BD player, 360, Wii, Sky HD and Ipod all hooked up in no time.

Now for the sound quality. This has just replaced my old Samsung DVD player surround system so I was interested to see what difference this would make. Several points here: the bass is great. I can't tell you what position the dial is on, I just kept on tweaking until it suited my needs (explosions have to be bowel moving!!). I also noticed how much clearer the sound is compared to my old system. Proper definition between speakers. I generally just leave it on AFD to automatically detect the source signal and that seems to work for me.

I instantly went through a few classic scenes to test it out - intro to Raiders of the Lost Ark, a few choice selections from Star Wars trilogy, Leftism by Leftfield to check out the bass , COD 4 & 5. Suffice to say, the wife and kiddie didn't see me for a few days

Connectivity is also a big plus - it's such a luxury to have everything hooked up and not have to unplug and plug other leads in etc... (you all now what I mean!)

As for buying through Pixmania I did have a bit of a nightmare - the site just wouldn't work for me. I then had a brainwave - ordered it through Amazon who are partners with Pixmania. Also, like others have already stated here, I did receive two euro plug convertors

There are lots more for me to play with, namely the bravia sync with TV and BD player. It is nice just having the one remote to use.

Overal, there are obviously better amp and speakers out there, but if your like me and this is your price range I can not recommend this highly enough.

I know I have already stated this in previous posts, but thanks again for the original post by Godfarter and all the advice from Rottenfox. God knows what I would have ended up with!! Right, I'm off for some more COD.

Good post Geezer

Pretty much sums up my experience.

Another thanks to Rottenfox for all us useful input

[djkay1982]

Originally Posted by RottenFox

lol..about the decorating, same here..old persons house.
"harvest vomit", woodchip, and "basket filled with rotten fruit" looking wallpaper from top to bottom..

as for your cables, hdmi's for these:

V+
Xbox
HD DVD player

and a single hdmi out to the tv.

for the sony dvd player, either connect the scart/component(better quality) directly to the tv, and connect its optical or digital coax audio out,to the 800.

brillant, thanks for the help matey.

yeah not the best is it, my house still smells of cottage pie n **** lol

so the leads i need to get is, a standard optical cable and a scart-component

with the scart/component can i get one with video and audio connectors?
do they do them? or would i need to run a seperate twin phono audio lead to the tv from the sony DVD player if i wanted to get audio thru the TV instead of the amp

thanks again

[RottenFox]

it depends on how you want to connect,really..i would connect component(red/blue/green) directly to the tv,and an optical lead to the 800.
you could connect component to the 800, but then you would need component out, so another expense there.

as for audio,yes,you would need to connect the red/white leads(seperately bought) from the dvd player, to the tv, if you wanted audio from the tv,instead of surround.

if you decided to connect with scart, to the tv, from the dvd player, you wouldnt need any external audio leads,from dvd to tv, as scart carries audio.
so all you would need is an optical cable from dvd player to the 800.

and scarts quality isnt as good as component,so thats something to remember.

[djkay1982]

ah thanks RF, didn't realise scart wasn't as good as component.

think i will follow your advice, and go for component from DVD to TV, then optical from DVD to amp.

i defo want the sound through the amp for the DVD player, was just thinking about sound from TV as well, so my bird doesn't struggle to watch her friends DVDs lol, it will only confuse her having to switch the amp on but again im not bothered about that so i wont bother lol

one last question am i best with a component to component then? rather than scart to component? is that better quality than scart to component?

cheers bud

[RottenFox]

scart to component wont work, and component - component is far better quality than scart.
so component from dvd player, to component in, on tv.
optical lead from dvd player, to optical audio in, on 800.
analogue phono(red/white) audio leads,from dvd player, to analogue audio in(component audio it might be labelled as, but its more than likely going to be smack bang right next to the component in's on the tv), on the tv.

[c20h25n3o]

I brought the blown-up speaker to the Sony service center. Damn it, 2 weeks of regular sound again.
I was just getting used to everything in 5.1. .
Nice to see so many new owners, this set is such great value for your money!