Optical to coaxial

Barcelonic · 09-11-2009, 7:56 PM

Apologies if this isnt in the right section.

My dad's got a surround sound system with a coaxial input but no optical input. I've just bought him a WD Live HD media player which has both HDMI and optical outputs.

For some reason he's having difficulty getting the TV's AV5 channel (media player) to send sound through the surround sound system instead of the TV, and as the files use DTS audio it would only play as stereo anyway (even through the surround sound system).

So what I want to do is use the optical out on the back of the media player to send sound to the surround sound system. Because that would be 5.1 as it wouldnt need to be downmixed for HDMI passthrough. But as the surround sound system only has coaxial input, if i got an optical-to-coaxial converter from Maplin would it still be 5.1, would i lose quality and if so how much?

Thanks guys

Jamie · 09-11-2009, 8:39 PM

Yep the maplin adapter would be perfect for your needs. Co-ax and optical are both an equivelent signal just using a different type of connection.

As long as your Dads Surround can handle DTS (some earlier amps and current Panasonics don't) you'll be fine

Barcelonic · 09-11-2009, 9:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JimBobVFR400

Yep the maplin adapter would be perfect for your needs. Co-ax and optical are both an equivelent signal just using a different type of connection.

As long as your Dads Surround can handle DTS (some earlier amps and current Panasonics don't) you'll be fine

Thanks.

Can this decode DTS... DAV-DZ630 (DAVDZ630) : Technical Specifications : Home Cinema & Hi-Fi : Sony ?

josh92176 · 09-11-2009, 9:09 PM

The maplin adapter would work fine, but you can get the exact same thing here at amazon for £8 less (maplin deal £15 + £3 P&P) (amazon deal £9.90+free P&P)

-josh

josh92176 · 09-11-2009, 9:16 PM

As far as i can tell there is no digital coaxial in on your system (p97 of the manual). The coaxial means an aerial connection.

Please correct me if i'm wrong.

-josh

Barcelonic · 09-11-2009, 9:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by josh92176

As far as i can tell there is no digital coaxial in on your system (p97 of the manual). The coaxial means an aerial connection.

Please correct me if i'm wrong.

-josh

ye thats weird cus on there it says no coaxial but there was a picture of the coaxial input in the manual. unfortunately i dont have easy access to the back of the machine itself. i will have to double check this tho first.

thanks

Jamie · 09-11-2009, 10:56 PM

Looking at the spec the system is a DVD recorder, not just a player. So I'm guessing the co-ax input would be the aerial. Sonys website does confirm the amp has no digital inputs, either optical or co-ax.

The unit does have an analogue RCA input so thats the best you are going to get. In theory the Sony will take this stereo input and produce a psuedo surround effect using Dolby Pro-Logic.

Barcelonic · 09-11-2009, 11:33 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JimBobVFR400

Looking at the spec the system is a DVD recorder, not just a player. So I'm guessing the co-ax input would be the aerial. Sonys website does confirm the amp has no digital inputs, either optical or co-ax.

The unit does have an analogue RCA input so thats the best you are going to get. In theory the Sony will take this stereo input and produce a psuedo surround effect using Dolby Pro-Logic.

sheet gutted, o well. thanks anyway. i guess ill have to turn my attention to getting the sound through the tv to the surround system.

its weird it'll play the sound from the tv channels but not from the AV channels. hmm...

josh92176 · 10-11-2009, 4:46 PM

Just to confirm, it is impossible to get true surround sound (i.e not upmixed from stereo) from the WD box via those speakers (at least without buying extra hardware).

However you are having trouble getting stereo sound from from the WD media player to the speakers? I assume your current setup is that you currently have the WD box connected to the tv via hdmi and the tv sending sound to the dvd recorder via stereo rca plugs?

If so your problem could be that: the WD box is set to send surround sound instead of stereo over the hdmi and the tv cannot downmix this to stereo or the tv simply cannot pass-through the sound from av channels to the receiver. If it is the second scenario (worth experimenting and looking at the settings on the tv and WD media player first) then you will need to run the sound over stereo rca cables directly from the WD media player to the DVD recorder.

Hope this has been of some help

-josh

Barcelonic · 10-11-2009, 5:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by josh92176

Just to confirm, it is impossible to get true surround sound (i.e not upmixed from stereo) from the WD box via those speakers (at least without buying extra hardware).

However you are having trouble getting stereo sound from from the WD media player to the speakers? I assume your current setup is that you currently have the WD box connected to the tv via hdmi and the tv sending sound to the dvd recorder via stereo rca plugs?

If so your problem could be that: the WD box is set to send surround sound instead of stereo over the hdmi and the tv cannot downmix this to stereo or the tv simply cannot pass-through the sound from av channels to the receiver. If it is the second scenario (worth experimenting and looking at the settings on the tv and WD media player first) then you will need to run the sound over stereo rca cables directly from the WD media player to the DVD recorder.

Hope this has been of some help

-josh

thanks for ur help - i connected the WD media player directly to the surround system with the red and white jacks. the audio is in stereo and has lost quality but at least its playing through and as you said id need new hardware which isnt going to happen. the main thing is my dad can now enjoy H.264 HD video files on his HDTV and i made sure to get the WD Live player because it's the cheapest media player i could find that is able to downmix DTS audio!