Onkyo TX-NR609, side v rear settings and no surround sound

[markfay]

Sorry two questions. Hope as a newie that doesn't break any protocols?

1) I'm just got a Onkyo 609, when I set up the speakers the graphics on the TV screen showed my rears as the side speakers, i.e they lit up with the sound. Is this correct? I have a 5:1 not 7:1 setup

2) possibly related, my DVD player is an old Pioneer DV-444 so am running digital out via coax for the sound, despite trying many settings on the 609 I can't get the sound set up properly. I can only get front stereo without any speech and have have only heard the rears (or sides!) kick in once when an explosion happened during the film.

What are the correct settings to get 5:1 sound?

thank you

 

[MaturityDodger]

Hi Mark, welcome to the forums.

1) Standard speaker config for 5.1 is 'Front left', 'front right', 'Surround left', 'Surround right', and 'centre'. It shouldn't be using 'Rear surround', or 'front height' channels.

2) The fact that speech is being filtered out of the front pair does suggest that there is a proper 5.1 signal there, instead of a problem like you're only getting 2 channels from source. It could be a problem with the setup of the speakers themselves.
Have you definitely got them plugged into the correct sockets on the 609?
Try going into the setup menu, and looking at the 'speaker level config'. As you go down the list of speakers, it should play some white noise through that speaker. Try this for the whole list, and see if that noise comes out of them all. From that info, I may be able to give better advice.

Have you been through the Audyssey auto-setup with the microphone? Did all the 'chirps' come out as expected?

 

[markfay]

Thanks so much audioE.

That's put my mind at rest on the side v back speaker issue. thank you

I've tried the white noise and correct! the centre speaker didn't work. The cable had slipped out during all my fiddling.

I then had surround sound stereo but cured that by switching the pioneer to pcm.

The Onkyo now says PLII movie. is this the best setting?

many thanks for your help

Mark

 

[MaturityDodger]

The Onkyo now says PLII movie. is this the best setting?

Good question.
"Best" is such a subjective word to use here. In theory, Pure Direct is the 'best' as it gives the purest signal path, and so the best sound quality. It will reproduce the 6-channel audio as encoded on the disc. But you might decide that you prefer the overall result if you take a hit on the sound purity and use a mode that applies some additional processing. You could find it works better for you, as it can inject more excitement and realism in systems, particularly when the room setup isn't ideal.
So try a few modes, and see which you like best. You could have a different favourite mode for different genres of film.

You'll always need an AVR processing mode if you're using a non-native speaker format. (e.g. stereo source, 5.1 output. Or 5.1 source, 7.1 output)

I couldn't be entirely certain, but I thought I had to switch my source to 'bitstream', not PCM to make it work properly with my Onkyo 508.
You can be certain you've got the proper multichannel input by setting the AVR to Pure Direct mode, and checking you still have sound from all speakers.

Also, make sure the AVR knows that you've got 5.1 speakers, not either of the 7.1 configurations. If it thinks you've got extra speakers then it'll send some effects to those channels instead of the channels you really have.

 

[markfay]

many thanks. I like a fairly pure sound when listening to CD's but for movies like to have a bit more excitement as you said.

I'll experiment and find what suits us and try the pure direct 'test'

thank you for all your advice.

Mark

 

[MaturityDodger]

In that case you'd want to use pure direct mode for CDs. Note that this won't give you any sound through the centre and surrounds.
I think it won't use the subwoofer either. So if your front speakers are particularly small and you feel that they lack bass, you might get better results from a 2.1 mode. In any case, I'd avoid any 5.1 upmixing for stereo music.

 

[markfay]

the front speakers are Cambridge Audio floor standers and yes I find the sub woofer too much when using a stereo source. Great for films though.