Onkyo tx-sr607 remote question

[Muttleyuk]

Hi

I currently have a Samsung UE-46B6000 LED TV and a Sky+ HD Box, and I would like to add an Onkyo TX-SR607 Amp.
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The TV is mounted on the wall and the Sky box is in a cabinet/sideboard below it. Because this cabinet has no glass doors, I need some way of controlling the Sky box without having the doors open. I've just used one of those 'magic eye' extenders and this works fine.
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Before I buy the Onkyo though, I want to know that I can control the volume of the amp in some way, again, without the doors open.

So, it will be all HDMI:
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Sky+ HD box -> TX-SR607 -> UE46B6000
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I understand that the TV uses the HDMI CEC control (Samsung Anynet+) as does the amplifier (Onkyo RIHD).
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My question really, is this:
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Using the TV remote, routed through the TV IR receiver and passed over HDMI, could I adjust the volume of the amplifier? I've read other posts on here saying that the other way around (using the amp remote) will display a volume indicator on the TV, but that's all.

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Thanks in advance for any help

 

[logiciel]

The first thing I would say is don't locate any amplifier inside any enclosure!
They need their ventilation and all I'd ever have above one is the ceiling.
The second is that in addition to the HDMI from SkyHD to Onky you'll need an optical audio connection, which you'll force to take precedence over the HDMI audio.
That's because Sky put out only stereo sound through their HDMI, and for 5:1 you need the optical.

 

[Muttleyuk]

Thanks for the response.

I did read that Sky needs an optical cable for the 5.1 and that's no problem.

I agree that the amp should be well ventilated, but the cabinet is massive and I'm going to leave the back of it off so I think it should be ok.

With that in mind, do you know if the CEC volume would work?

 

[logiciel]

That's OK, and good to hear you'd caught on to Sky's stupid HDMI limitation.
As far as I know the Onkyo system is meant to work only with other Onkyo devices but could be wrong.
The same would apply to Anynet for Samsung devices.
There was another point in your first post: "(using the amp remote) will display a volume indicator on the TV" - that applies only to composite video sources.
The answer could be to replace the "eye" with a simple IR Extender, that would control everything inside the (hot!) cabinet.

 

[Muttleyuk]

I decided to bite the bullet yesterday and just buy it.
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For anybody interested, it is indeed possible to do this.
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It would appear that the HDMI CEC control does provide a certain degree of interoperability between manufacturers, and that it's rebranded, in Samsung's case, Anynet+ and in Onkyo's case, RIHD.
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See here:
HDMI - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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From what I understand, certain manufacturers implementations of CEC may differ and so you may not always be so lucky.
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Anyway, all I needed to do was go to the amplifier setup, then 7.) Hardware Setup -> 3.) HDMI -> RHID on. (off by default).
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I can now use my TV remote (or my Sky remote) to change the volume of the amp via the TV receiver with the amp completely hidden away
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On the TV, it actually displays 'TX-SR607' when changing the volume.
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The TV speakers are automatically muted too! Job done!
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I'll keep an eye on the temps! Thanks for your help, logiciel... hopefully I've repaid the favour by helping somebody else