Panasonic BD35 audio problem (1 Viewer)

[lxmarch]

Panasonic BD35 audio problem

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I am interested to see if anyone here has experienced a similar problem to the one I find with my Panasonic BD35 and my Onkyo 606 receiver.

My player is set to bitstream and secondary audio is set to off. I choose Dolby TrueHD from the disc menu but my receiver indicates only a Dolby Digital signal, not Dolby TrueHD. All my settings are correct as far as I know. I have tried speaking with tech reps from Onkyo and Panasonic but it is useless.

The audio doesn't sound bad by any means but I am concerned about not getting what I expected, which is the ability to hear the Dolby TrueHD and DTS Master soundtracks.

Can anyone lend a hand here? Thank you, Laurie.

 

[gene c]

I have a Samsung BR player but it's hooked up via the analog inputs so I really don't have any experience with hdmi. Anyway, strangely, on pg 8 of the 35/55's manual TrueHD and DTS-MA are listed under Bistream "OFF". So, try turning Bitstream OFF and see what happens. I doubt this will help but it can't hurt to try.

You can also try using the 35's internal decoder by using the PCM output. I believe if you do it this way the 606 will not indicate TrueHD/DTS-MA but you might hear an increase in audio resolution.

 

[lxmarch]

Hi Gene. Thanks for your thoughts. I, too, am perplexed by the way the instructions on page 8 read but when I look at them closely I think under HDMI it is the secondary audio that is separated in to on and off, not the bitstream. I think the problem may be that the player is remaining in secondary audio on instead of off as I have set it in the menu. This would account for the conversion back to DD or DTS but not why Panasonic would pretend not to know anything about this.

I will try to send PCM and see if I can notice a difference but I am really trying to get the indicator on the Onkyo to light so I really know for sure what I'm getting. I'll post any results. Thanks again, Laurie

 

[David Willow]

Hi Laurie,

On the 606 display, are you seeing the the selected DSP or the actual detected sound format. You may have to cycle thru (use the display button on the remote).

 

[lxmarch]

No, unfortunately, I'm seeing the actual sound detected by the receiver. I've had conversations with both companies and it is clear they have no idea what is going on or how to fix it and much to my dismay, they don't seem all that interested to find out.

 

[gene c]

If you haven't seen it yet, look at the reply Brent S submitted in your other thread in the Audio/Video Sources forum.

 

[lxmarch]

Thanks for the heads up. I think he means selecting yes in the Restore Default Settings menu. If so, I did that already with no luck. I'm still searching for a solution. Thank you. Laurie

 

[lxmarch]

Well, thanks to all who contributed ideas to help with this problem. All ideas were good but the solution was a bit different. Bottom line- receiver now lights up for Dolby TrueHD and DTS HD! Here's the solution I found:

For some reason (which I still need to investigate), my BD 35 intermittently changes its resolution from 1080i back to 480p or 480i. Therefore, when I power up the player, I get those wavy lines and could not see or read the settings in the setup menu to change the resolution back. The way I had been fixing that issue was to press the stop and play buttons simultaneously on the unit for over 5 seconds. This is listed on page 39 of the manual for fixing a distorted picture or screen. It shifts the unit to a "more compatible mode with HDMI equipment" so you get a stable picture and can go normally back into the menu settings and reset the resolution. Fine. BUT---the next sentence in the manual states, "However, DD plus, Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD are not output in bitstream." What? Why is this? So, even though my subsequent menu settings looked correct and indicated bitstream was on and secondary audio was off, it was not passing the Dolby TrueHD or DTS-HD.

Therefore, I can not use the "press stop and play method" to get to a better resolution so that I could see the setup screens. I have to find a way around that but what I did for now was intuit the menu screens even though I couldn't actually see them. I remembered what they were and also used the manual to count down on the screens. I was able to reset the resolution to 1080i directly and when I popped in a disc, on popped the Dolby TrueHD indicator on the Onkyo!!!

Thanks to all who gave their time to help and I hope some of you out there who might have the same or similar issues will be helped by this. It would be nice if Onkyo and Panasonic took an interest in this issue. I'll try my best to get this info to them but I'm not exactly sure of how to best do that.

BTW, if anyone knows a reason for or a fix for the intermittent change in my resolution setting, please let me know.

Thanks to all, Laurie