best way to hook up my system? (1 Viewer)

[zsirhc]

i want my system to be hooked up correctly, not just however i can get everything to work.

hopefully you guys can help me out.
heres my equipment

samsung 72" dlp tv
harmon kardon AVR 247
the cable box is an explorer 8300HDC
playstation 3
and i have a 5.1 speaker set.
oh and a dvd/vcr combo so i can convert my vhs to dvd.

when i last had it all hooked up it was cable box, ps3, and vcr/dvd player into receiver with hdmi cables. the receiver hooked up to tv and i choose what to watch via the receiver.

then i disconnected the ps3 and connected it directly to the tv, cuz a guy at bestbuy told me that the ps3 has the best hd output. he wanted me to buy an hdmi 1000 cable(or something like that) its was pretty pricey so i held out, but if it does matter then i'll buy it.

thanks for the help.
sirhc

 

[SethH]

I would go back to the way you had it. Run everything to the receiver via HDMI and then run a single HDMI cable from the receiver to the tv. Don't buy really expensive HDMI cables, but do buy decent quality. Check out Blue Jeans Cables, Monoprice or Firefold for some good quality cables.

 

[chuckg]

Passing the HDMI signal from the PS3 through the receiver on its way to the TV is perfectly fine. The signal, being digital, will be just as good as going straight to the TV.

the folks at the stores don't always know so much...

And, as Seth said, don't bother with the ultra expensive cables. If you get a picture at all it will be as good as it can get- there's no way a cable can make a digital signal anything other than perfect or useless.

 

[zsirhc]

thanks,
i didnt think the wire would make that big a difference.
what about the audio, should i just use the audio that comes through the hdmi cables?
something i bought came with one of those optical audio cables. are those better or the same as the audio that comes through the hdmi?