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Need help hooking up cable box to the receiver (1 Viewer)

vasia

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I am trying to hook up Motorola digital cable box DCT2500 to my Marantz SR8300 receiver. I connected digital out of the DCT2500 (did not have optical out) to the digital in of the Marantz and it plays fine. THe only problem is that even when the program is listed on the TV as Dolby Digital, the receiver still shows getting just a PCM stream. Is there a setting in the digital cable box to enable digital output? I cannot find a manual for this thing on the web and the cable guy did not have it either.
 

vasia

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I am trying to hook up Motorola digital cable box DCT2500 to my Marantz SR8300 receiver. I connected digital out of the DCT2500 (did not have optical out) to the digital in of the Marantz and it plays fine. THe only problem is that even when the program is listed on the TV as Dolby Digital, the receiver still shows getting just a PCM stream. Is there a setting in the digital cable box to enable digital output? I cannot find a manual for this thing on the web and the cable guy did not have it either.
 

Jeff Gatie

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Depending on the cable company, the digital audio is usually located on the "Setup" menu available from the onscreen display. Look at your setup manu and see if there is a setting for "audio". Change it to "bitstream" or "digital". You may also want to call your cable company and request a knowledgable tech (one who knows more than the first guy to answer the phone!).
 

Jeff Gatie

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Depending on the cable company, the digital audio is usually located on the "Setup" menu available from the onscreen display. Look at your setup manu and see if there is a setting for "audio". Change it to "bitstream" or "digital". You may also want to call your cable company and request a knowledgable tech (one who knows more than the first guy to answer the phone!).
 

Wayne A. Pflughaupt

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Are you referring to broadcast TV shows (i.e., ABC, NBC etc.)? If so, that’s only for the HD reception. Your cable box probably isn’t doing HD. Typically “digital cable” only delivers 5.1 on the premium movie channels.

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt
 

Wayne A. Pflughaupt

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Are you referring to broadcast TV shows (i.e., ABC, NBC etc.)? If so, that’s only for the HD reception. Your cable box probably isn’t doing HD. Typically “digital cable” only delivers 5.1 on the premium movie channels.

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt
 

vasia

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No, I mean just premium movie channels. My receiver is not receiving 5.1, just PCM. I am sure Jeff is correct, its just setting set to output analog, but without manual it was a bit confusing how to change settings. Has anyone had similar issues?
 

vasia

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No, I mean just premium movie channels. My receiver is not receiving 5.1, just PCM. I am sure Jeff is correct, its just setting set to output analog, but without manual it was a bit confusing how to change settings. Has anyone had similar issues?
 

vasia

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Well, I spoke with Comcast about it and here is a little lesson in Comcast attitude towards its customers. I hope I understood them correctly, since neither of two techs I spoke with seemed to be willing to really tell me what is happening. They do send DD signal and the cable box I have says DD on it, but they "do not support it". What that means, is that this function is disabled during setup (that's what I understood from their less then willing desctription) and they would not enable it. YOU CANNOT ACCESS SETUP ON CABLE BOX!!!! To get DD, you'll need HD cable box, which costs much more, so I gues that's the real answer, the only caveat you cannot hook up HD box to regular TV (at least according to the techs). So, bye bye DD content, thanks Comcast.
 

vasia

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Well, I spoke with Comcast about it and here is a little lesson in Comcast attitude towards its customers. I hope I understood them correctly, since neither of two techs I spoke with seemed to be willing to really tell me what is happening. They do send DD signal and the cable box I have says DD on it, but they "do not support it". What that means, is that this function is disabled during setup (that's what I understood from their less then willing desctription) and they would not enable it. YOU CANNOT ACCESS SETUP ON CABLE BOX!!!! To get DD, you'll need HD cable box, which costs much more, so I gues that's the real answer, the only caveat you cannot hook up HD box to regular TV (at least according to the techs). So, bye bye DD content, thanks Comcast.
 

vasia

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Hi Rick,
Yes, I know, but even in that case received shows Dolby D (I have a buch of russian DVDs with 2channel DD). The cable box just does not output DD signal at all and that's what I was told. I suspect that it can be selected to do so from setup menu, but set up cannot be accessed.
 

Wayne A. Pflughaupt

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Again, that should not apply to premium movie channels. I don’t have digital cable, but my understanding is that you can get 5.1 from HBO, etc.

Of course, your local company would have to be supporting it. Try calling them again and ask about 5.1 for the movie channels (unless of course, you’re only interested it getting it for network TV programming).

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt
 

vasia

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That exactly true and that's what I asked them. The botton line is that the description of the program says it is Dolby Digital, the cable box has Dolby Digital logog on it, but when I asked Comcast tech, the answer was that they do not support it! Moreover, if I had their HD box, which is more expensive and they claim I cannot use with regular TV, I'll get 5.1 would be just fine. So I assume their "not support" just means that it is disabled in the cable box and they do not allow customers to change cable box setup (setup button on the remote simply does not work).
 

Chuck Mullen

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The HD converters have composite and s-video outputs that are active at all times and will work with any TV. They are expensive for Comcast to buy so they only want to give them to customers that have an HD set. What I did was order one and when the installation tech asked me why there was no HD set for him to hook it up to, I just told him it was on order and I knew how to hook it up when I got my new TV.;)

I have had several of the SD digital STB's from Comcast and have never even had a digital audio output on one so I can't help you on that. (BTW, they have all had the DD logo on the front.)
 

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