Receiver question (1 Viewer)

[Carletta]

I have a Sony STR/DE 698 7-1 receiver which works perfectly with my HD TV. The DTS decoder on the receiver is great and flashes as a blue light when a DVD movie plays with dts. The sound quality is perfect across my 7 speakers with excellent sound separation. However, I recently purchased a blu ray player with dts. The dts won't kick in on the receiver and the sound quality is less than it was with a regular DVD player. The receiver does not have HDMI. What is the problem and can you recommend a suitable receiver if I have to buy a new one? I'm not looking for multi-zone ability such as a Denon but I do think I need a 7-1 to get the ultimate sound separation if they make one.

 

[David Willow]

Hi Carletta,

What brand/model Blu-Ray do you have? How do you have it connected to your Sony?

DTS requires a digital connection. You have to use either the digital coax or optical cable.

 

[Carletta]

The blu ray is a Samsung High Def BD-P1400/XA. It is connected to the receiver via Digital Coax but DTS won't kick in. If I unhook and replace with my regular DVD player using Coax, then the DTS lights up on the receiver.. My guess is the receiver doesn't recognize the DTS on blu rays.

 

[gene c]

Try going into the BluRay player's setup menu and change the audio output from PCM to Bitsream.

 

[Carletta]

There is no selection for bitstream. Is this called something else?

 

[gene c]

I have a Samsung BD-1400 (but without the /XA suffix) and PCM and Bitstream are the only two options in the setup menu. What options are you seeing? Are you in a different country than the U.S? I can't seem to find the BD-P1400/XA on the internet.

 

[Carletta]

I experienced a lot of play back problems with the Samsung Blu R., so I took it back to the store and got an Insignia 1080 from Best Buy. I could try what you suggested about the Bitstrem and go to the set up menu on the blu R to change the audio output from PCM to Bitsream. What do I change on the Receiver, if anything, to get the DTS to kick in?

 

[gene c]

The Sony STR-DE698 does allow you to change the "Digital Input Decoding Priority" from DCE.Auto to Dec.PCM. The default setting for the DVD input is PCM. If you are having trouble getting a DTS signal then change the Decode Priority to Auto and see what happens. See pg. 40 of the manual. If you don't have the manual, look here.

 

[Carletta]

Ok understand. I'll try it and let you know.....Thanks

 

[Jeff Gatie]

Please note that Blu-ray downmixes DTS to the full bitrate DTS core (1.5 mbs vs. the 640kbs DTS in most DVD's). Some legacy receivers, particularly budget Sony models, used a DTS decoder that is unable to process full bitrate DTS.

This posed no problem for DVD, because the number of titles with full bitrate DTS can be counted on one hand (an example is the original Saving Private Ryan DTS only release). But since Blu-ray downmixes to full bitrate, the problem has been seen more often.