LGBD390 Blue Ray hook-up

[aoapd]

I have just purchased an LGBD390 blue ray player. I have a Pioneer VSX-14 Receiver with Dolby and Dolby Pro Logic, which I use an Optical input. When I play a regular DVD in the Blue Ray I have great sound ie. all channels work and show up on the receiver. When I play a Blue Ray disc The sound is diminished and I have to turn the volume up to enjoy plus the seperate channels don't show on the front of the receiver display. Can you tell me if I am doing something wrong or does the blue ray disc format for audio not able to play thru my receiver since it is about 10 years old?

[MrBoylan]

Originally Posted by aoapd

I have just purchased an LGBD390 blue ray player. I have a Pioneer VSX-14 Receiver with Dolby and Dolby Pro Logic, which I use an Optical input. When I play a regular DVD in the Blue Ray I have great sound ie. all channels work and show up on the receiver. When I play a Blue Ray disc The sound is diminished and I have to turn the volume up to enjoy plus the seperate channels don't show on the front of the receiver display. Can you tell me if I am doing something wrong or does the blue ray disc format for audio not able to play thru my receiver since it is about 10 years old?

Hi,

You are experiencing the joys of using a 2009 source component with a 1999 receiver. Blu-ray Disc is designed for backwards compatibility but this doesn't mean "backwards perfection."

Assuming a receiver upgrade is not in the cards (though you should strongly consider getting an HDMI-compatible receiver for best performance), you have a couple of options if you want to get the best sound.

First of all, make sure the digital audio output on the player is set for "Primary Pass-thru" and not "PCM" or "DTS-reencode." This should get you a standard 640 KBPS Dolby Digital signal from your optical output when listening to Blu-ray Discs with Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus or Dolby TrueHD soundtracks. If you're only getting 2 channel indicators on your receiver now, then it sounds like it is getting a PCM stereo signal instead of Dolby Digital 5.1.

But considering the fact that your receiver does not even support DTS decoding, the best quality option for your specific system is probably going to be using the BD390's multi-channel analog outputs instead of the digital output. Doing this allows the player to decode Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD and multi-channel L-PCM soundtracks into multi-channel analog outputs. Then all your receiver needs to do is amplify these channels and send them out to your speakers.

Your user manual does not appear to be available online, but the Pioneer VSX-14 product page does say this about the receiver:

"6 Channel Input with independent remote controlled gain adjustment for center and right / left rear levels, and sub"

To take advantage of this you will need 6 RCA cables (or 3 stereo pairs of interconnects) connected between the player's 5.1 channel output and the receiver's 6-channel input. You will also need to configure the BD 390 for 5.1 channel output instead of 2-ch or 7.1-ch output (in the "Audio... Speaker Set-up" menu).

You may notice that the overall volume is lower this way (and specifically the subwoofer output), but this is normal. It just means you may need to crank up the volume on the receiver a bit to compensate. Also, because the subwoofer level is generally recorded on the disc at 10 dB below where it "should" be, you might need to adjust the actual volume or gain knob on your subwoofer itself to get adequate bass.

The nice thing about your unit is that you should have independent level adjustments on the remote for center, surround and subwoofer channels, so you should be able to dial things in to your liking right from your couch.

Good luck and if you need some tips about how to set-up the analog outputs of your player, check out our tutorial on the subject:

How To Set up a Blu-ray Player Using Multi-Channel Analog Outputs... And Why: BigPictureBigSound

Let us know if you need further help.

Regards,

-Chris

[aoapd]

Chris
Thank you very much for this info. I thought I would have to hook up the analog instead and I appreciate your expertise. What a great site and it's because of you. Have a great day.

[aoapd]

One more question. I have 6 cables coming from the blue ray and only 2 inputs (L&R ) going into the receiver for the DVD input. How do I proceed.

[MrBoylan]

Originally Posted by aoapd

One more question. I have 6 cables coming from the blue ray and only 2 inputs (L&R ) going into the receiver for the DVD input. How do I proceed.

I wish I could help you there, but I don't have a copy of the manual, nor could I even find a decent photo of the jack pack (that thing is ancient!).

Did you check in your manual for a note about a 6-channel analog input? Did you look closely at the input labels on the back of the receiver to see if the center, subwoofer and left/right surround inputs are off to the side somewhere? They aren't always grouped together. If you can upload a picture of the back of your receiver (please use MACRO focus mode - the little flower icon on most digital cameras) or if you can scan in the relevant section of the manual then I might be able to help more.

Regards,

-Chris

[aoapd]

Hi Chris,
This unit does not have 6-channel analog input, I'm positve. I did look at the online link ans I do see it mentioned there but that must have been for a more recent model with the same model number.
It looks like I will have to deal with the optical cord hook up for now. All DVD's play well with the 6 channel seperation, I will just have to settle for diminished sound when I watch a blue ray.
I guess the main thing for best sound with this combination is to set the SPDIF output signal to "primary pass thru". Do I have to set the HDMI output to anything even though it's not being used?
Again thanks for all your help. I appreciate your time and effort.

[MrBoylan]

Originally Posted by aoapd

Hi Chris,
This unit does not have 6-channel analog input, I'm positve. I did look at the online link ans I do see it mentioned there but that must have been for a more recent model with the same model number.
It looks like I will have to deal with the optical cord hook up for now. All DVD's play well with the 6 channel seperation, I will just have to settle for diminished sound when I watch a blue ray.
I guess the main thing for best sound with this combination is to set the SPDIF output signal to "primary pass thru". Do I have to set the HDMI output to anything even though it's not being used?
Again thanks for all your help. I appreciate your time and effort.

Bummer there's no multi-channel analog inputs. I saw someone else mention in an online review that their VSX-11 (one step down from yours) does have external inputs but that model doesn't have a built-in Dolby Digital decoder (only pro logic) so that makes sense. Back then some DVD players had built in Dolby Digital and DTS decoders with their own sets of analog multi-channel outputs. Weird that the Pioneer site would get it wrong on the VSX-14, but stranger things have happened.

Does your receiver have DTS? Because that was not mentioned on the product page so I'm assuming it's not there either. Without DTS, you're stuck in that there is no one setting that is optimal for all discs. You can set HDMI audio to 2-ch PCM (or turn HDMI audio off entirely if there is an option to do so in the menu), and set SPDIF to Primary Pass-Thru. This should get you standard Dolby Digital sound on Blu-ray Discs which have Dolby TrueHD. The one caveat there is that some of the early Dolby Digital decoders (and your receiver is one of the earliest models with Dolby Digital) have trouble decoding a 640 KBPS Dolby Digital signal which is the internal "companion track" that you'll find on most Dolby TrueHD Blu-ray soundtracks. The usual symptom is either no sound at all or sound that stutters. If either of these occurs, then you'll need to set your SPDIF output to PCM instead, but then you only get 2-channel sound (not 5.1).

But with DTS it's even worse. If your receiver does not have DTS, then you'll have to switch your S/PDIF digital output to PCM Stereo in order to get any sound at all from DTS discs and this means no discrete surround sound. Just plain old boring stereo (or at best, matrixed surround).

Also keep in mind that any settings you make to the S/PDIF output will apply to both DVDs and Blu-ray Discs. So if you set S/PDIF to "PCM" it will be a 2-channel PCM output for everything and you'll need to manually change it back to Primary Pass-Thru when watching DVDs.

If your receiver supported DTS, you could just set the player to "DTS re-encode" and this would allow you to get discrete multi-channel sound from everything with one setting (the player would re-encode all Blu-ray sountracks as 1504 KBPS DTS 5.1). But as it is, with an older Dolby Digital-only receiver, your options are pretty limited.

BTW, Pioneer makes HDMI-equipped receivers with on-board decoding of Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD in the $400 price range now. Grant Clauser reviewed one recently and found it to be a strong performer:

Pioneer VSX-919AH Home Theater Receiver: Review by Grant Clauser on BigPictureBigSound

The Elite models are a bit more expensive but still pretty affordable. Getting this or another HDMI-capable receiver would be your best bet, if not now, then somewhere down the line.

Good luck!

-Chris

[Matthew]

I plan to buy the Pioneer VSX919AH or Pioneer VSX1019AH Or
Yamaha V465 with the PS3. I'm confused about the 1080P video.
If I connect the HDMI from the PS3 to the receiver, the HDMI
from the receiver to the HDTV will I get true 1080p? The
specs on the 465 says it doesn't upscale to1080p. Does the
PS3 take care of that? Also I read not to get a receiver that has
HDMI pass through which 465 has.

[MrBoylan]

Originally Posted by Matthew

I plan to buy the Pioneer VSX919AH or Pioneer VSX1019AH Or
Yamaha V465 with the PS3. I'm confused about the 1080P video.
If I connect the HDMI from the PS3 to the receiver, the HDMI
from the receiver to the HDTV will I get true 1080p? The
specs on the 465 says it doesn't upscale to1080p. Does the
PS3 take care of that? Also I read not to get a receiver that has
HDMI pass through which 465 has.

Answered over in another thread:

confused about upscaling receivers vs PS3 blu-ray

Short answer: any of these receivers will do. The Yamaha RX-V465 does not have analog to digital video transcoding or upconversion, but you don't need this if you are only connecting high def sources via HDMI. The RX-V465 will happily pass through a 1080p signal from the PS3 and a 1080i signal from your cable or satellite box. The PS3 does upscale standard def content to 1080p over HDMI if you have it set up to do so.

-CB