Simple home theatre setup - receiver requirements?

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hardc0re

Gawd
Joined
Sep 19, 2006
Messages
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I have the following equipment I need to bring together with the least hassle possible (e.g without extra cables or pieces of equipment),

My plan is to get an entry level receiver but I'm having doubts with this setup as I may be forced to use optical cables instead of just HDMI because of the HDMI return channel constraint or perhaps I've misunderstood how this works. I have no experience with receivers and home theater setups so here goes... feedback is appreciated!

Pieces of equipment and connection methods:

- HD tv antenna = coax to the TV

- TV = HDMI to the receiver

- 2x 150 watt floor standing speakers (the reason I need the receiver) = speaker cables to receiver front channel

- the HTPC = HDMI to receiver

- the playstation 3 = HDMI to receiver
 
hardc0re said:
I have the following equipment I need to bring together with the least hassle possible (e.g without extra cables or pieces of equipment),

My plan is to get an entry level receiver but I'm having doubts with this setup as I may be forced to use optical cables instead of just HDMI because of the HDMI return channel constraint or perhaps I've misunderstood how this works. I have no experience with receivers and home theater setups so here goes... feedback is appreciated!

Pieces of equipment and connection methods:

- HD tv antenna = coax to the TV

- TV = HDMI to the receiver

- 2x 150 watt floor standing speakers (the reason I need the receiver) = speaker cables to receiver front channel

- the HTPC = HDMI to receiver

- the playstation 3 = HDMI to receiver
Click to expand...

If your TV and receiver are ARC compatible, there should be no need for optical cables. Just make sure that your ARC HDMI out on the receiver is going into the ARC input on the TV. I'm assuming you're wanting this for OTA TV and Smart TV functions?

The rest of the setup is fine. Anything coming in HDMI should be bitstreamed to, and decoded by the receiver (assuming the HTPC and PS3 have the right audio settings configured).
 
I don't think the TV has audio return, if it doesen't I guess I'll have to get the audio cable, but how will the PS3 and HTPC manage? I haven't seen any specs discussing this, would I also need audio cables for those too?
 
hardc0re said:
I don't think the TV has audio return, if it doesen't I guess I'll have to get the audio cable, but how will the PS3 and HTPC manage? I haven't seen any specs discussing this, would I also need audio cables for those too?
Click to expand...

Yeah, you'll want either an optical or digital coax cable for the OTA signal. White/red RCA cables would work too, but you'll only get stereo audio out of them. Set your TV to output audio through the AVR and you'll be good to go.

As for the PS3 and HTPC, as long as they're connected via HDMI, you won't really have to do anything. Audio and video are sent through HDMI, so you'll just need to make sure the AVR is on the correct input for each device.
 
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