There is one HDMI port on a Sky Plus box and I’m struggling to see how to change it to video only. There’s no menu setting which leaps out. It’s currently doing my head in.
When you say run the optical output to the 202 do you really mean run the optical output of the Sky Plus to a DAC and then the analogue output of that to the 202?
Sorry, I got confused and don’t know the skybox detail. For my Bluray players I run the HDMI video/audio output to the TV and run an optical output from the TVs to my DACs (Nova or NDX2). To play audio Blu-ray’s I also run opticals from the Blurays directly to the DACs. Not sure any of that helps you.
Think I’m out of my depth here tbh. Have wasted money on a DAC. Trying to avoid crashing downhill so will start again tomorrow and just start with moving the CDP to a different input and then take the XPS2 out and see what happens.
Ok mike HDMI can carry picture, 2 Chanel analog and multi channel digital all together. If you go with optical digital you still need to run some type of video cable. The pioneer Kuro is OLD I’m pretty sure no HDMI, it may have DVI and or component video for picture, I’m also pretty sure no Dolby Digital output. It also can’t do 4K and it maybe only about to do 720p or 1080i. FWIW I’m seeing 65” Sony OLED sets at holiday prices of $2000. !
No you haven’t wasted money on a Dac go to your Sky box settings and then to sound, show the optical cable . My suspicion is that if you just plug an optical cable and don’t adjust the settings you will get no sound.
It surely seems unlikely that the Sky box would have an optical out that is defunct with no actual sound output capability. Ergo there must be a way of configuring things to listen to said output, no?
Yes, there is and here it is. I have just bought a second hand Uniti Qute and have found that it is not enough to just attach wires you need to configure the source. If you don’t want to configure the sound, then maybe just attach some RCA cables to the 202 from the Skybox, but keep the TV out of the sound loop
Mike you are over-thinking this. You don’t have to give primacy to sound via optical. The Skybox is quite capable of outputting sound on both the HDMI and the optical at the same time. You probably need to make sure that the optical output from the Skybox is switched on in the Sky setup menu somewhere.
It will work Mike . The output of your Sky Box should also be set at PCM . I’m away from home at the moment so can’t see the box settings but if ever I’ve had a problem with TV sound it’s usually that setting.
Okay then. One at a time. The Kuro is a decade old and as I’ve already posted a few posts back it does have HDMI and that’s what’s sending picture and sound from the Sky box to the TV. The TV doesn’t do Dolby but then that’s irrelevant if what I’m trying to do is take sound from the optical out on the Sky box to the pre via a DAC. Yes, it does1080i but again it’s irrelevant to this.
Off topic but I’ve yet to see a better picture than a Kuro.
No, as I’ve also already posted, the dust covers were fully removed and there was no problem inserting the optical cable at either end.
Google is not my friend. I use DuckDuckGo
In any event I have my original (paper) Kuro manuals but, as already stated, short of finding some setting in there which rejects the audio via HDMI and thus forces the optical output to be selected then I don’t see it as relevant. This is all about explicitly bypassing the TV analogue or digital out.
@Ian2001 I have already posted about going into TV and Sky box settings but there is nothing relevant which impacts. The settings you show are the only ones I can see too but they have no impact. If I set HDMI to Dolby B then sound can be made to cease from the analogue out of the TV. If I then toggle the two optical settings neither produce sound. It’s that simple really. Those settings do not produce sound via the DAC.
There may be some merit in as you say forgetting about all this and just going analogue from Sky to pre but then the DVD would still need to either send analogue sound via the SCART to the TV and then onto the pre. That would defeat the simplification/isolation I’m trying to achieve here to narrow down the source of the sound issues.
@Pete.T the Sky output is definitely set to PCM. @davidhendon the only page in Sky settings of relevance is the one posted by @Ian2001 and messing with all the settings there literally does nothing.
Call back from Sky tech did come at 9am this morning. They don’t support non-standard set ups and weren’t even able to tell me what the optical output sends out. Posted on the Sky+ forum but no response. AV forum response so far has been to toggle between Dolby B and PCM. Well I think we’ve covered that one in enough detail here.
The way it should work is that the sound and picture go by HDMI to the TV. If the TV has speakers then you just turn the volume down to zero.
The sound then also at the same time comes out of the optical connection, if you have the settings as shown by lan2001. That optical connection goes to your DAC and from the DAC you have an analogue connection to your Naim preamp. You must have that audio input enabled on your Naim preamp.
Speakers for the Kuro were optional extras. There are no speakers built into the monitor. You could buy a pair of speakers to fit to the sides of the monitors if you so wished (I did), but they were extras !
The problem - if I understand correctly - is simply how to get the sound being out-putted from the optical out of the Sky box, via the new DAC, into a standard analogue input of the 202. There is no need to speculate on any other factors eg picture/HDMI/DVD etc.