Dolby Pro Logic IIx, stereo and 5.1

dl8860

dl8860

dl8860

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On my newly setup Denon X2000, when I watch HD channels from my Sky+HD box it says it is outputting Dolby Pro Logic IIx, and I can clearly hear that I am getting 5.1, or rather 5.0 through my speakers (no sub yet)

However, when I watch non-hd (with stereo source), it will only output stereo sound, through my front left and right.

But isn't the whole point of Dolby Pro Logic to take a stereo source and split it into 5.1? I can't find any options or settings to override how the amp decodes the audio signal. What am I missing here?
 
On my Denon, it remembers the last setting. So if I have been listening to a source in stereo, next time I do if will still be stereo, UNLESS it gets a proper Multi Channel source(DD DTS HD etc), in that case it switches to them. A lot of the Sky channels you will get a form of Dolby Digital if you change the HDMI output in Sky box sound menu.
 
dl8860 said:
On my newly setup Denon X2000, when I watch HD channels from my Sky+HD box it says it is outputting Dolby Pro Logic IIx, and I can clearly hear that I am getting 5.1, or rather 5.0 through my speakers (no sub yet)

However, when I watch non-hd (with stereo source), it will only output stereo sound, through my front left and right.

But isn't the whole point of Dolby Pro Logic to take a stereo source and split it into 5.1? I can't find any options or settings to override how the amp decodes the audio signal. What am I missing here?
Click to expand...

Are you saying you can't hear anything at all from your rear speakers ever, or is it just not very loud? As in put your ear right next to the speaker and flick through a few channels with a range of audio goings-on.

I have the same receiver but don't have sky. When watching standard def TV I have it set to PL II Cinema (I think it's a category under the red button, but it may be green as VincentHanna says. It's the left most coloured button I believe!). If I put my ear to the speaker I can hear faint mumblings but that's about it most of the time. Only when there a effects, i.e. bullets flying around do you hear anything from the rears, but that's exactly the point of the rears. They're not supposed to be on all the time, the sound is supposed to come from in front of you, i.e. where the TV is.
 
The answers here cover the basics of it. While the amp will do a lot of stuff automatically for you depending on the signal it sees, there are times when you might have to intervene manually either by choice or because there's a setting on the amp that means it defaults to stereo. In short then, what you should do is read the user manual. The more you are familiar with the manual then the better your understanding will be of how and why the amp operates in the way it does. That then feeds back to make the manual easier to understand.. and so on and so on.
 
I have a Humax Freesat box.

The HD channels are in Multi Channel surround sound, but all the standard def channels are in stereo, so I have to manually change them to surround if I want the centre speaker in use.
 
Haven't used your amp in particular, but I assume you have set the Sky HD box to output Dolby Digital over HDMI in the options?

Would think your sound settings also want setting to "DOLBY DIGITAL + PLIIx Cinema" rather than just "PLIIx", as this should pass through any Dolby encoded streams 5.1, and expand any Stereo sources.

Note that the sound settings should be per source, so e.g. you will need to change your SkyHD source, your bluray source and any games console source.


Looking through the manual it's quite vague about how it handles different sources - e.g. on my Sony it has an ESurround mode that basically says, if it's already a multi-channel source e.g. DTS or Dolby then decode it, otherwise if it's a Stereo source enhance it using Prologic or DTS Connect.
 
Ah thanks guys, the coloured buttons at the bottom did the job. I just assumed they were gimmicky presets, like the 'football mode' on my TV or something like that
 
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