New AVR needed as current doesn't support HDCP 2.2 - Budget £600-800

[firstborn]

Hi,

Following a recent house move and upgrade of TV to LG 65CX - I'd just found the time to set-up speakers (7.1 Q Acoustics 3010/3020 + Dali sub) and AVR (DENON AVRX-5200) - hadn't given it a second thought but then realised that I can't route Sky UHD through it as it's not HDCP2.2 compliant. I also have a Panasonic DP-UB820

As an interim I'm using Sky Q into TV and Sky Q audio into amp via optical, but I think it's time to update the AVR.

I was fortunate to get the AVRX-5200 at a really good price at the time, but budget will be more conservative now at around £600-800.

Any recommendations? Thoughts on the DENON AVR-X2700H?

Thanks

 

[firstborn]

What about using ARC to get audio, then plugging everything into the TV for the time being?

In the meanwhile, save for a better AVR.

AVR doesn't support ARC either - or maybe it does... spec sheet said no, but it appears to have an ARC/HDMI connector. I think I'll go with that if it does. Thanks.

Issue with hdmi 2.1/2.2 as need add on box.

Leave it another gen for hdmi 2.1

No idea what that means, sorry.

 

[firstborn]

What about using ARC to get audio, then plugging everything into the TV for the time being?

In the meanwhile, save for a better AVR.

So SKY UHD up and running over ARC, with some surround audio success. Blu-ray player, due to limited bandwidth over ARC will only give me stereo - AVR doesn't support eARC, or I go through AVR and it's limited to 1080p with full audio.

Time for a new amp!

 

[firstborn]

The Pana 820 has two sets of HDMI out. One of them is for an Audio Out via-HDMI connection direct to an AV receiver that doesn't pass full fat 4K picture. *** This describes your situation exactly ***

Send full fat 4K direct to the TV from HDMI 1 on the 820.

Send audio only in Dolby True HD and DTS HD Master Audio direct to the amp from HDMI 2 on the 820.

Problem solved.

Ohhh, ffs! Thanks! And I mean THANKS!!

 

[firstborn]

For any casual readers here who are wondering what the issue is in relation to the comment by @theone8181 regarding 4K/10bit for Sky. The Denon amp doesn't support Hybrid Log Gamma (HLG). This is how Sky sends HDR signals for any UHD content with a bigger colour palette than the standard 8-bit used for SD (576i) and HD (1080i) broadcasts.

The AVR-X5200 does have support for something called Deep Colour, and it has that in both 10-bit (1024 steps) and 12-bit (4096 steps) versions, but that's not the same as HLG or HDR10 or Dolby Vision.

Deep Color / Deep Colour works within the boundaries of the colour range defined by the 8-bit colour system, but it has the potential to use more steps in order to reduce colour banding. This would reduce the steps in colour you might see in a black to dark blue graduated background.

HLG, HDR10 and Dolby Vision all use a bigger colour range, so although we talk about 10-bit and 12-bit colour for these systems, the positions of red and green and blue are spread much further apart with the UHD colour range than with HD. This is why the AVR-X5200 can work with Deep Colour but can't pass HLG, HDR10 and Dolby Vision.

Devices with HDMI sockets uses a communication handshake to set a common set of standards between all the devices in the chain. For example, if I try to set up a BD player with 24 frames per second output with a TV that doesn't support it, I'll either get a message as such, or the player will default to 50Hz / 60Hz playback and ignore my preference. The same would happen if I tried to set HLG as an output option where some device in the video chain going to the display didn't support that standard.

Sky's implementation of UHD 4K and HLG doesn't help matters. The Q box can be set to 2160p (UHD) which simply means it's upscaling all non-UHD content to the UHD resolution. In theory, a user could have the box set to UHD output but never watch any real UHD content because they don't have the right subscription package to access anything better than SD and HD 1080i.

Access to HLG is also dependent on the subscription package and the content. The Q box setting is 10-bit, but unless playing a downloaded UHD-res film with HLG, or watching a premium UHD sports channel, then the box will never output a HLG-enhanced video signal.

@lucid so where does HDCP come into all this? I assumed all my problems where related to the 5200 only being HDCP2.1 and @theone8181 seems to have a HDCP2.2 compliant AVR.

If I did buy a new amp that states 'HDMI: Dolby Vision / HDR 10+ / Dynamic HDR / HLG' and HDCP2.3 compliant - would all source work through the AVR properly and hence single cable to TV?

Thanks