[RileyM]

Hi All

I've just noticed the LG HX806SG Blu-Ray 3D Home Theatre System is at PC World for £159.00 in their 100 Hour Price Crash.

One question I have would be about connecting outputting audio from TV/Sky+HD into the system to get 5.1. The LG product page lists "Portable In" under Audio In. Ive not seen this before, what does it mean? Would it be possible at all?

My connections are currently as follows

Sky+HD 1TB -------------> HDMI -------> TV (Samsung LE32A457)
DVD Player ----------------> Scart ------> TV (Samsung LE32A457)
Netgeat EVA9150 ---------> HDMI -------> TV (Samsung LE32A457)
TV (Samsung LE32A457) -> Stereo RCA -> Old Skool Hifi system (TV speakers are crap).

As I say, i want to (prefferable) connect the TV audio to the system to get 5.1 for SkyHD stuff or content on my media reeiver, but if not possible I'd be happy to just connect Sky as i see the Home Theatre system supports all the formats i use on the Netgear Media Receiver (apart from FLAC, which I dont use much anyway) so i suspect it will take the receivers place

Look forward to your advise

Many Thanks

[Chris Frost]

It's always always always a good idea to check the manufacturers web site and download the manual. Here's the page for that product. The manual is available by clicking on the support tab.

Portable in - see page 14 - there's a jack socket (3.5mm) and a USB

TV audio out connection on analogue phonos - see page 14 - Aux (R/L) IN


The HX806 has only one Optical in. That's nothing unusual though with budget home cinema kits. The usual way is to connect the sources to the TV (so using the TV as a switch and a convertor from HDMI to optical for audio) and then take an optical out of the TV to the home cinema kit. Depending on the TV this will give you a pass-thru of DD5.1

You say your TV has only analogue audio out on phonos. If the model number you gave is correct then you might want to have another look. I think you'll find the is an optical output on your telly.

The fly in the ointment though is Sky. The HDMI from a Sky box doesn't carry DD5.1, only Pro-Logic/Stereo. To get at the DD5.1 you need to use an optical connector.....and the HX806 has only one.

The common solution here is an optical switch (< £10), but that does mean remembering to switch it each time you want to swap between Sky's 5.1 feed and the TV output from the other sources.

You can probably see now why so many posts here suggest spending a little extra on a proper AV amp and 5.1 speaker kit. It's more likely you could connect all your sources, and you'd probably get far better sound quality as a result.

HD audio decoding:
Sony STRDB820 + Yamaha NSP 5.1 speaker package - £250
Onkyo HTS3405 receiver & 5.1 speaker kit - £250

[RileyM]

Thanks for your help Chris

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chris Frost

It's always always always a good idea to check the manufacturers web site and download the manual. Here's the page for that product. The manual is available by clicking on the support tab.

Portable in - see page 14 - there's a jack socket (3.5mm) and a USB

TV audio out connection on analogue phonos - see page 14 - Aux (R/L) IN

Yes, i did just see that in the manual just before you replied.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chris Frost

The HX806 has only one Optical in. That's nothing unusual though with budget home cinema kits. The usual way is to connect the sources to the TV (so using the TV as a switch and a convertor from HDMI to optical for audio) and then take an optical out of the TV to the home cinema kit. Depending on the TV this will give you a pass-thru of DD5.1

As there's optical out (see below), isnt this guaranteed that DD5.1 will be passed through?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chris Frost

You say your TV has only analogue audio out on phonos. If the model number you gave is correct then you might want to have another look. I think you'll find the is an optical output on your telly.

Sorry, yes the TVs model is correct. The only reason i mentioned RCA as its connected to the OLD Hi-Fi, which only has that option. This was for times when you need better audio than that offered by the in-built speakers

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chris Frost

The fly in the ointment though is Sky. The HDMI from a Sky box doesn't carry DD5.1, only Pro-Logic/Stereo. To get at the DD5.1 you need to use an optical connector.....and the HX806 has only one.

The common solution here is an optical switch (< £10), but that does mean remembering to switch it each time you want to swap between Sky's 5.1 feed and the TV output from the other sources.

You can probably see now why so many posts here suggest spending a little extra on a proper AV amp and 5.1 speaker kit. It's more likely you could connect all your sources, and you'd probably get far better sound quality as a result.

So, to get proper DD5.1 from Sky I cant just connect
Sky -> HDMI -> TV -> Optical Out -> Home Theatre

but would have to go
SKY -> HDMI -> TV
and then
TV -> Optical Out -> Home Theatre? If so, this'll output ALL TV audio through to the Home Theatre?

It looks like the Home Theatre system does have audio switching capability so from what I understand, I can get keep it on the Optical In (thus no switching) and won't need a optical switch?

(Sorry for all the newbie questions, i'm new to this)

edit; Can anyone spot the dofference between LG HX806SG (PC World £159) & LG HX806SH (PC World £169)? I can only find SH on the LG France website, but I don't understand french. The PC World description of the SH said 2.1 decoder, despite the title saying 5.1

[chrisjr]

If you do connect the TV to the surround system then you will only get stereo or at best Dolby ProLogic/Surround encoded audio. ProLogic can give a pretty convincing surround effect but is not quite the same as true Dolby Digital 5.1.

Hence the suggestion to use an optical switch so you can connect both Sky and TV separately to the LG. However if you can live with that limitation then by all means get this system.

Personally I would be looking at the Onkyo system Chris Frost posted. That is a proper surround system and is far more flexible when it comes to hooking up external kit to make the most of the sound formats on offer.

Add in something like the Sony BDP-S380 Blu-Ray which you can get from Richer Sounds (with the Onkyo) for under a 100 quid and you would have a system that blows the LG into the weeds.

[Chris Frost]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RileyM

So, to get proper DD5.1 from Sky I cant just connect
Sky -> HDMI -> TV -> Optical Out -> Home Theatre

That's correct. You can't get DD5.1 from Sky unless you use the Optical connection out of the Sky box. That would be okay if TVs had Optical inputs as well as an output so you could pass the sound through, but they don't.

The way the rest of us do it is like this:

Picture & stereo sound on HDMI (or SCART): Sky box to TV

DD5.1 sound on Optical: Sky box to surround system


You still need some way to get the sound from the Netgear box to the surround kit.

Since there's no HDMI input on the HX806 then the fallback is either an analogue connection (AUX in R/L phono) which will mean just stereo or at best Pro-Logic; or an Optical connection in to the HX806 since that's the only way to get a DD5.1 digital signal in to the surround kit. You can either let the TV convert audio from the HDMI to optical and take the optical out to a switch, or you can go direct from the Netgear on optical straight to the switch...but whichever way you do it you still need some kind of switch because you have two sources of DD5.1 and only one hole to plug them in to.

At least you don't have to worry about a third optical or coax digital source (the DVD player) because the LG has a Blu-ray/DVD drive built in.

[RileyM]

**post deleted**

[RileyM]

Sorry for reviving my old thread but...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chris Frost

The common solution here is an optical switch (< £10), but that does mean remembering to switch it each time you want to swap between Sky's 5.1 feed and the TV output from the other sources

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chris Frost

...whichever way you do it you still need some kind of switch...

...could you recommend a optical switch? I;ve looked at my usual online stores (amazon UK , Play etc), but many of the <£10 items on Amazn have quite a number of people saying they dont work, or stopped working after switching between sources. I find it odd that so many of them have so many negative reviews.

could you advise?