Rick,
There’s a lot of questions you need to ask yourself before taking the HD plunge. For one, do you want to go with separates or are you OK with a receiver?
Do you want the video processing piece handled by your display, your receiver or have you considered going with an external video processor?
Can you resist the urge to constantly upgrade as HDMI evolves and adds more features? The HDMI spec is constantly evolving and somewhat of a moving target. Regardless of what the conspiracist think, you need to ask yourself if you can restrain from feeling that need to continually upgrade. They are currently developing a 2.0 spec and 1.3 equipped hardware just recently (within weeks) became available.
HDMI version 1.2 is all you will need, but with 1.3 comes a few selling points. With 1.3 comes automatic lip sync, and the new codecs; DTS-M and DD-HD. It also comes with 16 bit deep color. ON the audio side, 1.2 can carry the bandwidth for all the formats (up to 8 channels of PCM at 96 hz each), but it will never recognize the two HD formats in their compressed, bitstream format. Personally, I don’t care. All the current players will detect all the formats and convert them to a Linear, uncompressed PCM format. Or, the disks have an option to select an Uncompressed PCM sound stream. So whether or not you have an HDMI 1.3 equipped piece of hardware, it just doesn’t matter. 1.1 and 1.2 will still provide you with uncompressed sound.
On the video side of things, HDMI 1.1 will support 12 bit deep color. As far as I know, there is no media available with anything greater than 8 bit, so this is a mute point….for now. Eventually, media will have 16 bit, but I seriously doubt it will be within the next two to three years.
If you are wondering if there is a noticeable difference with the new high rez audio on Blue Ray and HD/DVD disks, absolutely. The difference is like going from MP3 to SACD. I am constantly surprised that more folks who visit this board haven not jumped onto that just for the audio that HD/BR provides. The Axiom board members are audio fanatics, but continue to whine and bitch about HD wars and refuse to just simply enjoy the formats now….
HD/DVD players had a rocky start. They were slow, expensive and had continuous HMDI errors. The second generation players are much faster to load and errors are far and few between, and you can buy the entry level player for $199 and it comes with five free HD/DVD’s. The third generation players will be better yet. HD/DVD players and disks currently will not extract the raw 1080P/24 data off the disks. The ones who output 1080P, do this by use of an internal video processor. They pull the interlaced data off the disk at 1080i, then they de-interlace it to 1080P, then they apply a cadence to output 1080P/60. This is incredibly stupid. You are better off outputting 1080i and letting your display do the rest. The third generation players are rumored to extract the raw 1080P/24 data off the disks. This is something worth waiting for.
BR/DVD players are a mixed bag. Some extract 1080P/24, some do the same BS that the Toshiba HD/DVD players do. Some BR players will not decode some of the audio formats, while others decode all of them. Some do the video piece right, but fail at audio and some do the opposite. None but the PS3 does both correctly, but there are a couple about to ship that are rumored to do both correctly. I’m happy with my PS 3, so I’ve not looked to replace it. With my new IR adaptor for the remote, I have no bitches. Plus, the PS3 is the fastest unit there is for load time. And they are also the fasted for getting firmware updates out.
As far as SD/DVD upconversion goes, both HD and BR have players that do a remarkable job. The Toshiba HD-X2 does fantastic, and so does the Samsung 1200 BR player (but it does not decode all the sound formats).
Back to the audio processor………
You can hear HD audio right now with your 635. You will need a HD/BR player that has the analogue outputs. The HD-X2 has them, but I’m not sure which BR player does. It’s not as convenient as the HDMI, but I’m pretty sure your 635 also has bass management for the analogue inputs??? If so, you can apply your preferred bass management settings with the HK, as well as PLIIx.
If you want to upgrade your audio processor, there are several HDMI 1.1 and 1.2 AVR’s on the market right now that work very well. Now that Marantz has killed the bugs on their first batch of units, I can tell you with confidence that the SR/8001 is a wonderful receiver. It sounds amazing…… and it has plenty of power. But, it does not perform any video processing. I do not want video processing done by my audio processor. I use an external VP to that and will continue to do so. But that comes at a premium cost. Stand alone VP’s run from $3000 and up.
The new line of Onkyo HDMI 1.3 receivers and their sibling line of Integra have some very interesting products out. On paper, they look amazing. In real life, they have issues and I’d avoid them. I’d wait till they get a few firmware updates under their belt before buying one.
One receiver and pre/pro I’m very interested in is the Sherwood Newcastle 972 and their yet to be announced pre/pro. What I find so interesting is they will be using Trinnov room equalization. Trinnov is highly respected and I’ve not ever heard of his stuff on a receiver before…. I’m sure it will be better than Audysey…
Another pre/pro to look for is the NAD T175. It will have Audysey pro with NAD’s own tweaking. What I like about this unit is it does NO video processing.
I was interested in the Integra 9.8, but its lack of Audysey Pro support has made me loose interest. I understand that Integra will be releasing more advanced Pre/Pros in 08.
Rotel is rumored to be working on a HDMI 1.3 Pre/Pro and receiver. I have a soft spot for Rotel, so I’m real interested in what they come out with.
I keep mentioning that I prefer stand alone video processing. It’s an expensive option, but after enjoying it, I will always have one. It’s very cool to set up every input with its own profile and calibration. I have until the end of the month to make up my mind to buy a new one. I currently use the DVDO VP-50, but I can upgrade to the VP-50Pro model just released, or I can sell it and buy the new Lumagen Radiance. I like the Radiance because it has two live HDMI outputs, whereas the DVDO has one. I’d like to send one to my projector and one to my receiver without using splitters. Sending video through the receiver before the projector does something to the video stream that I don’t like. If I bypass the receiver, the image looks sharper.
…..I know that’s a lot to digest, so shoot me an email for further clarification. I’m tired of typing.
