As you may have noticed from another thread, I have been in the receiver market for quite a while and have not been able to make up my mind. I had planned on waiting until the "spirit" moved me because I thought that my old receiver was basically doing just fine.
Well, I have noticed a "problem" that is really starting to bug the wife and I.
I have Comcast cable connected directly to my new Sony HDTV. It is my understanding that the Sony's tuner will accept and decode multichannel DD audio from the cable signal. Even though the Sony has an optical (audio) output for multichannel DD, I am just using the Right Left outputs to my old Kenwood receiver. Why? The old Kenwood only has one optical input and I am using that for my OPPO DVD player.
Now for the problem. The audio on the HDTV cable signals is sometimes overwhelmed by the surround sound/ noise/ audio. For example, on a football broadcast, it is sometimes difficult to hear the announcers because of the crowd noise. The same thing sometimes happens on "24," "E-Ring," and other HD shows. It is like the center channel is not driven hard enough.
I am using a 5.1 system and all channels were calibrated with a Radio Shack Sound meter.
I am beginning to wonder if the old Kenwood is being confused by the TVs audio output? I have tried the Kenwood with all of its digital modes. Prologic seems to be the best, but still is not good.
I have thought about adding gain to the center channel, but, then it wouldn't sound right when I watched a SD channel or used the DVD player.
Have any of you experienced this effect? If so, what did you do about it?
Maybe I just need to flip a coin and get a new receiver????
