I’m beginning to feel like the Axiom, HMDI spokesperson and I’m not even qualified and hate it more than Ken does……
No, you do not NEED 1.3. Definitely, do not. Is it worth waiting for? Maybe, maybe not. With 1.3 you will get True color, auto lip sinc, and higher band width carrying capabilities for DD-HD and DTS-M. You will also get a whole new batch of bugs. So take your chances.
With 1.1 and even 1.2, most of the bugs have been discovered and the manufactures have, or are addressing them with firmware upgrades.
If you do not need or foresee yourself needing 7.1 and only need 5.1, there is a very large selection of HDMI receivers that will process high def audio that is on HD and BR disks in an uncompressed multi channel PCM bitstream.
Where the bulk of issues are residing with these new formats is 6.1 and 7.1 multi channel LPCM bitstreams. Some HDMI receivers process all 6.1 or 7.1 discrete channels without issues, some don’t. Some will extract 7.1 channels from 5.1 channels no problem, some don’t. So if you don’t need or want 7.1, no problem. You have numerous choices. If you want/need 7.1, your choices just got a whole lot narrower.
Now another point that continues to be left out of this 7.1 LPCM debate is just how many disks are encoded with more than 5.1 discrete LPCM channels. I know of three. I’m sure there will be more as more and more SD movies get transferred and new movies hit the streets, but in reality, how many nobody really knows and those who claim to know are quite simply……full of BS.
How many movies are directors actually filming in 7.1??? I don’t know. Not all of them, that’s for sure. Of my collection of just under 800 SD dvd’s, I have a WHOPPING four DVD’s that have discrete 6.1 channels. None have 7.1.
