jimmygolf:
no i have not purchased the amp and speaker package yet, i originally wanted the best buy yamaha 863 amp but it seemed to be sold out everywhere and i got offered the onkyo 876, 1010i, speaker cable, 5m sub lead and other leads for £1085 which i thought was a bargin! the reason i chose the amp was for the picture upscaling (hope im right on that and not sounding more stuipid) the set up is going in my bedroom and wont be played over loud but i thought buying the 1010i would be a inprovement over the standard pioneer krp side speakers and because i wanted to connect my pc to the tv the 500m was the only option and that did not come with the seperate media box so a amp was a must as i am wall mounting it and want my system looking neat, i was not going to originally buy any amp or speakers i was going to buy a sony lcd and that was that, but after the issues the set has had i did not want to take the risk.ÿÿ
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yes the svideo cable is for the sky+ box.
Hi Jimmy,
According to another thread Musicraft in Derby got some 863s delivered this morning. I'd recommend you give Rick over there a call (01332 346284). I don't think he does mail order as a rule (just in case you don't live nearby) but he may well let you organise your own courier. They have Onkyo kit too so it might be worth making the trip to demo the two side by side.
The video processing in the 876 will be largely redundant in your setup. The PS3 does a decent job of upscaling to 1080p but its 576p output is only so so. Because it outputs 576p and not 576i (at least over HDMI) you won't be using the deinterlacing bit of the Reon chip's HQV processing (that's the best bit). As for the Sky box, other owners have reported good results connecting to the 876 via s-video. HQV includes some cleverÿalgorithmsÿfor correcting problems with lower end analogue video sources. Having said that though, the best way to get video out of a standard Sky / Sky+ box is RGB SCART. The 876 (and most other AV receivers) can't handle RGB SCART (aka RGB + Sync), so normally the advice would be to run the SCART connection straight into the TV and the optical cable to the AV receiver. But I don't think the 500M has a SCART socket - you'd need an LX5090 or 500A for that. There are other solutions, but they involve adding convertors which typically degrade the picture quality or external video processors which typically cost a bomb. Upgrading to Sky HD is definitely your best bet.ÿ
The 876 / Q Acoustics bundle you've been offered sounds like decent value for money, but they're poorly matched. I'd be inclined to get a cheaper amp and better speakers (Yamaha 863 + Kef 3005s is a combo that's known to work well), plus a Sky HD subscription. I'd connect everything via HDMI (plus an optical cable for the Sky HD box) and rely on the upscaling built into the PS3 and Sky HD box.