Help for a relative newbie please

[admin_exported]

Hi everyone!

I have a question. Currently I have a sony lcd with one hdmi input. I have a ps3 (also used for Blu Ray) and xbox 360 and sky hd. All plugged into an Ixos hdmi switcher box.

I have a fairly old amp that currently is pushing out the sound via digital optical outputs. Is it worth me upgrading to an amp with hdmi in/outs?

How does hdmi work through an amp? Is it video as well as audio? Sorry, i bet these are really stupid questions!

Cheers

 

[Andrew Everard]

The amp will take over switching functions, and in most cases will switch both audio and video together - a few amps with HDMI switching can't extract the audio from HDMI connections.

The PS3 will output audio over HDMI to a suitable amp, but the Sky HD box will only output stereo over HDMI. For surround you'll still need the optical cable.

 

[Anonymous]

thanks for that.

So i would only benefit from HD sound via either games console?

 

[professorhat]

The only HD sound you can get is from the PS3 when playing a Blu-Ray. You need to ensure any AV receiver you get can accept Linear PCM via its HDMI port - most of the new ones above the £300 level can do this, but if you're not sure, just put a post on here and someone will tell you.

I'm not aware of any games on the PS3 as yet which have HD audio soundtracks (though of course this may change in future), and the Xbox 360 is unable to output the HD audio formats (even if you have the HD-DVD drive) so it will only be watching Blu-Rays on the PS3 that takes advantage of this.