Monitor Audio Asb-2 setup help.

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Hi guys, I've just purchased a Samsung UE48HU7500 and a Monitor Audio ASB -2, I'll be buying a decent blu-ray player at the weekend

. However I'm not great with setups and i'm unsure already. The Asb-2 doesn't do 4k passthrough but the bluray player I'm after has 2 hdmi outputs, if I connect one to the tv and the other to the sound bar would I get the better picture going to the tv?

Also I've read reviews stating that the asb has three hdmi inputs but this confuses me:

"They all pass through 3D signals, while the v1.4 output supports the convenient Audio Return Channel feature, effectively bumping up the HDMI input count to four."

If It only has three, I would connect the xbox, playstation, blu-ray player, would I be right in thinking the best option for the sky box would be an optical cable? And then hdmi out to the back of the tv?

Cheers folks.

Adam.

 

[bigboss]

You can ignore 4K passthrough for now, as you won't be connecting any 4K source for a while (none available at the moment).

If you choose the Oppo blu ray player, it has 2 HDMI inputs. So you can actually connect the Xbox or Playstation or both to the Oppo.

 

[bigboss]

I hope you've got the ASB-2 for £800 and not £1000:

http://www.whathifi.com/news/monitor-audio-cuts-price-of-asb-2-soundbar-and-s300-system

 

[Ad_87]

Yes I got it for £799. Impressed with the sound so far although one big problem seems to be lip sync issues with Sky when connected through HDMI..

 

[bigboss]

Have you read Andy Clough's response to your comment about lip sync?:

http://www.whathifi.com/review/monitor-audio-asb-2/user-reviews

 

[milleniumaire]

Unfortunately for me I paid £1000 for my ASB-2 three months ago and I'm disappointed with it and it certainly isn't worth that price.

The biggest issue has been picture/audio synchronisation from a Sky HD box. After many emails to Monitor Audio support they acknoledged that a £1000 "receiver" wouldn't work as well as my main £2,500 Pioneer receiver and they may have a point, however that price tag should give decent audio/video but it doesn't. Their suggestion was to use a HDMI cable from the Sky HD box directly to the TV (for picture) and a separate digital cable from the Sky HD box to the ASB-2 for audio. This does work, however, it goes against my plan of having the ASB-2 as the "centre" of my setup. It also makes it difficult to use the ASB-2 remote as the on-screen display isn't visible when the input is set to digital! It also can't handle the Dolby signal provided by Sky HD boxes.

Another issue I'm having is the incredibly long amount of time it takes to start up and initialise, which causes problems with setting inputs on my universal remote.

I confess, the sound is much better than the sound from the TV and playing music through the speaker from my Sonos Connect is nice, but if I knew then what I know now, I wouldn't have spent my money on this product.

At £800 it is better value for money, despite its issues, but I think its real value is around £600 to £700.

I would urge anyone who wants to connect the ASB-2 to a Sky box to look for a different solution.