Hello to all. Im in a dilema. I have a 50 inch plasma with 2 HDMI inputs. I have comcast HD service (to many trees in area to get direct tv). I also have a DVD player with HDMI outputs.

Im going to route 2 HDMI cables to my tv from the cable box and the dvd player. My question is, how should I route my audio to my reciever? I have optical inputs on my reciever. If I hookup the optical out on my dvd player to the reciever optical in....will it over ride the hdmi (audio portion) going to the tv???

You should probably post this question in the Tech Forum to get the most help.

Here's my answer, though. If you hook up the DVD player with both HDMI to the TV and Digital Optical to the receiver, you will get sound through both the TV and receiver. So, you could turn the TV all the way down and just use the receiver when watching a movie, or you could use the TV as a faux center channel by turning up the volume, though I would argue that you'd get the best sound using just your receiver.

Your Comcast cable box is capable of transmitting the audio via the HDMI cables. If you connect an optical in, it is possible to override the HDMI, but the settings on that particular box will need to be updating. (My guess is that once the HDMI is connect, it will become the default) Some cable boxes have problems sending Dolby Digital through HDMI.

Can someone educate me on HDMI... I just got a HDTV and want to know if I should use the HDMI cable or composite video from my cable box. I do not have a HDMI DVD player nor a reciever. My reciever will have to be hooked with regular audio(red/white)

If you have a cable box with an hdmi out and a tv with an hdmi in you should would use that. If you are trying to connect audio to a receiver you would be better off seeing if the cable box has a coax or fiber out and use those with your receiver.

My reciever doesn't have coax or opt in. For now I will have to use the RCA audio out from my TV into my reciever. My reciever was only DDready which meant I have to use my DVD player as an external decoder. I have lots of wires going between my DVD player and my reciever. Do you know if its possible to feed the audio(optical/coax) through my DVD Player? Its a SONY DVD Player(not sure of the model.

Your dvd player may pass the signal, check the manual.

IMHO you would be better off getting a new receiver. Even inexpensive ones should have built in decoders with better input selection for you.

I have been reading about all of these problems with the HDMI link from the cable box. Are they still occurring? Maybe I should just use the component video.

I know this is an old thread, but I found it using a Google search and this kind of pertains to a question I have.

I'm getting Comcast's HD box pretty soon and was wondering how people have their connected to a receiver. I have an older receiver so I don't know if it's doable or not. I know there are optical connections which I'm going to use for my HD-DVD player, but I was wondering what others do for older receivers to a digital box...

Mine is connected via Component cables