I'm fairly new to the HD game and there's still a lot I have yet to learn but right now my question concerns the audio; TrueHD and DTS HD in particular.

Currently, I own a Sony BDP-S300 Blu-ray player. From my understanding, it does NOT decode either Dolby TrueHD or DTS HD.

My question is this: if I buy a new receiver that inlcudes HDMI ver. 1.3, will it be able to decode TrueHD and DTS HD? I'm considering buying the Yamaha RXV-663 Receiver but don't want to bother if the best sound I'm going to get is DD or DTS (which is what I'm getting with my current receiver).

Last I read, the BDP-S300 may have an undocumented ability to decode TrueHD if you do the settings a certain way.

However, if you are seriously interested in getting a receiver that can receive bitstreamed lossless audio, the 300 can't do it because it doesn't have HDMI 1.3. It will also almost certainly never decode DTS-HD.

At this point, your best bet for bitstreaming TrueHD and DTS-HD to a 1.3 receiver is either get a Panasonic BD30 now, or wait for the Sony BDP-S350 which is out in a few months.

EDIT: Looking at the specs for the 663 it should definitely decode TrueHD and DTS-HD, provided you have a player that can send undecoded TrueHD and DTS-HD.

here is some info that will help you with your question..

http://www.abccables.com/info-hdmi-1-3-truehd.html
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...php?p=13242999

In order to send the raw bitstreams for the advanced audio codecs to a receiver for decoding, you need to have HDMI 1.3 on both ends of the chain, at the Blu-ray player and at the receiver. The S300 does not have HDMI 1.3.

Thanks guys, that's the info I was looking for. There's no huge hurry for me to upgrade right away so I'll hold off right now.

... or get a PS3 for less $$$ and auto-upgrade-able.

I've actually considered it but I just bought an xbox 360 and don't know how well a new gaming console will go over with the mrs. even if I use it primarily for movies...