PS3 doesn't output 5.1 to Receiver

[bilbravo]

Hi all. I've been perusing these forums for some answers and have only found that I am now more confused that I was before. This is not due to anyone's inability to explain things, just that I have read some opinions/answers that seem to contradict one another.

Firstly, I have a Sony STR-DG710, an LG 30FZ4D (30" CRT 1080i) and a PS3.

Now, I am in no way an audiophile, videophile, etc. But I do like to get the best I can out of my equipment. The STR-DG710 is a new addition, which came shortly after my PS3 because I needed more than the 1 HDMI my TV set provides and was purchased over the lesser receivers in this Sony line because this was the one that did PCM.

I am running the PS3 with HDMI in to the receiver, audio and video. I have noticed that I never have issues with surround sound from games, but I do have some questions about the BD audio:

1. Bitstream output vs. Linear PCM . I know my receiver will not receive uncompressed PCM, but it does do 48khz PCM (I think--correct me if I'm wrong). When I set the Bitstream output, I get a 5.1 signal--but is it just DTS/DD or is it of a higher quality (I know they have TrueHD, DDTrueHD, blah blah--it all confuses me).

2. When I set it to Linear PCM I only get what my receiver seems to tell me is a stereo signal. I do not get a nice 5.1 signal on my receiver's LCD screen.

Is there any way to get the Linear PCM TO work? Or is Linear PCM specifying that it is "uncompressed"?

I cannot seem to find an answer to this in the PS3's sorry excuse for a manual :-)

Thanks in advance.

[T-Town Oil]

i did a quick glance of it on cnet and it said it accepted uncompressed signals.

[Waking Midnight]

Originally Posted by bilbravo

Hi all. I've been perusing these forums for some answers and have only found that I am now more confused that I was before. This is not due to anyone's inability to explain things, just that I have read some opinions/answers that seem to contradict one another.

Firstly, I have a Sony STR-DG710, an LG 30FZ4D (30" CRT 1080i) and a PS3.

Now, I am in no way an audiophile, videophile, etc. But I do like to get the best I can out of my equipment. The STR-DG710 is a new addition, which came shortly after my PS3 because I needed more than the 1 HDMI my TV set provides and was purchased over the lesser receivers in this Sony line because this was the one that did PCM.

I am running the PS3 with HDMI in to the receiver, audio and video. I have noticed that I never have issues with surround sound from games, but I do have some questions about the BD audio:

1. Bitstream output vs. Linear PCM . I know my receiver will not receive uncompressed PCM, but it does do 48khz PCM (I think--correct me if I'm wrong). When I set the Bitstream output, I get a 5.1 signal--but is it just DTS/DD or is it of a higher quality (I know they have TrueHD, DDTrueHD, blah blah--it all confuses me).

2. When I set it to Linear PCM I only get what my receiver seems to tell me is a stereo signal. I do not get a nice 5.1 signal on my receiver's LCD screen.

Is there any way to get the Linear PCM TO work? Or is Linear PCM specifying that it is "uncompressed"?

I cannot seem to find an answer to this in the PS3's sorry excuse for a manual :-)

Thanks in advance.

hey there. i have actually been recently having this problem as well. whenever i try to output into pcm uncompressed audio it does it in stereo however whenever i set it to dd it outputs into 5.1. im not sure why but just letting ya know youre not the only one with that problem.

[mdm1699]

Originally Posted by bilbravo

Hi all. I've been perusing these forums for some answers and have only found that I am now more confused that I was before. This is not due to anyone's inability to explain things, just that I have read some opinions/answers that seem to contradict one another.

Firstly, I have a Sony STR-DG710, an LG 30FZ4D (30" CRT 1080i) and a PS3.

Now, I am in no way an audiophile, videophile, etc. But I do like to get the best I can out of my equipment. The STR-DG710 is a new addition, which came shortly after my PS3 because I needed more than the 1 HDMI my TV set provides and was purchased over the lesser receivers in this Sony line because this was the one that did PCM.

I am running the PS3 with HDMI in to the receiver, audio and video. I have noticed that I never have issues with surround sound from games, but I do have some questions about the BD audio:

1. Bitstream output vs. Linear PCM . I know my receiver will not receive uncompressed PCM, but it does do 48khz PCM (I think--correct me if I'm wrong). When I set the Bitstream output, I get a 5.1 signal--but is it just DTS/DD or is it of a higher quality (I know they have TrueHD, DDTrueHD, blah blah--it all confuses me).

2. When I set it to Linear PCM I only get what my receiver seems to tell me is a stereo signal. I do not get a nice 5.1 signal on my receiver's LCD screen.

Is there any way to get the Linear PCM TO work? Or is Linear PCM specifying that it is "uncompressed"?

I cannot seem to find an answer to this in the PS3's sorry excuse for a manual :-)

Thanks in advance.

Sounds like you only have to adjust you PS3 audio output formats. You can find this in the settings. Leave it on PCM.

[Vonscoot]

Originally Posted by bilbravo

Hi all. I've been perusing these forums for some answers and have only found that I am now more confused that I was before. This is not due to anyone's inability to explain things, just that I have read some opinions/answers that seem to contradict one another.

Firstly, I have a Sony STR-DG710, an LG 30FZ4D (30" CRT 1080i) and a PS3.

Now, I am in no way an audiophile, videophile, etc. But I do like to get the best I can out of my equipment. The STR-DG710 is a new addition, which came shortly after my PS3 because I needed more than the 1 HDMI my TV set provides and was purchased over the lesser receivers in this Sony line because this was the one that did PCM.

I am running the PS3 with HDMI in to the receiver, audio and video. I have noticed that I never have issues with surround sound from games, but I do have some questions about the BD audio:

1. Bitstream output vs. Linear PCM . I know my receiver will not receive uncompressed PCM, but it does do 48khz PCM (I think--correct me if I'm wrong). When I set the Bitstream output, I get a 5.1 signal--but is it just DTS/DD or is it of a higher quality (I know they have TrueHD, DDTrueHD, blah blah--it all confuses me).

2. When I set it to Linear PCM I only get what my receiver seems to tell me is a stereo signal. I do not get a nice 5.1 signal on my receiver's LCD screen.

Is there any way to get the Linear PCM TO work? Or is Linear PCM specifying that it is "uncompressed"?

I cannot seem to find an answer to this in the PS3's sorry excuse for a manual :-)

Thanks in advance.

Setting your PS3 to Bitstream will only get you DD/DTS as the PS3 cannot yet send the lossless codecs (TrueHD, HD-Master Audio) through HDMI to your receiver. If you have the PS3 set to Linear PCM, it can decode TrueHD internally and send it out as PCM, just as it can with Uncompressed PCM. If your receiver does not support PCM (I'm not familiar enough with the receivers to say it does/doesn't), then you might be stuck with DD/DTS until the PS3 can send lossless codecs or you upgrade your receiver OR you choose a different BD player.

If any of this info is incorrect, feel free to correct it.

[Sonny]

Yup set it to PCM in the PS3 and you should be OK.

[Amon37]

After reading up on his reciever it will NOT send multi-channel PCM through HDMI oly 2ch.

Since you cannot receive multi-channel PCM you are better off setting it to "bitstream" and atleast getting 5.1 DD, DTS and 6.1 DTS.

[bilbravo]

Originally Posted by Amon37

After reading up on his reciever it will NOT send multi-channel PCM through HDMI oly 2ch.

Since you cannot receive multi-channel PCM you are better off setting it to "bitstream" and atleast getting 5.1 DD, DTS and 6.1 DTS.

Did you mean "receive" instead of "send"? I'm not criticizing, just making sure I understand what you were saying.

At any rate, thanks to you and everyone else who helped out. I thought this was what it was going to come down to but I have not kept up on all the new audio codecs, etc until I got my PS3 so I wasn't sure.

It's not a big deal to me, surround sound is enough--I don't really have great speakers to make use of the PCM audio anyhow. As I said, the receiver was a means to get multiple HDMI inputs. Now that I know why it wasn't working, I can sleep at night! It was really bugging me that I couldn't figure it out. lol

Thanks again.

[Amon37]

Originally Posted by bilbravo

Did you mean "receive" instead of "send"? I'm not criticizing, just making sure I understand what you were saying.

I meant receive, sorry if that was confusing. I should have said "Even though the PS3 is sending Multi-Channel your receiver can only output it as 2Ch PCM."

But you got what I meant.