Interesting audio issue with my Sony receiver.

[BIslander]

You have a cable set top box that does your tuning? You are using the analog stereo outputs from that box? What inputs are they plugged into on the receiver? From your description it sounds like they may not be attached to the correct L/R stereo jacks on the receiver. Or, there may be a problem with the wiring of the particular pair of input jacks you are using.

As a matter of curiosity, why aren't you using a digital output from your cable box? You'd get DD 5.1 on a lot of shows that way.

btw, HDMI cables would not be responsible for the lack of audio in some speakers.