Not Running Dolby with PS3 Games. Help..

[Pelican170]

Originally Posted by foots

To me it sounds like when you are using a HDMI cable the PS3 is processing the DD signal internally and outputing the audio via PCM 5.1/7.1. The reason it doesn't do this with optical cable is that you can't get > 2.0 PCM through optical so it passes the DD bitstream to your receiver to be processed.

This would explain why when using your HDMI cable and you deselect all of your PCM options in the settings you are forcing the PS3 to send the bitstream (unprocessed) information to your receiver while playing a game. Thus it shows up as DD on your receiver display.

So why doesn't it do this while playing games off the hard drive? It is probably just different profile settings in the firmware (that sony hasn't allowed you to change). Similar to how the DVD upscaling only works on a disc and not on video played back off the hard drive.

Now why you are experience a different quality sound? I would think they would sound the same but the quality of the DACs in your receiver could be superior which could give you a slightly noticeable improvement in sound quality.

That is what I was leaning towards and makes sense. I will have to check the sound quality again to be sure that i correct, but im pretty sure that I did notice a difference. Thanks for you advise. This seems to be the closest to a solution so far...