Starting system that can grow

[Bad Chile]

First of all - to all the members whose posts I've spent the past five days reading, thank you. I've learned a bunch, and I appreciate it.

I currently live in a rented apartment, have a 47" Philips 47PFL5704D/F7; a Panasonic DMP-BD60K Blu Ray; and no audio system. I'm figuring get a receiver, a Polk CS1 center and Polk Monitor 50 left and right and keep the surrounds (Monitor 30s) in the box until I get a house. Oh yeah, and hold off on the sub until I get the house....

I'm thinking of hitting up NewEgg for the Pioneer VSX-519V-K over the VSX-819V-K. It appears that the Blu Ray player will do all the audio decoding into the Receiver. Is this true? Does the 819 afford me any great advantages given what I know about the DMP-BD60K?

Thank you for all of your time and assistance in helping a n00b? (Ok, way back in 1998 I had a 27" Trinitron, a couple Bose 201s and a VCS-10....all long gone!)

Edit: The only other audio source would be Verizon Fios via HDMI. The TV has 4 HDMI inputs, so I'm not hurting there...

Edit II (for future reference): According to both the Panasonic website and a CNet review, the BD60K does the decoding. "The DMP-BD60 has onboard decoding for Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio Essential. That means it can decode those soundtrack formats so they can be played back on almost every HDMI-capable AV receiver. Bitstream output is also supported, if you'd rather the decoding be done in your AV receiver. (DTS-HD Master Audio Essential differs from standard DTS-HD Master Audio in that it lacks decoding for a few legacy DTS DVD soundtracks formats such as DTS 96/24, ES, ES Matrix, and Neo:6. It still decodes all the high-resolution Blu-ray DTS soundtracks.) "

[Cup Overflowing]

Originally Posted by Bad Chile

First of all - to all the members whose posts I've spent the past five days reading, thank you. I've learned a bunch, and I appreciate it.

I currently live in a rented apartment, have a 47" Philips 47PFL5704D/F7; a Panasonic DMP-BD60K Blu Ray; and no audio system. I'm figuring get a receiver, a Polk CS1 center and Polk Monitor 50 left and right and keep the surrounds (Monitor 30s) in the box until I get a house. Oh yeah, and hold off on the sub until I get the house....

I'm thinking of hitting up NewEgg for the Pioneer VSX-519V-K over the VSX-819V-K. It appears that the Blu Ray player will do all the audio decoding into the Receiver. Is this true? Does the 819 afford me any great advantages given what I know about the DMP-BD60K?

Thank you for all of your time and assistance in helping a n00b? (Ok, way back in 1998 I had a 27" Trinitron, a couple Bose 201s and a VCS-10....all long gone!)

Edit: The only other audio source would be Verizon Fios via HDMI. The TV has 4 HDMI inputs, so I'm not hurting there...

I was just wondering the same thing for the VSX-519V-K. Newegg has it for 187.99. Great price. I have the BDP-S300 with all the updates so I believe it decodes DD THD, and PCM Uncompressed. I just won't get DTS HD-MA, correct? I will get DTS HD thought I believe. Just wanting confirmation.

[lojack1976]

You will need a player that will decode both True HD and DTS Master Audio to take of advantage of the lossless codecs. If your player can decode both then this receiver is an excellent low cost option. You can always go with something a little further up the line if you want to future proof yourself however. You may want to go up to a 7 channel setup, and it also doesn't hurt to get a receiver with pre-outs if you decide later that you want a separate amp. Of course if you don't have a desire to do either then its hard to get a better deal than this.