Marantz 4002 PCM Question

[hinesward09]

First post, and I don't think I have seen an answer to this question before.

I have a Panasonic BD-35 and Marantz 4002 hooked up to my Samsung 46A650 with only HDMI connections. I have a 5.0 set up (going to purchase a subwoofer soon). The BD-35 HDMI cable goes into the 4002 and the 4002 HDMI cable out goes to the TV. I have the BD-35 set to PCM with secondary audio off.

Bluray movies sound great (I think) and come through all 5 channels when I select certain Surround Modes (not Auto, Source Direct/Pure Direct and a couple of others) but only the L and R lights come on the receiver implying to me that the receiver is simply amplifying two channel PCM into the 5 speakers.

The Marantz manual describes several PCM input signals including Multi-Ch PCM, Multi-Ch PCM 96kHZ, PCM, and PCM 96kHz depending on what Surround Mode you are in, but I cannot figure out which type of PCM that the Panasonic BD-35 is sending to the receiver. I never get "Multi-Channel" PCM to come up on the screen and never get anything other than the left and right speaker lights to come on.

Anyone have a similar set up and can help me out? Am I getting lossless sound or is the receiver simply amplifying 2 channel PCM into all 5 speakers?

Thanks for your help!

[hinesward09]

So, I tested by changing the panasonic bd-35 to bitstream to see what would happen when I played Dolby TrueHD and DTS-MA blurays. After doing that, depending on what disc was playing (TrueHD -- Dolby Digital, DTS-MA -- DTS), the receiver lights up like a christmas tree with what I understand to be lossy Dolby Digital and DTS. Both of these sound great as well on all five speakers, but NOT as good as the PCM that only lights the front left and front right speakers. Part of me just wants to ignore this issue because I think the sound is so good, but I would love to get an explanation for why PCM is not registering properly on the Marantz 4002. I wonder if not having a subwoofer has anything to do with it? Any other thoughts?

[hinesward09]

So tonight I changed the Panasonic BD-35 Settings and turned Secondary Audio on to see what would show up on the Marantz 4002 receiver and when I did that all the lights showed up on pcm and the receiver showed 5.1 multichannel as well as virtual 6.1 and a couple other options. However, with secondary audio on, and all the lights on, audio only came out of the front two speakers (nothing in the center channel or either of the rear surrounds). This is what I suspected after seeing in multiple forums that you need to have secondary audio off to get lossless sound.

So, I have concluded there must be something about multichannel PCM in the combination between the Panasonic BD-35 and Marantz 4002 that causes only the front left and front right to show up in certain circumstances, even though it is in fact generating mutichannel PCM -- it sounds so much better than Dolby Digital that I cannot believe it is simply 2channel PCM.

Does anyone have this combination of panasonic bd-35 and marantz 4002 that can shed light on this issue?

[hinesward09]

I found the culprit to my PCM problem! In panasonic bd-35 audio settings which show up when the movie is playing, there is a separate setting for Sound Effects. That was somehow set to "V Surround" which was messing things up. I changed Sound Effects to "Off" and all the lights came on and the sound is even stronger than it was before.