[sremick]

Hello, all. Spent many hours browsing and searching these forums. Unfortunately, some questions remain so I've got to ask..

1) I couldn't find a straight answer as to whether the movies available for broadband downloading over DishOnline (currently almost 1500 titles) are in HD or not. Some posts say no, some suggest that some are... but in browsing the catalog and details on some random titles, I could find no designation as to whether anything was HD, SD, or whatever.

2) I could not for the life of me get audio over the HDMI connection. I had to resort to hooking up an optical toslink cable. From the posts I dug up from searching, it seems this used to be a problem but shouldn't be anymore. Is there some newbie step I might have missed in order to get audio over the HDMI? The 722 is connected to an AV receiver that does do HDMI switching and directly drives the 7.1 speakers. The receiver is then connected to the projector via HDMI. HDMI audio from my DVD player works just fine, so it's not some weird limitation of my receiver. I'd love to trim down the rats nest of cables behind my cabinet.

3) Does Dish plan on eventually transitioning all things that use the phone line connection to eventually support the broadband connection as well? I already have an ethernet switch run to my AV cabinet but there's no phone line, and I'd rather not run one. I see DishOnline and PPV work over broadband, but account info and random other things seem to still fail unless the phone line is connected.

4) Any issues in recording 1080i to a DVD-R over my currently-unused component outputs on my 722?

 

[puckwithahalo]

2) I could not for the life of me get audio over the HDMI connection. I had to resort to hooking up an optical toslink cable. From the posts I dug up from searching, it seems this used to be a problem but shouldn't be anymore. Is there some newbie step I might have missed in order to get audio over the HDMI? The 722 is connected to an AV receiver that does do HDMI switching and directly drives the 7.1 speakers. The receiver is then connected to the projector via HDMI. HDMI audio from my DVD player works just fine, so it's not some weird limitation of my receiver. I'd love to trim down the rats nest of cables behind my cabinet.

You'll want to use the optical cable anyway, the receiver only provides stereo sound through the HDMI cable.

 

[Ron Barry]

Welcome sremick to DBSTalk.

1) The Movies that are on DishOnline are currently in SD.
2) The 622/722 does output 5.1 through HDMI and you should not have to do anything. Have you tried connecting it directly to a TV to see if you can hear the audio? Make sure your Audio output is set to DD/PCM.
3) Hard to say but hopefully overtime all services will go through both types of connections. DishOnline is a Broadband only feature and the call home feature was something that was enhanced for broadband because there was a real need there since more and more people are opting away from having a direct phone line in the house.
4) Both HDMI and component are hot at the same time. If you search for DVD Recorder you should get some threads discussing how people are using them and success stories. This thread might get you going http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?t=89736&highlight=DVD+Recorder.

 

[sremick]

1) The Movies that are on DishOnline are currently in SD.

Oh well, there goes my interest.

The 622/722 does output 5.1 through HDMI

This conflicts with what puckwithahalo said. Now you know why I'm so confused.

Have you tried connecting it directly to a TV to see if you can hear the audio?

No, as I have no way to do that. My "TV" is a projector, which has no sound of its own.

Make sure your Audio output is set to DD/PCM.

It is. It was the initial/default setting.

 

[Ron Barry]

Well as far as I know, the 722/622 does support DD 5.1. If you search on HDMI DD and 5.1 I think you will see that people are getting DD 5.1 output from the HDMI cable. However, I personally still would keep both connections so if something goes wrong you have another way to trouble shoot an audio issue.

 

[puckwithahalo]

2) The 622/722 does output 5.1 through HDMI and you should not have to do anything. Have you tried connecting it directly to a TV to see if you can hear the audio? Make sure your Audio output is set to DD/PCM.

I've double-checked, and though I will still keep looking to be positive, I am fairly sure that while HDMI can carry 5.1, that on the VIP receivers, only the optical audio connection carries it.

 

[EXTACAMO]

Look in the manual for your A/V receiver and see if it supports audio switching through HDMI. Some receivers don't and you have to use some other means such as optical.

 

[EXTACAMO]

I'm using only HDMI with my 622 and Onkyo TX-SR606 receiver and have no problems with audio.

 

[Ron Barry]

Also check out the DVDR section in this thread. Should provide some useful information if you want to record to DVD from the 722.

http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?t=93559

 

[ChuckA]

I've double-checked, and though I will still keep looking to be positive, I am fairly sure that while HDMI can carry 5.1, that on the VIP receivers, only the optical audio connection carries it.

This was the case when the 622 was first released. However, since that time the software has been enhanced to provide DD 5.1 over the HDMI connection. If you are reading the User Guide, it certainly may still indicate no 5.1 over HDMI but that is outdated information. DD 5.1 has been available over HDMI for at least the last year.

 

[phrelin]

HDMI does carry audio now. How do I know since I don't use it? Because of the various reports in the discussion about the audio dropout problem with some folks reporting using only HDMI, some HDMI plus Toslink, some only Toslink, etc. Of course, they could be fibbing but I don't think so.

 

[puckwithahalo]

This was the case when the 622 was first released. However, since that time the software has been enhanced to provide DD 5.1 over the HDMI connection. If you are reading the User Guide, it certainly may still indicate no 5.1 over HDMI but that is outdated information. DD 5.1 has been available over HDMI for at least the last year.

Fair enough. I just remembered it from my original training on the 622, and I couldn't find in writing if/when it had been changed and I couldn't find anyone who knew for sure.

 

[Stewart Vernon]

Adding to what Ron Barry said regarding DishOnline... One good thing about both DishOnline, VOD, and PPV with Dish is that thus far all HD has been clearly marked. So, if it doesn't say HD then it isn't.

While that isn't exactly good news for you since you were asking about HD DishOnline, at least if that ever changes it should be obvious as they will label it correctly so you'll know.

At least part of the problem with DishOnline and HD would be it would take you quite a while to download a movie that way. It can be kinda slow getting an SD movie that way actually... but HD would be slow with the size of the average files based on what I've observed from archiving recordings.

That's why they do the HD VOD thing overnight while in standby, since it still takes a while but happens when you aren't using the receiver anyway so it will be there already downloaded when you want vs the DishOnline being a download-when-purchased scenario.

 

[BobaBird]

The 622 has passed DD5.1 over HDMI since the L401 software update of 3/07, so the 722 has had it since its introduction.

The problem with not getting audio (stereo or 5.1) over HDMI is that many entry- and even mid-level AV receivers still only support "HDMI switching" which refers only to the video signal.

 

[lujan]

What ever happened to HD 1080p on VOD? I haven't seen a movie listed as 1080p since 10,000 B.C. and I AM LEGEND before that.

 

[sremick]

The problem with not getting audio (stereo or 5.1) over HDMI is that many entry- and even mid-level AV receivers still only support "HDMI switching" which refers only to the video signal.

My receiver is a Harman/Kardon AVR-247. While not high-end, it does support HDMI switching. It is not audio-only, as I stated earlier, which is proven by the fact that the only cable coming from my DVD player into the receiver is HDMI, and all audio works fine.

So given that, and given that the majority of people seem to feel that the 722 should do DD over HDMI, what else am I missing?

 

[phrelin]

My receiver is a Harman/Kardon AVR-247. While not high-end, it does support HDMI switching. It is not audio-only, as I stated earlier, which is proven by the fact that the only cable coming from my DVD player into the receiver is HDMI, and all audio works fine.

So given that, and given that the majority of people seem to feel that the 722 should do DD over HDMI, what else am I missing?

You probably have already done this, but have you tried running the 722 through the input you're using for the DVD player on your AVR-247?

 

[jkane]

There is more than one version of HDMI cable on the market. Some do not have the pins included for audio! Verify you have the kind that does have it. I think it is like HDMI version 1 and version 2 or something. It's been a while since I looked into that, and don't feel like researching it again right now. ;-)

I use the optical myself since I am not sending the audio past the receiver anyhow. It doesn't bother me to have two cables going to it.

 

[girdnerg]

My receiver is a Harman/Kardon AVR-247. While not high-end, it does support HDMI switching. It is not audio-only, as I stated earlier, which is proven by the fact that the only cable coming from my DVD player into the receiver is HDMI, and all audio works fine.

So given that, and given that the majority of people seem to feel that the 722 should do DD over HDMI, what else am I missing?

I have the Harman/Kardon AVR-347 and use HDMI only from my 622, so I know it works with all audio formats sent by E*. Like other's have suggested, since you know it works, I would unplug the HDMI out of the back of the DVD player and plug it into the 722 and see what happens.

 

[sremick]

You probably have already done this, but have you tried running the 722 through the input you're using for the DVD player on your AVR-247?

Yes. The receiver status shows as if 2-channel Dolby Digital is being received, but there is no sound.

There is more than one version of HDMI cable on the market. Some do not have the pins included for audio! Verify you have the kind that does have it. I think it is like HDMI version 1 and version 2 or something. It's been a while since I looked into that, and don't feel like researching it again right now. ;-)

I don't have enough posts to provide a link, but go to Monoprice and search on part# 3948 to see the exact cable being used.

I think I'm ok.