I recently upgraded my cable box and wanted to hook it up via its optical out to my 950. I did and now I'm just wondering what I'm supposed to be seeing on the display when watching programs. I turned on HDNet movie channel with Wayne's World which i thought would be dolby digital 5.1 but when I select the channel the 950 read PCM and 48z then switches automatically to PLll-C. I'm pretty sure I locked the data format on auto so I thought that Dolby D would be selected. Am I missing something or do most cable stations, even ESPN, not broadcast in dolby digital 5.1? I thought they did. It does sound good and I can cycle through the surround modes but DD and DD EX never show up. I have to turn off the cable box and set it before I turn it on. Just plain confused. thanks for any and all help.
ews

Not every program broadcasts in Dolby 5.1, many do Dolby 2.0 or PCM stereo. Also, make sure the cable box is set to output Dolby Digital - mine has an option to do either Dolby Digital or PCM stereo, and for the latter the box decodes DD internally and downmixes to stereo.

duh! thanks, gonk. the minute I posted this and was searching through the forum for some info the light bulb went on and I did exactly what you said. sure enough had to change the audio setting to Dolby Digital on the box and bingo. sure sounds great. nice to know their are people like you out there to help.
ews

Glad to help.

Oddly enough, reading this made me realize that my HD DVR receiver from uverse, a Motorola VIP1216, was not outputting dolby digital over the hdmi. It outputs video great, but the audio I'm getting from it will not switch to DD, just as the OP noticed with his.

It sounds really nice with the PL11 and it's many variations on my Integra 9.9, but it won;t do DD over the HDMI. It does it over the toslink though. How odd.

I did some investigating on a uverse forum and found my answer:

That jives with what I have experienced. The PLII 5.1 actually sounds really nice though.