I just bought a 990 and 7125 amp, so far so good. But I have recently seen where the new hd/dvd and bluray players will have hi-def available thru HDMI only. How are we going to get sound thru our 990's?

You might think about not buying one until the industry gives you, the customer, what you want. They have made it hard for the honest and innocent to use their product, while doing nothing to stop criminals. That said, won't you be able to use 7.1 analog inputs from the HD player to the 990? Did you read something that said they would provide an analog signal carrying one of the HD audio formats?

I won't buy a Blu-Ray or HD-DVD probably ever but certainly not until the format wars end, the anti-piracy shields are lowered, the prices comes down (early adopters are punished--they pay the bill for development), there's plenty of media available and the stupid industry stops thinking that they can charge $30-$40 for a DVD and expect people to pay it. That's gonna be a long time.

Yeah, I agree, as it is now they are pricing things to create a niche market. Of course the early adopters will jump in, but probably not many others will follow, at least not until you start to see universal players (which I've heard are coming) and loosening of the DRM restrictions (and not on a voluntary basis either...must be as a standard).

Then again most people buy iPods and download songs from iTunes so what do they care about DRM restrictions?

But I bet that most people will care about which format will be dominant.

Not to mention those of us who have analog only HDTV monitors (or projectors)-

There's been a lot of debate about the audio side of this lately. Here's the latest info that I've seen (and I haven't seen anything definitive that contradicts it): HDMI 1.1 or 1.2 will carry the newest audio formats decoded into multichannel PCM, and all players will have 5.1 or 7.1 analog outputs that will also carry these formats (mostly 5.1 outputs for some reason, which I can't explain). HDMI and component will both carry the video, although the studios can choose to cripple component (limit it to 540 lines instead of 1080) when mastering each disc. So far, the main Blu-ray studios are promising not to pull that switch for now, although Warner hasn't made it clear what they're doing with their HD-DVD titles in a couple weeks. As for the HDMI video, the 990's DVI switching will work with it just fine.

I don't know how well it works, but I've seen on most of the new displays with the HDMI inputs there is a digital output of some description on the back. For example, I lifted this from the pdf of Sony's 40" BRAVIA™ XBR® LCD Flat Panel HDTV KDL-V40XBR1 display.

You can use the TV’s OPTICAL OUT jack to connect a digital audio device that is PCM/Dolby digital compatible, such as an audio amplifier.

Use an optical cable to connect the TV’s OPTICAL OUT jack to the device’s OPTICAL IN jack.

It also has this discalimer.

The OPTICAL OUT jack is available only when a digital TV channel is received.

It specifically says TV channel so maybe this isn't applicable to another input source, such as a next gen player. Although, it's my understanding that the 5.1/7.1 outputs on the next gen players are because nobody has software yet that knows how to decode the new audio formats. But I think that the media is still supposed to carry a standard DD track. Hopefully someone around here has a little more knowledge on the subject.

We've got three new audio formats to look forward to - Dolby Digital Plus, DTS-HD, and Dolby TrueHD. TrueHD is a lossless format (actually descended from DVD-Audio's MLP), and DTS-HD offers a lossless option. All three can do 7.1 discrete channels. All three are also too large to pass over a coaxial or optical digital audio cable. Firewire could probably do it, but it's never going to get the chance - HDMI's the only digital avenue allowed. The problem is that HDMI won't be allowed to pass the raw, undecoded bitstream of any of these formats until version 1.3 (we're currently on 1.2, which came out last August). In order to transfer any of these formats now, the player must decode the audio first. It can then either send the eight channels of PCM digital audio (the output of the decoder) over an HDMI v1.1 or v1.2 connection, but HDMI inputs on receivers that support audio (rather than just being video switches like the 990's DVI) are still very rare. Therefore, most people will get to those new formats by letting the player convert those PCM signals to analog and use a 5.1 or 7.1 analog output (preferably 7.1, which the 990 can handle, but so far nobody's announced players with 7.1 outputs for some reason). Both DD+ and DTS-HD are also required to include legacy DD 5.1 and DTS 5.1 tracks, which can be passed over a coaxial or optical digital audio cable.

Thanks for helping my understanding of this guys. Sam

Ahh... so it's not just a software limitation, it's also a physical hardware limitation. That makes sense. As always, thanks for the details, gonk.

I have a Sony 60sx955, the optical output is only active with Off the Air channels. I will output 5.1 from the HD channels that I receive. There is no output on the Optical Out when HDMI inputs are selected.