OK I am in the process of purchasing the 1070 and am confused about what are my best connection choices. I have a Oppo 970 and a Mitsubishi LT3280. The LT has both DVI and HDMI. The 970 has no DVI. I have the 970 as I wanted a universial player and do not have a large TV. I am also planning to use 5.1 with Apeerion Speakers.

So should I
1. HDMI CD/DVD to TV and the DVD audio direct to the 1070? If so what which audio choice should I make? Same question for TV audio.

2. HDMI to DVI cable from DVD and TV? I assume I lose the audio with this cable. Therefore what shouold I use for the audio portion from the DVD and TV. I assume I only need the audio for TV which I use little.

What makes for a better connection?

Any other comments or suggestions?

Either the DVI or HDMI input should yield the same picture quality. If the Oppo 970HD is your only DVI/HDMI source (HDMI in the case of the 970HD), there's no compelling reason to use the 1070's DVI switching. I'd probably run HDMI from the 970HD to HDMI on the TV and run SPDIF and multichannel analog audio from the 970HD to the Model 1070 for DVD-Video and CD (SPDIF, coaxial or optical) and DVD-Audio and SACD (multichannel analog). This would also allow you to use your TV for audio when watching DVD's without turning on the 1070, although I generally tell folks that it's usually easier to just turn your surround receiver on even if you're just watching the weather channel.

You are correct no other HDMI/DVI sources. None planned either. The TV has another HDMI as well. I do have legacy stuff: tape player, VCR and Sony playstation. I suppose I will run them through the 1070 so I can use the stereo speakers rather then the TV speakers.

What about any audio from the TV to the 1070. I suppose this would only be for TV? Correct. By the way I have no cable TV as we watch little TV.

The reason that you can use the TV for audio is because of the HDMI between the TV and 970HD, correct? I agree I expect I will use the 1070 most of the time.

Now for a religous question. Coaxial versus optical. I assume optical is better for distance, but from my computer experiance I know you have to be careful of kinking.

Thanks

The tape deck, VCR, and PlayStation can all run both audio and (for the VCR and PlayStation, if you want to do so) video through the 1070. The tape and VCR will use stereo analog, and I think the PS1 only had analog output as well. The TV should have an analog stereo audio output (possibly even a digital audio output, although that's generally reserved for TV's with over-the-air HD tuners). You can connect that audio output to an input on the 1070 so that you can use the 1070 for audio while watching TV.

The 970HD's HDMI cable can carry audio to the TV, but that can be defeated if you want - and I'd expect that you'll want to listen through the 1070 when watching DVD's anyway.

When it comes to the religious war between coaxial and optical, I'm agnostic - I don't believe that either is inherently better. Optical is immune to EM and RF interference, which is a plus over long runs or runs through particularly nasty tangles of power and speaker cables, but it requires a conversion from electrical to optical signal transmission that coaxial doesn't. For normal runs in an equipment rack, I believe that the two are going to be effectively indistinguishable if decent cables are used and the connections aren't messed up somehow. If you get a nice optical cable, it'll be hard to put a kink in it without some serious effort - I've long felt that Outlaw's PDO is a great optical cable at a really sweet price ($20). The only non-PDO optical cable in my system is an 8-foot cable from my Roku SoundBridge, and that's only because the SoundBridge is too far away for a PDO to reach.

I had pretty much the same question about whether to bypass the 1070 with HDMI from the Oppo 970. But the question popped up about on screen menus, if any, for the 1070. If the the HD tuner or the DVD is the selected source, is it possible, or even necessary for 1070 menus to appear? None of the equipment has arrived yet, so I'm still fishing in the dark for the setup I need. I would be nice to skip owning two HDMI-DVI cables.

You only really need the 1070's on-screen display if you are making changes to the 1070's settings (something that's rarely done), and with the 1070 you can even use the front panel for all menu adjustments if you are in a position where you can see and read the front panel.

Also, keep in mind that the 1070's menus are not added to the digital video inputs (the DVI connections), so if you were planning to route both DVI or HDMI sources through the 1070 for that reason, there's no benefit to doing so.

Thanks gonk,

You confirmed a dawning suspicion about the 1070 menus being needed only for setup.

I didn't know about the menus not going out on the DVI outputs. Not having hardware in hand yet, I imagine everythting being more complicated than it probably is.

I like when the 1070 menu shows the volume as I adjust it as well, since the display on it is very small. However, the menu will not show over component cables unless you use a 480i source. As my Xbox and Wii are the only component devices I have, and both use 480p (in the case of the Wii, just most of the time) or better, (the Xbox has 720p in some games) and my other sources are DVI (which I have no use for the switching of the Outlaw yet, only one DVI source) and VGA, these are connected straight to the receiver, so I almost never get this display.