why I'm returning my 2000T - what should I get?

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why I'm returning my 2000T - what should I get?

(23 posts)

colirv

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grahamlthompson - 5 hours ago »
If you have a surround sound system it should be perfectly happy with the standard ac3 (2.0 or 5.1 audio) output by the Humax (aka Dolby Digital). You should be able to connect the system directly using the S/Pdif output.

Except I can't ATM!

The Humax and Bravia TV are connected via HDMI cable - using the first HDMI socket on the TV as it has ARC. The Samsung Blu-ray 5.1 system is also connected to the TV by HDMI. With my old Fox-T2 this set-up worked perfectly. However, using the same set-up with the 2000T and the order in which TV and Humax are switched on and off matters. If I get it wrong then the TV sound reverts to the TV's own speakers. I get round this by having the TV's volume set permanently to zero and connecting the TV's digital audio out to the Samsung's digital audio in. This means the digital audio in is not available for the Humax, which was your suggestion.

What I haven't yet tried (simply because it hadn't occurred to me) is connecting the Humax to the Samsung instead of to the TV. That's my next project!

| Wed 4 Jun 2014 17:34:23 #11 |
grahamlthompson

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colirv - 45 minutes ago »

grahamlthompson - 5 hours ago »
If you have a surround sound system it should be perfectly happy with the standard ac3 (2.0 or 5.1 audio) output by the Humax (aka Dolby Digital). You should be able to connect the system directly using the S/Pdif output.

Except I can't ATM!
The Humax and Bravia TV are connected via HDMI cable - using the first HDMI socket on the TV as it has ARC. The Samsung Blu-ray 5.1 system is also connected to the TV by HDMI. With my old Fox-T2 this set-up worked perfectly. However, using the same set-up with the 2000T and the order in which TV and Humax are switched on and off matters. If I get it wrong then the TV sound reverts to the TV's own speakers. I get round this by having the TV's volume set permanently to zero and connecting the TV's digital audio out to the Samsung's digital audio in. This means the digital audio in is not available for the Humax, which was your suggestion.
What I haven't yet tried (simply because it hadn't occurred to me) is connecting the Humax to the Samsung instead of to the TV. That's my next project!

There's no point in connecting the HDR1000s to the arc socket on the TV. Arc is the audio return channel which allows your TV to send digital audio input to the TV out to a AV amplifier. The HDR1000s is a audio source, it can't do anything with digital audio input at it's hdmi socket.

Your 5.1 audio system (assuming it's arc capable) should use that socket.

| Wed 4 Jun 2014 18:22:45 #12 |
damian

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most TV's 'digital out' is lpcm stereo from the internal tuner and even when you feed them surround sound via hdmi they don't pass it through, but output the stereo that would have gone to the TV's speakers.
It's a pain as some TV's will have 3-4 hdmi inputs and it'd be natural to assume that the digital audio going in via hdmi would also be sent back out exactly the same via the TV's 'digital out'. This simply isn't the case for most TV's.
Your best bet, as you've already worked out, is to feed the digital out from the Humax direct to the Samsung. For the very few times that you're recording two channels and want to watch live TV or you've switched the Humax off, you may want to connect the analogue L+R output of the TV, if available, to the analogue L+R input of the Samsung, again if available.
I have my Humax connected via s/pdif to a pioneer receiver and the Humax volume set at 10 - can't remember why, but it works for me and my setup.
You should try, as Graham suggested, connecting the TV's arc hdmi to the Samsung and you'll have to wait for the very rare programme/film, such as Dr Who etc., to broadcast 5.1 to see if that gets fed back as 5.1 via arc, but you'll probably find that it also gets converted, as the TV digital out does, to lpcm stereo. In this case it's back to an s/pdif Humax-Samsung direct connection.
I trust this makes sense
Humax do suffer from hdmi handshake problems that none of my other hdmi enabled devices suffer with which just adds to the frustration until you find a work around, normally the order in which things are switched on.
Network, OP (original poster), shouldn't be a problem, check the router to see if there's an eco or power saving setting for ports, similarly if you're using home plugs or similar it's possible these may go into sleep mode, but I'm not aware of any that do. DLNA can take a while to appear on the network for any device.
Humax do seem to have shot themselves in the foot recently with their product offerings and support which is a real shame; however there's probably not much else that's better on the market at the moment.

| Thu 5 Jun 2014 1:50:25 #13 |
colirv

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Right. Apologies to Graham and Damian whom I've unwittingly led up the garden path. The TV's ARC HDMI slot is indeed connected to the Samsung, and passes 5.1 comfortably to it. The TV's remote even controls the Samsung's volume, which means one less remote to worry about. I was clearly not thinking straight yesterday. Sorry, chaps.

Quite when I'll try an alternative connection will depend on how soon the visiting family give me the chance!

| Thu 5 Jun 2014 10:02:38 #14 |
colirv

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I've now tried Plan B, and the Humax's picture passed on by the Samsung to the TV is too bright - far brighter than the TV's and Samsung's own, with no obvious means of adjustment on the Humax. So I'm back to the original set-up, which I can live with.

| Thu 5 Jun 2014 20:24:40 #15 |
grahamlthompson

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colirv - 1 hour ago »
I've now tried Plan B, and the Humax's picture passed on by the Samsung to the TV is too bright - far brighter than the TV's and Samsung's own, with no obvious means of adjustment on the Humax. So I'm back to the original set-up, which I can live with.

Getting more and more confused. I thought you were going to connect the box via s/pdif to the audio amplifier. This has no video capability so no way the video signal is going via the AV kit. Assuming the AV kit has the capability to pass through a hdmi signal, and you are passing through hdmi via the amp to the TV, after extracting the audio the video should be identical to making a direct hdmi connection to the TV.

| Thu 5 Jun 2014 21:35:23 #16 |
colirv

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I can be very confusing! The Samsung is an HT-E5550 Blu-ray Home Entertainment System. The disc playback picture it passes to the TV and the TV's picture from its own tuner are near enough the same. The picture the Samsung passes on when the Humax is connected to one of the Samsung's HDMI-in slots is much brighter. I was expecting it to be the same but it isn't.

I need to reserve the Samsung's s/pdif slot for the TV to save having to re-boot the whole system when the Humax and TV disagree.

| Thu 5 Jun 2014 21:55:17 #17 |
grahamlthompson

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colirv - 39 minutes ago »
I can be very confusing! The Samsung is an HT-E5550 Blu-ray Home Entertainment System. The disc playback picture it passes to the TV and the TV's picture from its own tuner are near enough the same. The picture the Samsung passes on when the Humax is connected to one of the Samsung's HDMI-in slots is much brighter. I was expecting it to be the same but it isn't.
I need to reserve the Samsung's s/pdif slot for the TV to save having to re-boot the whole system when the Humax and TV disagree.

In that case the Samsung unit must not be simply passing on the HDMI signal to the TV. HDMI input to my Denon amp from the HDR1000S is identical to the direct connection. I think you need to talk to Samsung.

| Thu 5 Jun 2014 22:38:04 #18 |
colirv

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grahamlthompson - 2 hours ago »
I think you need to talk to Samsung.

Or I need to speak to Humax (everything worked perfectly until my Fox T2 was replaced with a 2000T) or indeed to Sony (other makes of TV don't seem to have this handshake problem with the 2000T). So I'll end up talking to none of them, and hope that a firmware upgrade on the 2000T will make it match the capability of the Fox T2.

| Fri 6 Jun 2014 0:56:07 #19 |
damian

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I have a very similar Samsung bluray system with a hd-foxt2 connected through it and it doesn't suffer from a bright picture. There are plenty of other issues though.

If it's network connected you should check for updates, there was a very recent one in May 2014 I believe.

It may be worthwhile resetting it back to defaults, check the manual for troubleshooting and the procedure, but you may lose any apps that you've downloaded. Failing that, you could double check the settings as there are quite a few options for hdmi.

I'd be tempted to connect the analogue stereo L+R TV <-> Samsung as previoulsy mentioned, I don't think the TV outputs 5.1 anyway so there's no real advantage in using the s/pdif

1st thing to try is software update on the Samsung, 2nd - default reset on the Samsung, 3rd - the anynet-cec might be causing trouble. etc. etc.
Unfortunately these things are too complicated for their own good. I agree with Graham that the Samsung seems to be causing the problem (mine doesn't), it's just that finding the right tweak via trial and error takes time and patience.

Just noticed your last post and I'm assuming you set up the 2000T whilst connected directly to the TV. It would also make sense to have the Humax connected to the Samsung and then TV and then do a factory reset on the Humax whilst connected to the Samsung. I've found this necessary when moving Humax boxes around between different displays.

The biggest problem I've noticed and experienced is HDCP which causes virtually all of the handshaking issues. The joke is that anybody serious about pirating/copying buys a piece of kit that by-passes hdcp meanwhile the rest of us who just want to connect our equipment and watch content we've paid for suffer big time. Humax don't do themselves any favours, but they're as much victims, the real culprits are intel and the film industry for forcing this half baked rubbish on the consumer.

| Fri 6 Jun 2014 1:17:41 #20 |