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Help with an Optical lead, which sockets/equipment should be connected

L

Linny40

TK LADY VETERAN
Bought a Digital Optical Audio Cable as suggested by a very large electrical store, but cant seem to get it to do anything.

Went into the store to ask if i could by a surround sound for my blurray, but told they come all in 1. Bought a panasonic bluray player in December, so dont need to spend £500 on a whole new system.

Was told to get the Optical lead as that would work with my tv and the surround sound we currently have.

I have a HD tv, HD cable box, Bluray player and JVC surround sound ( did have dvd player unit but we took out and replaced with bluray player)

All have the Optical socket.

The lead i bought did not come with any instructions, but yes its obvious plug 1 end into 1 unit and other end into other unit. But which units??
the JVC is an old unit and has scarts but no HDMI all other units have scart & HDMI, Bluray does not have a scart socket ( that would make life easier)
The JVC also has 2 optical sockets VIDEO & TV

I have tried different combinations but cannot seem to get the surround sound to work when playing a dvd.
So does anyone know which sockets the optical lead should go in. Because of the av leads the tv will work with the surround sound, but not when a dvd is playing - only on the cable box.

Hubby says to get a techno guy in ( thats gonna cost even if he cant get it to work)
 
You are gonna have to make a choice which device you want to have the optical audio out and then that one should be connect via the new cable to your surround sound system. My choice would be the blu-ray player, but that is only if it will split the audio out and allow it to go out on the optical as well as the hdmi. I would definitely not sacrifice the picture quality by doing away with the hdmi to my tv all together just to make the surround work. Regardless which device you hook up, you should be able to scroll through the "input" portion of the menu on your jvc and select the "optical in" item. Sorry if this a little scatterbrained, just got up. lol
 
more and more things change,scarts were the in thing now hdmi and spdif,if you ever upgrade with an amp there are plenty of ports to use.
if you only have 1 input optical or digital out [ slightly different lead ] you can buy a switcher and have 3 units connected to 1 input
 
Are you getting any sound at all Linny?
If not check the blu-ray players menu and make sure it's set to output sound over optical and not hdmi.
As for the JVC just go through the menu and set optical 1 for video (blu-ray)
This is how I have my PS3 hooked up, HMDI plugged into the tv and the optical plugged into my processor.
You should be good to go :)
 
thanks guys. got to wait for hubby to come home as i need 2 peeps! 1 playing at the back and 1 reading what boxes say at front. guess where i end up :(

Honestly its sounding more complicated. Its also having the time to sit ( squashed up behind the damn tv) to go thro everything.
I wonder am i better to pay the £500 for a whole new unit and out the other bits (JVC surround) LOL! the blu ray player can go in our room :)
 
Ummmmmm in the back?? LOL
Wish I lived closer to you I could have you up and running in 5 mins ;)
 
Icanbe said:
Wish I lived closer to you I could have you up and running in 5 mins
Click to expand...

well you didnt swim far enough did you :)
thanks. Im sure we will fix it - eventually and yes sorry getting some sound but only 2 out of the 5 speakers when its on the Br player. But when vm box is on i get it out of all 5, so all speakers work depending on the settings The stupid JVC was complicated when we 1st bought it back in 2005 But its what he wanted and it cost a packet n half back then!! oh and THATS without the £20 optical lead. With lead in there seems to be no difference :(
Could it be that the belkin lead is duff lead
 
It is very possible that the lead is bad, optical leads are very sensitive to bending, it can break the glass fibers inside, check the outer jacket and see if it has any sharp kinks in it, if it does then it is broken inside.
There is one more thing you can check in the blu-ray players menu, check the "Digital out" and make sure it is set to "Bitstream" because if it is set to "PCM" you won't get surround sound from the blu-ray player (I know this is getting to complicated now LOL )
Hope you get it all working, Trust me I know how frustrating it can be LOL!!!!
 
Last edited:
Icanbe said:
I know this is getting to complicated now )
Click to expand...

it dont take much to confuse me lol! but ill check it out. Just about got as far as playing a dvd and adding the USB to the BR lol! dont think weve even gone as far as menu!
Yrs ago i was good at all that sort of stuff but now its just more and more complicated! Lets go back to VCR players - all you had to do was tune in the 2 white line and away you went! SIMPLES!!!!!!!!
 
here's one of those toslink switches the cactikid mentioned, a bargain including two toslink cables, gonna get me one of these myself.

Code: 
http://cgi.ebay.ie/3-Way-Digital-Optical-Audio-TosLink-Splitter-Switcher-/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=220567259593
 
Linny40 said:
Bought a Digital Optical Audio Cable as suggested by a very large electrical store, but cant seem to get it to do anything.

Went into the store to ask if i could by a surround sound for my blurray, but told they come all in 1. Bought a panasonic bluray player in December, so dont need to spend £500 on a whole new system.

Was told to get the Optical lead as that would work with my tv and the surround sound we currently have.

I have a HD tv, HD cable box, Bluray player and JVC surround sound ( did have dvd player unit but we took out and replaced with bluray player)

All have the Optical socket.

The lead i bought did not come with any instructions, but yes its obvious plug 1 end into 1 unit and other end into other unit. But which units??
the JVC is an old unit and has scarts but no HDMI all other units have scart & HDMI, Bluray does not have a scart socket ( that would make life easier)
The JVC also has 2 optical sockets VIDEO & TV

I have tried different combinations but cannot seem to get the surround sound to work when playing a dvd.
So does anyone know which sockets the optical lead should go in. Because of the av leads the tv will work with the surround sound, but not when a dvd is playing - only on the cable box.

Hubby says to get a techno guy in ( thats gonna cost even if he cant get it to work)
Click to expand...
Linny not too sure what you are asking without a little more info, but try this , i hope it helps,
you can always ask for further info.
the best way to connect,is via your tv to the sound system via digital optical cable , so any input to tv will be
sent to jvc s/s system . you may not notice the digital output as it will only play when the input is dolby digital or dts.
dts sr/s is the best input , so set your other inputs ie; blueray player etc; to the tv to dts if allowed.
You will need something that has a very strong digital playback to test out your system first.
I wou;ld add that optical digital cables are very good for copying digital sound but i have found that playback
is not really that much improved in comparrison to ordinary digital cable inputs,
 
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UPDATE!

Right i sat and played with the optical cable for a fe days pluging in and unplugging leads, all to no avial. The Optical lead seemed to make no difference.
I spoke to someone in a shop and was told i needed 2 leads 1 for JVC and bluray and 1 for jvc and vm box. Again still sound out of either front or back speakers Not all at once.

THEN i decided to play with the other leads ( ones with red/white ends audio leads i think they are,) moved them on the JVC to different sockets and low and behold surround sound form both VM box and BR player!!! YAY!!!!!!!!


so going to take my belkin lead back to the store and get my £20 back - the one i bought from the other store was only £10. So i had spend £30 on leads that i did not need!
IF only i had the patience to have "studies" all the leads to begin with :)
 
I think you discovered the "COAXIAL" out LOL , was the female plug on the blu-ray and vm box orange by any chance?
 
Icanbe said:
was the female plug on the blu-ray and vm box orange by any chance?
Click to expand...
no dont remember seeing any orange
Ill try n take some piccies so you can see what im trying to explain lol!
Now come on you dont expect me to remember what i did lol!
KingWilliam sorry didnt see your post earlier :(

Icanbe said:
was the female plug on the blu-ray and vm box orange by any chance?
Click to expand...
no dont remember seeing any orange
Ill try n take some piccies so you can see what im trying to explain lol!
Now come on you dont expect me to remember what i did lol!
KingWilliam sorry didnt see your post earlier :(

Added after 30 minutes:

Some photos a bit jumbled but labled as to whats what
JVC surround sound
9.jpg

TV
10.jpg

Bluray JVC on bottom
11.jpg

JVC
12.jpg

JVC
13.jpg

These are the ones where i changed the leads Bluray on this pic in correct place
14.jpg

this one i had the red/white leads in the bottom rather than where they are now
15.jpg

VM BOX
16.jpg


@icanbe i now see the orange socket but no lead for that :)
hope all this makes sense but as said got surround sound now on vm and bluray player without the optical leads :):)

had to sit squashed on the floor and try and point phone in right direction - its rather tight behind the tv and with all the cables i had to try and hold them up to get a pic lol!
 
Last edited:
linny 40 it looks to me your tv doesn't have spdif input, cannot see from pic you are showing.
It appears your JVC s/s has three digital inputs, Showing on one of your pics.
"3 (tv) spdif (optical)," ---
"2 (vid) spdif (optical)," ---
"1(dvr/dvd) Component THIS shows as yellow "Coaxial" digital component audio."

So i would suggest
No 3 should connect to Blueray spdif optical out.
No 2 should connect to V/M Box spdif optical out.
No 1 should connect to digital component out from tv if this does have a digital component out.

Note the cables 3 & 2 are the same spdif ,
1 is component "Coaxial " which is similar to ordinary audio cables but not the same.

It Would help me if you could give me a picture of each box and the tv
showing all the connections on each unit in one complete picture. ie showing all connections on each individual box in one photo.

I know this sounds daft but you will only get the, surround sound playing through your jvc unit, from each box you will be using.
 
Last edited:
thanks King William, as said above i now seem to have sound on all speakers for the vm box and the bluray player.
Not sure what you mean by a "spdif" but tv does have the optical Digital out socket under where it says PC next to the AV a sockets.
But i will try and get clearer photos for you.
 
Linny40 said:
thanks King William, as said above i now seem to have sound on all speakers for the vm box and the bluray player.
Not sure what you mean by a "spdif" but tv does have the optical Digital out socket under where it says PC next to the AV a sockets.
But i will try and get clearer photos for you.
Click to expand...

Yes can see it now the tv does have digital out this is also what i mean by a spdif connection.
As your jvc only has 2 spdif connections and one coaxial connection you will have to make
your own selection which to use with spdif connections.

I would suggest trying spdif connection from tv to jvc. Then with the blueray and v/m boxes
being connected via hdmi cables, you will need then only have surround sound on JVC set to tv .
Then when you use blueray or v/m just change the avi on Tv to hdmi 1 lets say blueray or hdmi 2 lets say V/M.
So then all s/sound output goes through the tv to the JVC.
Hope this helps.
 
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