Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems HD621 Issues... with DVI receivers

Well, my black box arrived (and very nice it is too) this morning and it's now installed and running. And it works! My Sony BDP-S550 displays DTS Master HD 48kHz (instead of the DTS 3/2 I see from the coax output) and the 861 displays PCM 96kHz instead of DTS 48kHz. Lossless digital!! YAY!!. No comments on sound quality until I get a chance to properly evaluate!

One installation issue was that the 861 sources that I moved to the HD621 were left on the 861 sources tab as Audio Input "Last Valid" instead of being moved to the multichannel input, so I was only getting sound from the last selected source. Once I corrected this out I started to get sound.

And one serious problem which at the moment looks to be with the HD621, but could be my Lumagen ProHDP, is that it forces my Sony BDP S550 into RGB PC mode! The Lumagen's EDID was always ignored by the Sony so I had the Sony manually set to YCbCr mode, but even that seems to be overriden by the HD621; even setting the Sony to RGB VIDEO is ignored and it's forced into RGB PC. My HDXA1 works correctly though (although I've had to now force it to RGB PC as well) so I need to experiment more to see where the blame lays.

Anyway, the upshot is that I've been forced to reconfigure my video input settings from the ideal YCbCr to the far from ideal RGB PC Not a happy bunny!

I'll contact Meridian direct regarding this but if others see the issue with other hardware perhaps they could mention it here. It's sure to be HDMI handshake issues so hopefully Meridian will be able to improve this via firmware upgrades.

Back to fiddling!

Cheers,

Mark

I can tell you are excited, but you didn't explain your connection diagram.

Can you remove the Lumagen from the equation to see if you can send YCbCr to the TV/Projector from Sony BDP-S550 through HD621?

I will but don't have time right now... Will also try with a Lumagen Radiance (HDMI device).

Connections:

Sony BDP-S550/Tosh HD-XA1 -> HD621 -> Lumagen ProHDP -> PD Cineo 3 1080+

I *have* tested EDID to the Tosh and it also makes no difference. The HD621 is enforcing RGB PC. It looks like the HD621 is perhaps ignoring the ProDHP as it's a DVI device and imposing it's own settings on the sources.

Isn't HDMI handshaking wonderful

Mark

In time, I'm sure you will switch in your Radiance...

RGB PC ? Who needs that ? Clearly some error if that is what the HD621 defaults to.

Just tested direct to the projector and everything is fine, so it's looking like the some sort of DVI/HDMI issue, with the HD621 defaulting to RGB PC if it doesn't like talking to the receiver, eg the Lumagen ProHDP.

I'm ready to switch to the Radiance just as soon as they add the video delay... and then all these issues go away.

Cheers,

Mark

How does the lumagen present itself? Sounds like HD621 detects the Lumagen as a DVI PC level device.

All Lumagens allow user definable EDID settings, thus mine presents itself as a YCbCr 480i/1080i device. BUT there have been other occassions where HDMI devices refuse to cooperate with it, and they seem to be following the HDMI spec when doing so, so it's impossible to do anything really.

However, my Sony BDP-S550 doesn't handshake with the ProHDP but I've always been ok as you can configure the Sony to always output YCbCr. Well, that was until I stuck the HD621 after it. Now it only outputs RGB PC... It would be much more palatable if the HD621 at least defaulted to RGB Video...

Cheers,

Mark

Well you can see why Shawn got out of the Clux/Octava buisisness. This HDMI stuff is such pain too support.

If your test with the Radiance fixes it but you still want to use the ProHDP you probably could use the Gefen DVI Detective+. Use it to learn the Radiances EDID that worked and then plug the Gefen ahead of the ProHDP.

Shawn

Any thoughts on how I should configure my PS3, 568.2MM, Lumagen XD and future HD621? There are two scenarios:

1) PS3 -> HD621 -> 568.2MM via MHR and -> XD via HDMI (video only)

2) PS3 -> XD -> HD621 via HDMI (audio only) -> 568.2MM via MHR

In 1) the HD621 separates the audio and video and passes the video to the XD, ie, video goes through HD621 and XD, audio only through HD621. Does the HD621 remove the audio signal so that the XD receives a "video only" signal?

In 2) the XD separates the audio and video, ie, video only goes through XD and the audio goes through both XD and HD621. The HD621 receives an "audio only" (video is blanked) signal.

Another scenario just occurred to me:

3) PS3 -> HDMI splitter. In this way the video only goes through the XD and the audio through the HD621 and of course both go through the splitter. ** I just did some casual research and it seems a splitter may not be as transparent as I thought. An active splitter may be required, which kind of defeats the purpose.

Thanks,
George

Hmm, if the HD621 EDID tell the players to output PC levels better put it behind the XD since than you can get video levels from the players and force the output to video levels.