Onkyo TX-SR702 and sub out problems

To all-

I've searched the forums and couldn't find a solution - so here it is.

I bought this receiver last week, and have it hooked up to a pair of bookshelf speakers, a sub through the pre-out sub connection (it's powered) and a DVD player through the optical input. I do not have the rest of the surround speakers yet.

When I watch movies the sub works fine.

When I play a music CD, nothing comes through it. I've tried everything I can after viewing the manuals for both the DVD player and receiver.

The speakers are set to small, the sub is set to yes - and the crossover has gone from 80 to THX up to 120 with no difference.

There are decoder settings for Analog/PCM - but I can't seem to find much in the manual about these, excuse my ignorance - I'm very new to this.

Does anyone have a similar configuration? I'm beginning to wonder if the receiver is fauly - but more likely it's my limited intelligence with things like this.

Sorry

I'm not well versed on the Onkyo output settings but it sounds as if your reciever's listening mode might be set to some type of auto detection. Try fussing with the listening mode buttons. Just a shot in the dark here.

The only time you shouldn't get output from the sub is if the receiver is in Direct or Pure Direct mode. Do you happen to have one of those set when listening to CD?

There could also be an issue with your selections in the setup menu, although usually the defaults are fine. In most cases, you want the surround mode selections to be 'Last Valid'. That simply means use the mode that was last selected. So, if you are listening to a CD with PLII Music and then switch to another input, when you come back to CD it will go back to PLII Music.

If you do not have Direct or Pure Direct set, tell me what your menu settings are and I can help you get this sorted out.

Thanks for the tips... I'll have to check it this evening when I get home, I'll post a follow up tonight with either success or failure!

One note though, when I play the CD and try to cycle through the DSP settings I can get either CD Stereo, or Theater Dimensional (since I have only a L-R & Sub I use that for movies). So my guess from the last reply is that there is an issue with the Last Valid selection.

I have tried setting DVD and CD to the OPT1 optical input hoping that by selecting CD as the source I'd be able to 'expose' some other DSP modes. But that didn't work.

I might try resetting it, it might be caught in some wierd state.

This receiver works incredibly well for movies, I have this and a Sanyo PLV-Z2 projector and even with just two speakers it's great. If I could get this resovled it would be perfect. Sounds like it's just a misconfiguration.

Onkyo customer service is awesome... I gave up after 25 minutes on hold waiting to speak to a rep.

OK, I have tried a few things.

I was able to get it working through the optical 1 input for both CD and DVD. I have to mess quite a bit with the equalizer settings though to make it sound good for both. Seems almost like I have to turn off the equilizer for CD audio and put it on Auto for DVD.

Does anyone have a similar receiver, and have similar issues?

Thanks,

Eric

Just a suggestion. Assuming your DVD player has both optical and digital coax outputs. (Or two of either). Hook both of them up to the reciver. One for DVD one for CD. This way once you get the setting as you like them the Last Valid function will remember that setting. No need to mess with the setting every time.

Great suggestion from NomoSony, you might want to use that approach. It will allow you to have two different sets of settings and not have to change them once you get them set the way you like.

I don't quite understand what difference you are hearing that you don't like. The CD and DVD inputs are identical in terms of the specs for the audio inputs.

Are you comparing apples to apples? If you are playing a cd thru the cd input but a dvd with a dolby digital track on the dvd input, they will sound slightly different. If you are playing the same cd and only switching between the inputs, there should be no sound difference at all.

Side note. Nice manual and GUI from Onkyo! Granted the GUI reqires a couple extra buttons on the front panel but still very impressive. Somewhat puts Sony and Yamaha to shame.

How long are you waiting for the registration?

Anonymous...

I'm sure your right. I popped in a music CD, and the Lord of the Rings and there was a huge difference. With the equilizer on in CD mode it was painfully bright. The movie sounded fine. I was so excited the sub was working, I didn't even check the CD through the CD and DVD input. I'll give that a shot tonight.

As a side note, this is a cheap DVD player that came with the projector I bought (waiting on something new like a Bravo D2 - but ahven't decided yet). It has optical out, and RCA out - but no Coax. So I can't really test that. I will try it through the Analog inputs.

I think I failed to mention the solution. Once I set DVD and CD to OPT1 for input, I went to the decoder menus and for PCM I set it to PLII, then stereo - the whole mix until I found one I liked. It was set to Auto on one menu, and then Last valid on another. Things are working great - I set the sub crossover to THX (80hz) and couldn't be happier.

NomoSony - I have another Yamaha receiver and this is the first one with on screen setup I've had. I don't know what other receivers are like with this feature, but it makes it so easy the way Onkyo has built the menu's. Very easy to navigate. That and it sounds very clean, I am hearing a lot of detail I didn't know was there.

The old Yamaha was an HTR-5150 (probably about 6 years old now) and as an example - in the DVD Finding Nemo I could not hear the fish fins fluttering and swooshing in the water when they are just sitting there. Clear as day now.

mtrycrafts said:

How long are you waiting for the registration?

Click to expand...

Is that directed at me? I will have to wait forever as I used an email address that is invalid and yet it still lets me log in. I'll probably register again with a different email address that I can actually access and reply to the registration notice.

Anonymous-

Can you PM me, or post here - I'm interested in your speaker recommendations since you seem to be into Onkyo receivers. That's the next big step.

I am using JBL speakers that I bought in 1996. J900MV towers, J Center, and J520M for surrounds. They are all very efficient (92 db/w/m) 8 ohms speakers and are currently driven by an Onkyo TX-SR502. Previously driven by Onkyo TX-SV525.

The new JBL Northridge series are better and I will at least consider them when I move (if I can find a house that doesn't have a damn fireplace in the middle of the big wall!). Current plan is to get the 702, possibly an external amp to go with it, and new speakers too.

Speakers are a very subjective choice as we all like different things, but I've been pretty happy with the JBLs.