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hawke : 1. There is more distance to travel when D/A conversion takes place on the DVD player. And your analogue audio cables are now carrying the analogue signal to the receiver.
2. The bass management that is going on is probably a lot better in the receiver than in the DVD player. Just run the numbers and see what each gear has to do for the price.
3. No, this shouldn't be an issue
4. No, probably not.
5. Not sure why you would want to do this as it would result in splitting your bass management into a voodoo-ish type of mixture between the DVD player and the receiver. Definitely not a scientifically fair testing procedure.
It is generally best to capitalize on the (usually) superior electronics of the receiver for decoding DTS signals.
For experimentation, I am using "The Lord of the Rings, Fellowship of the Rings" prolog section to evaluate LFE response of DTS. LotR has *lots* of LFE. There is a huge difference in bass response between DVD decoder via 6-channel vs. Receiver decoder via optical connection.
In response to your responses...
1. I think a difference in cable length would have a much more subtle effect than what I hear. At first I wasn't sure there was even a signal coming from the the receiver's LFE output when using DVD decoder via 6-channel input. Once I confirmed that there was actually a signal it was so low I thought it just might be cross-channel leakage until I removed all but the LFE cable between the DVD and the receiver.
2. You are probably right about this. But, the DVD player actually has *more* configuration options than the receiver does (e.g. rear-channel delay), raising my expectations.
3. Agreed.
4. Still suspicious, and this is the reason for my number 5 ...
5. I want to try the direct hookup from DVD to subwoofer just to evaluate how good a signal is coming out of the DVD. If this gives me the full bass then I can blame the receiver's handling 6-channel input instead of anything in the DVD. Just a diagnostic tool, not intended to be my actual configuration.
So my remaining questions are: Is it safe to do this? Is the DVD analog output compatible with what the subwoofer expects as low-level input?</font>