Hi BMXTRIX.
Thank you for your post!
I basically have four use cases that I would see being utilized.
- Main Zone (Living Room w/ 5.1.2) being used on it’s own for either music or TV/movie watching.
- Zone 2 (Dining Room (2.0) being used on it’s own for either music or TV/movie watching.
- Main Zone & Zone 2 watching same channel/source.
- Main Zone & Zone 2 listening to same music.
The rooms are adjacent without a wall separating so it wouldn’t be likely that there would be different sources being played on both of them simultaneously. For situations where both Main Zone and Zone 2 are being used simultaneously with the same source (likely during a party or such), I would probably be okay with both being in stereo.
However, judging by your post and also from the Denon user manual (link below) it seems that it is not guaranteed that I would get audio (stereo) on both when dealing with HDMI sources. From Denon User Manual “…However, depending on the playback device, the playback signal may not be converted to PCM even if this setting is configured”.
Also, per those notes in the Denon User Manual, it seems that I have to select PCM for it to have a chance of working. If I’m understanding this correctly it would seem to be a pain to be switching setting for PCM to other, etc. near anytime I’m wanting to watch/listen to something.
http://manuals.denon.com/AVRX4500H/NA/EN/SEHFSYwiarbykp.php#SEHFMLakdvkjuf
This is all getting a good bit more involved than my knowledge. I was thinking that it would have been a good idea as it would have allowed me to justify spending more on getting a better AVR as it would be serving two area and that I would have also gotten to explore the world of AVRs and expand my knowledge somewhat (I know very little).
I’m leaning towards giving Denon a call tomorrow to clarify/confirm my understanding of the limitations (i.e. hit and miss and also ‘constantly’ needing to manually switch audio modes). If that’s the case I’ll probably reconsider.
Thank you for the heads up!!!