Ummm, Help! Sky decoder and HDD DVD recorder confuzzlement

**TonyB** · 10th December 2007, 06:46

Its a sad day. I am now officially old. Soon my four year old son will have to operate appliances for me.....

MrsB bought a DVD/Hard drive recorder whatsit yesterday and promptly expected me to hook it up to our home theater system.... which already looks like spagetti junction despite having only being set up for 2 days....

Now, we're moving house (which is why the hometheater has only been setup for two days), and in my defence I must say that I am farken tired, but this DVD/Hard drive recorder whatsit has me confuzzled. The Sky decoder has two scart plugs- the TV one goes to the TV (well the video does, the sound goes to the OTHER DVD home theater whatsit), and I'm using the Video Scart to go to the new DVD/Hard drive recorder whatsit. There is then a component video going from the new DVD/Hard drive recorder whatsit to the TV.
To watch SKY I set the TV to AV1.
To watch whatever is coming out of the new DVD/Hard drive recorder whatsit I set the TV to AV4
To watch a DVD on the OTHER DVD home theater whatsit I set the TV to AV3

I can record SKY very easily with the new DVD/Hard drive recorder whatsit. No problems there. I can even operate the remote.

BUT...

Heres the question:
Why is it, that when I hit play on the new DVD/Hard drive recorder whatsit, I get the pictures from the new DVD/Hard drive recorder whatsit regardless of whether the TV is set to AV4 or AV1?? AV1 should be showing whatever is coming out of the SKY decoder, so why oh why is it showing what is playing on the new DVD/Hard drive recorder whatsit???

**Grahameeboy** · 10th December 2007, 06:57

"Put the kettle on will ya Son"

**Hoon** · 10th December 2007, 09:34

I have Sky, Home theatre + DVD, Tivo, Xbox, VHS player and it all works beautifully but took me a long time to get there. I even routed the output signal back into the houses' unused aerial wiring (goes to TV aerial ports in the bedrooms) so can watch tivo/dvd/sky in the bedrooms too.

But I had to create a diagram and stash it in the TV cabinet because it was getting complex and everytime I went to change things it would take me 1 hour to work out how it all works, I'd then end up spending another hour thinking "Now why did I put this here instead of there", promptly start changing things, fuck it up and then realise "Ahh thats why I did that" then put it all back again.

Anyway, it might be something with your TV. On my TV, AV4 has a component input and s-video input which are both in use however the component input will overide the s-video as soon as I play a DVD. This doesn't override the other AV's though, only the shared AV4 one. I would check the menus/settings on the TV and HDDVD for anything. Failing that swap the inputs around to use AV2 or AV3 and see if that makes any difference.

Ohh also is your Sky using "scart to s-video" or "scart to composite" cables?? If composite, ditch your Sky decoder and get the new silver pace model one (just ring them up to replace it). Not only will you get a better quality pic but the sky guide is a lot quicker to scroll through.

**Devil** · 10th December 2007, 11:07

Cant you run all your inputs (audio and video) into your Home Theatre receiver and just output everything from there? Kinda the point of a HT receiver/signal processor...
Then use that for channel switching.

**007XX** · 10th December 2007, 11:16

Take a pic of the various panels at the back of your TV and other "whatsits" and post it...It'll give us a clearer mental picture on how to guide you...

Also, is there a RF output on your Sky decoder?

**Blue Velvet** · 10th December 2007, 11:20

Originally Posted by TonyB

Its a sad day. I am now officially old... why oh why is it showing what is playing on the new DVD/Hard drive recorder whatsit???

Mate, good luck with your whatsit

**vifferman** · 10th December 2007, 11:54

I used to love this sort of stuff. Now it just gives me a panic attack trying to understand it. Luckily I have an in-house electronics/computer/technology whizz to do all this sort of stuff. Trouble is, everything has to be done right. That's why our house has Cat6 cable everywhere and both WiFi and normal interdweeb access in almost every room.

Shame I don't even own my own PC, but each month I *do* get to pay for anything up to 70Gb or more of interdweeb access I don't even use.

Bring back the Steam Age.

**Hoon** · 10th December 2007, 12:25

Originally Posted by Devil

Cant you run all your inputs (audio and video) into your Home Theatre receiver and just output everything from there? Kinda the point of a HT receiver/signal processor...
Then use that for channel switching.

Yep I tried that but the things that put me off were:

- Signal degradation due to passing through an extra hop. Yep this can be minimized with a good quality receiver.

- The receiver doesn't relay the video signal unless its powered on so it either means you have to leave it on always or put up with the inconvenience of having to switch it off/on every time you turn on the TV.

- Adds an extra remote to "turn the TV on" i.e.
TV: on
Sky:select channel
Receiver:select input

The only reason I'd use it was if I ran out of TV inputs or as a last resort to fix some other issue.

But I guess everyones different though. My setup has to be missus friendly (i.e. minimal remote juggling) but at the same time offer best quality and maximum versatility (i.e. record Sky while watching Free-to-air TV and still being able to flick to the Xbox during ad breaks) but I still find myself having to make compromises - I still want my Xbox 5.1 sound dammit!!

**TonyB** · 10th December 2007, 13:38

Originally Posted by Devil

Cant you run all your inputs (audio and video) into your Home Theatre receiver and just output everything from there? Kinda the point of a HT receiver/signal processor...
Then use that for channel switching.

The original DVD is the home theatre system- its one of those integrated ones with the amp in the subwoofer. I’m picking the problem with running everything through that will be when I want to record something on SKY while the kids watch Bob the Builder for the 457th time? Then again, if I run a separate feed to the new DVD/Hard drive recorder whatsit , it should still be possible eh….

I’ll take a look at it tonight and see if it can be done

**TonyB** · 11th December 2007, 05:41

Figured it out last night- I am not yet ready for the technological scrap heap! It turns out the SCART plug I was using on the SKY decoder was an input rather than an output....or maybe it worked both ways....anyway, it was labeled TV. I swapped it over to the other one and everything worked perfectly.

I also figured out how to get a better picture out of the Sky SCART plug by fiddling with the decoder settings, AND managed to get the decoder to show the 16:9 format the TV stations are putting out these days, so I've got the edges of my pictures back.

All is right with the world.....except for the fact that I need FOUR remotes....