Video system

[last updated: 8 January 2012]

The audio side of the system is shown here.

Blue arrows show hdmi (digital video and digital audio) signals. The green arrow is the digital audio from the A/V media player. The black arrow is the stereo down-mixed analogue output I feed to the power amplifier. The multi-channel Audiolab 8000AP pre-amplifier has two hdmi inputs,¹ from which it strips incoming high-resolution digital audio for processing,² while passing along the digital video — unprocessed — direct to its single hdmi output.

DVDs and Blu-rays: The (hacked/dongled) multi-region, multi-zone Oppo Blu-ray player incorporates a later variant of the sophisticated DVDO upscaling technology I'd been using since 2006 in my original (primarily analogue) video scaler. This magic squeezes maximum video quality³ out of standard definition DVDs by skilful upscaling to 1080p. (Even 1080p/24 if the DVD has been correctly mastered.)

To save wear and tear on the Blu-ray player I still use the slightly older Oppo DVD player for my DVD viewing, and also for my CD and SACD listening. Curiously, there is a tiny subset of DVDs in my collection of 3,500 or so that freeze on the Blu-ray player but usually have no problem on the DVD player. As both the Oppo players have the same video scaling chipset, I route them to the pre-amp via a simple passive hdmi switchbox.

A/V files: My Asus Tablet PC (running Android 3.2.1) can easily handle 720p hi-def video playback on its own screen and full 1080p to the Kuro through its mini-hdmi output. (It also plays MP3s, though I don't use it for that.)

The Netgear media streamer is adept at pulling video files of various formats off my other network devices and presenting them at up to 1080p. Given the inherently variable quality of some of my A/V files — those that arrive via the Interweb thingy, for example — I am still holding in reserve my DVDO Edge video scaler (with the same video scaling chipset as the two Oppo players) in case I need it to pass along a full and consistent quality 1080p signal to the pre-amp. (It would also be the only way to zoom images if there are any size issues to handle.)

Satellite TV: Although it's true I seem to have given up watching live broadcast TV (potentially saving myself the cost of the annual licence fee⁴) — and I hope thereby to avoid both the wasted time and any brain damage incurred by the multiple channels of televisual rubbish they transmit — enough of my friends have told me, from time to time, of interesting programmes I have missed that I'm also once again in a position to use the Freesat hi-def PVR for TV rather than just radio. I also notice that several free channels of hi-def are now available. Mind you, last time I crawled up through the available channels, I was once again forced to conclude that a pre-frontal lobotomy just might make a few of them slightly more tolerable. Occasionally.

HDCP and hdmi

The bane of my (video) life, adding nothing but inconvenience, and ultimately forcing me to upgrade from a perfectly acceptable 50" plasma to the 60" as part of the process of capitulating to the need for HDCP handling via hdmi. But, honestly, I could spit! I switch off the plasma screen, and the audio disappears for about five seconds. I switch the screen on last, rather than first, and my DVD player produces a rainbow of colours unrelated to 'normal' operation. I switch between DVD and Freesat and I could take bets on whether or not I get sound from my Freesat until I've changed channels away from, and back to, what I want. All very tedious.

The Netgear's hdmi output works perfectly when directly attached to the Kuro plasma screen, but has proved less than 100% reliable when coupled via the AudioLab pre-amp. So I'm currently using an hdmi-to-DVI cable from the Netgear into the Kuro, and a separate digital audio lead to the AudioLab. A bit tedious. So don't even get me started on the idiocy of variable Blu-ray user menu interfaces...

When I was first using my DVDO Edge scaler I had some problems between that, my Pioneer Kuro screen and the Onkyo A/V amp I was using at the time. I also quickly got rid of a high-end (or, more accurately, high-price) Pioneer Blu-ray player. All because of HDCP and hdmi compatibility issues. Still, at least the DVDO technical wizard I contacted agreed with the basic principle: minimise the amount of video processing, and do it right. There's a good summary here.

Footnotes

¹  My first micro-controlled audio/video switchbox — built to my design in 1985 by my late (alas, in two senses of the word — he delivered the unit at the end of May 1988, and he went and died in the mid-1990s) friend Colin — had four fully-buffered composite video inputs, an independent video recording bus, eight analogue stereo audio inputs of around 90dB S/N ratio, and two independent stereo audio recording buses. S-Video (Y-C) and RGB video had hardly reached the UK back then. (With the honourable exception of early Philips LaserDisc players.) I recently (June 2010) discovered a letter (dated 28^th May 1988) that's relevant.
²  It decodes Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1 formats, but relies on incoming uncompressed decoded LPCM multi-channel audio data to handle the fancier surround sound formats that now exist. (Decoding of these formats occurs in the Blu-ray player.) However, in July 2010, I decided to revert to simple stereo — hence the Rotel power amplifier. The Oppo Blu-ray outputs a perfectly acceptable hdmi stereo down-mix from any surround material, and can also deal comfortably with the LPCM 2-channel material that some DVDs and Blu-rays offer. (Test results linked from here.)
³  Mind you, I note newer Oppo BDP-93 Blu-ray players use a more recent video processing technology, namely Qdeo by Marvell. (Details here in a PDF file.)
⁴  As it happens, I have no objection to paying the licence fee as I consider the BBC (and, in particular, its range of radio and web material) quite literally to be a national treasure. The various commercial channels I generally dismiss (rightly or wrongly) as tabloid fodder. I'm a cultural snob.