OK...just to make sure i'm not retarded, just a single set of rca's come out of a DVD player and head into the receiver correct? Then the DVD decodes it or whatever it does seperating it into 5.1 or 6.1 correct?

If the above is true then my onboard soundcard will work fine (how i have it now for just stereo).

If not, then my other soundcard actually has a front L/R cable, rear L/R, SUB. And i'm sure those'll connect up to the dvd with no probs, but i don't understand if thats necessary or not.

Someonee straighten me out.

Well, in order to get true 5.1 or 6.1 out of your reciever you need to use a coaxial or optical cable.

^^ Not quite. To get true surround you can use a digital cable connection (optical or co-ax). This sends the info to the reciever, which then decodes the info. Or if your dvd player has analog outputs (regular RCA's) for each channel that will work. This means that the DVd player does the decoding. There will be either 6 (5.1) or 7(6.1) outputs.

The prefered setup is with a digital connection as most dvd players have poor bass managment.

Yeah but you need an RCA out for each channel correct? So if you wanted it to be 5.1 without digital wiring, you'd need 6 RCA outs correct? Kind of a pain in the butt if you ask me.

[ August 18, 2004, 05:19 PM: Message edited by: MrEastSide ]

Well, that's kind of what I was thinking I was getting confused though. Wouldn't it simply give him stereo through all the speakers?

ahh yes, coax or optical cable...that made sense to me as soon as i walked into the audio store, thanks guys!!!

In the olden days some recievers were DD 'ready'. This meant that they had analog inputs for all 5.1 channels. In order for this to work you needed a DVD player that had 5.1 ouputs. All the decoding was done in the DVD player. And yes you had surround sound. THe only difference is that the decoding was done in the player and the discrete chanel infor was then sent to the reciever to be amplified. With a digital connection all the 1/0's go to the reciever and are decoded there.

Nowadays with DVD-Audio and SACD the bigshot music companies are sooo paranoid about copy protection that you cannot use a digital output (unless it is a propriatary connection type). Therefore you need to use 6 analog cables from the dvd/sacd player to the receiver.