HELP - Owners with Pioneer VSX - D912 & Ventriloquist & STF

[tdekany]

I wired up the system last saturday that took me way too many hours. 12 AWG speaker cable is used. No connectors used.

today - Connected DVD to Receiver: Optical connection - no sound! WTF??

Is that normal? Did get sound once connected analog cables. I thought you didn't need both.

However there is too much humming/buzzing noise with or without the sub, like when you are changing channels or during quiet passages.

Sub is set to out, volume is at 9 o'clock.

I used the auto MCACC. Rear speakers are way too loud. I know I can adjust it manually.

Digital Cable is also very noisy - can I do anything about it?

This was a christmas present to my girlfriend and I feel very embarrassed for having problems. My own home system is ok except for the cable part - slight buzzing.

Can someone help me????

[DavidD]

There may be several things going on here, so lets take them one at a time. Does the DVD player have both coaxial and optical out connections? If so, you might need to select the optical output.

Also, I might try taking the receiver and DVD player to your place and hooking each one up (one at a time) to verify correct operation with your working system.

[tdekany]

Originally posted by DavidD
There may be several things going on here, so lets take them one at a time. Does the DVD player have both coaxial and optical out connections? If so, you might need to select the optical output.

Also, I might try taking the receiver and DVD player to your place and hooking each one up (one at a time) to verify correct operation with your working system.


yes it has both connections.

Actually I just sold my amp/tuner (shipped them out today) and getting rid of the preamp as well, so I can reduce equipments. So all I have is a tv cd player & and a dvd player.

PS: why wouldn't the optical work? I did ask for optical first and then changed my mind.

[Dudley]

The optical should work, but to trouble shoot the problem you need to eleminate every possible problem one by one. The optical connection is a possible problem, as are the others mentioned.

[Sasha_G]

Ground loops still cause humming and buzzing, even if a subwoofer is not connected.

The optical connectors can stop ground loops between some components, but regardless, the cause is usually the cable tv. The installers usually don't ground the cable on the same ground as the rest of the electrical system, causing the strange behavior.

Making sure that all the units in your system don't use the ground plug should eliminate the ground loops.

If you really need to ground everything you should get a ground loop isolator.

Aragon, a Klipsch company, has one.
http://www.klipsch.com/mondial/index2.asp?path=/aragonelectronics/index.asp?frame=y&id=&line=&1

I'm not sure where to find this unit, but was able to find other ground loop isolators here:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=39803&item=3071476541

http://search.shopping.yahoo.com/search/__yltc=s:14489115,d:14489115,sec:search,slk:button ,v:70;_ylt=AsM1UUXxNei8.vvpUisDC8gbFt0A?p=ground+l oop+isolator&did=

[tdekany]

thanks everyone for trying to help.
1 - I will pick up a coaxial cable and see what happens.
2 - Sasha, thanks for the tip, I will disconnect the cable. If that doesn't work, then I will do ... - not sure what.

I called Radio Shack in my neighborhood and they have one. Is that good enough do you think?

Thanks all who responded.

I guess the other owners are fine.

[jwygal]

I have the same setup, and I am not having a problem. I can't help you on the noise/buzzing, but I might be able to help on the no-sound problem with your optical cable. Its possible, as I think someone mentioned, that you have to configure your dvd player to use the optical output. Its also possible that you didn't configure your receiver correctly. I'm guessing its the latter, since I had to do this before I got sound from my DVD player.

Which optical input are you using? Optical input #1 is set to TV by default, and optical input #2 is set to CDR by default, so if you are using one with a DVD player, you should change it. (You should be able to get the sound without changing it by selecting TV (or CDR) unless you have reassigned these to a different input, in which case the input will have been turned off.)

To configure the optical input for DVD:

Turn on the receiver's power.
Press the RCV button on the remote.
Press the left arrow button until OPT1 or OPT2 is selected (whichever one you are connected to).
Press the up/down arrow buttons until DVD is selected.

That should do it. If you then select DVD, you should get the sound from the DVD player. This is covered in the manual on pages 44-50, by the way. The first few steps to enter the configuration mode are on page 44, and the steps specific to the optical inputs are on page 50. Everything in between is for configuring other stuff.

If you've checked the settings on both the DVD player, and the receiver, and you still can't get sound from the optical connection, try a different cable.

Oh yeah, I had the opposite problem with the MCACC setup. My rear speakers were way too quiet after running it. I was barely able to hear them in most cases. I bumped them up 3 spots each on the manual setup, and I like the level now. I'm going to get an SPL meter one of these days, and double-check the setting, but I doubt if I'll turn them down, regardless of what the meter says, since I want to be able to hear them. They key is to do what sounds good, so if your rears are too hot, turn them down.

Good luck.

[Retread]

Originally posted by tdekany
thanks everyone for trying to help.
1 - I will pick up a coaxial cable and see what happens.
2 - Sasha, thanks for the tip, I will disconnect the cable. If that doesn't work, then I will do ... - not sure what.

I called Radio Shack in my neighborhood and they have one. Is that good enough do you think?

Thanks all who responded.

I guess the other owners are fine.

I had hum generated by TV cable ground loops. Don't know the Radio Shack isolator, but you want to have a fairly good one. I ordered the Jensen VRD-1FF Cable TV RF Isolator from Markertek over the Internet for $49. Killed that component of hum completely. There are other sources of noise and hum. I've been trying to use some professional microphone/amp and parametric equalizer equipment. These all have balanced in/out. I've finally ordered a bunch of high-quality audio in-line isolation transformers (which are different from TV cable isolators) and am waiting for them to come in.

[tdekany]

Originally posted by jwygal
I have the same setup, and I am not having a problem. I can't help you on the noise/buzzing, but I might be able to help on the no-sound problem with your optical cable. Its possible, as I think someone mentioned, that you have to configure your dvd player to use the optical output. Its also possible that you didn't configure your receiver correctly. I'm guessing its the latter, since I had to do this before I got sound from my DVD player.

Which optical input are you using? Optical input #1 is set to TV by default, and optical input #2 is set to CDR by default, so if you are using one with a DVD player, you should change it. (You should be able to get the sound without changing it by selecting TV (or CDR) unless you have reassigned these to a different input, in which case the input will have been turned off.)

To configure the optical input for DVD:

Turn on the receiver's power.
Press the RCV button on the remote.
Press the left arrow button until OPT1 or OPT2 is selected (whichever one you are connected to).
Press the up/down arrow buttons until DVD is selected.

That should do it. If you then select DVD, you should get the sound from the DVD player. This is covered in the manual on pages 44-50, by the way. The first few steps to enter the configuration mode are on page 44, and the steps specific to the optical inputs are on page 50. Everything in between is for configuring other stuff.

If you've checked the settings on both the DVD player, and the receiver, and you still can't get sound from the optical connection, try a different cable.

Oh yeah, I had the opposite problem with the MCACC setup. My rear speakers were way too quiet after running it. I was barely able to hear them in most cases. I bumped them up 3 spots each on the manual setup, and I like the level now. I'm going to get an SPL meter one of these days, and double-check the setting, but I doubt if I'll turn them down, regardless of what the meter says, since I want to be able to hear them. They key is to do what sounds good, so if your rears are too hot, turn them down.

Good luck.

Thanks Jeff - I did switch it to DVD. I'll try Option #2 tomorrow to see if that works. If it doesn't work, I'll try a coaxial tomorrow.

[tdekany]

I unplugged the cable box, started the dvd player and the humming was gone. Reconnected the cable and the buzzing is still gone from the DVD source. (thank god)
Cable is still bad but I did pick up an el chipo Ground Loop Isolator. If it doesn't work the guy at Radio Shack will take it back.

Retread - thanks for the recommendation. If the Radio Shack one doesn't work I'll order the Jensen one.

[tdekany]

All problems are gone. The inexpansive Radio Shack ground loop insolator got rid of the humm completely.

Digital connection problem: the DVD player was set for analog. Changed it and now it works.

thanks for everyones help especially Sasha, who helped me get rid of the humm/buzz sound. I hated it. My girlfriend loves the system, although we haven't really tested it yet.

Thanks guys!