Here's an article for people who may not be aware of how easy and do able it is to connect up all your equipment regardless of a lack of scart cables, leads, etc. Let's take two scenarios (similar but the second one uses an amplifier/receiver):
Scenario 1:
The user has a LCD TV with two scarts (1 RGB enabled), two HDMI sockets and one component input and a composite input (yellow with red and white), a Sky box, a Nintendo Wii, a DVD player and a new HD-DVD player from America. He would like to keep both DVD players because one is a UK model so he can play all his DVDs and on the HD-DVD player he can play US films. He also has an old VHS player (don't ask) and a Laserdisc player.
The first thing people do is look at the connections on the TV and shout "I've run out of sockets!" They are right but people don't realise you can do what is known as 'loop throughs' on all equipment. But first let's list the equipment to make it clearer:
- LCD TV
- Sky Digital
- Nintendo Wii
- DVD Player
- HD-DVD player
- VHS player
- Laserdisc player
Let's take care of Sky Digital first. We will use the Scart socket on the TV (the RGB one for best picture). Plug it in. That's done and we don't have to worry about it.
Next, the Nintendo Wii; even easier. Take the Component cables (sold separately) and plug them into the component TV cables. Good. But we are running out of sockets!
We have one scart socket left. In this example we simply must use the VHS player for it so plug it in. Great!
Okay the DVD player. I want to use RGB on it, but I have no scart socket left! No problem, plug it into the Sky Digital's spare scart socket on the actual back of sky digital box. That's great but how do I watch the DVD player? Easy, when Sky is on, if you turn on the DVD player it will automatically switch on and override Sky. The idea is you would not be watching Sky and the DVD at the same time so we accomplish our task.
Next we have the HD-DVD player and the user wants the best quality. It's a no brainer, use the HDMI socket and not worry about it ever again.
So we have the laserdisc player left. You could use the remaining sockets on the TV for yellow red and white but they are at the front of the TV and this user does not want leads hanging out of his TV. No problem. Simply plug the leads into the VHS player's line in sockets (you may need a scart box).
That's it. All the equipment is hooked up neatly and we still have a socket to spare on the TV and a spare HDMI! So if this user upgrades to Sky + he can use this socket. Of course he could also buy a Blu-ray player and use this. Job done.
This is a typical scenario for the average user. The next scenario looks at the use of a receiver for surround sound.
Scenario 2:
The user has the following equipment:
- LCD TV
- Dolby Digital receiver
- Sky +
- Nintendo Wii
- PlayStation 3
- DVD player
- HD-DVD player
- VHS player
Above we have the equipment like in scenario 1 but with a Sky + box and also a PS3. This could be a problem depending on the Dolby Digital receiver, but we can assume here the Dolby Digital receiver is a new one with HDMI sockets.
With the LCD TV in place and the Dolby Digital receiver wired for sound, what next? This is a good example of how to use the receiver as a switcher. Many people do not realise that a receiver does more than sound. It also controls your equipment via switching. So, take a HDMI socket from the TV into the receiver's HDMI out. This means that your TV will display what ever is selected on HDMI on the receiver so we need to connect all HDMI sources to it. We should have room for three HDMI connections. Take an HDMI from the HD-DVD player to the receiver not the TV. Do the same for the PS3 and the Sky+ box. All these are now controlled by the receiver and are achieved by turning the receiver and selecting the equipment on the receiver's remote control and the picture will magically appear on the TV depending on what you selected! Great isn't it? Only one wire to the TV, excellent.
Hmm, but we still have a DVD player and a Nintendo Wii to take care of. No problem. Take a set of component cables for the Nintendo Wii and a set for the DVD player and plug them into the component Inputs on the back of the receiver. Next take another set of component cables from the Output of the receiver and hook them into the TV's Component In terminal. Again, the same principal as above, select your source and it magically appears on the TV!
So we have just the VHS left. I would personally hook it's scart into the TV rather than take leads to the receiver and not worry about it. This is because VHS has always worked well off of the scart and was designed for this. Plus in this scenario the user will rarely use it because they have Sky +.
I hope this helps; I have tried to keep it simple but I agree it can still be confusing, but think of it as an idea to what can be achieved and the advantages of having a receiver.