Oppo BD-105D as a pre-pro

Posted by: Mario on 18 January 2016

Hello all, 

 

I'm planning to buy a 105D and want to connect the front 2 channels of the player into my 552's unity gain and use the player for volume control to all the channels when playing movies.

 

My question is, the front RCA's are doubled up on the player, once as a dedicated stereo pair and the other set as part of the 7.1 RCA's out. Can you use the stereo pair for the connection to unity gain and the other 5.1 surround channels into another power amp or must one use the pair of fronts on the 7.1 outs? Not sure if the dedicated stereo pair can be controlled by the oppo's pre-amp circuit. The beauty of the dedicated stereo pair is that a pair of SHARK 32 dacs are dedicated to these two sockets, where the other pair share another pair of dacs processing power with the other 5.1 channels.

 

I suppose that one could connect the player to the 552 twice, the stereo pair into a normal input on the 552 for stereo playback and the other pair into unity gain (for surround)  controlling volume via the oppo.

 

Hope I'm not confusing people!!!

 

Thanks,

 

Mario.

Posted on: 18 January 2016 by Felty99

Yes, Mario. Always best to use the dedicated stereo pre-outs from the Oppo and then use the other pre-out channels as you like. In the audio processing menu, you need to set the 'Output Volume' option to variable in order to use the Oppo's internal volume control and set the 'Stereo Signal' option to Front left/right. 

I recommend you read the manual because the Oppo is one of the few which is actually quite helpful when setting up. Enjoy!

Posted on: 18 January 2016 by Mr Underhill

Hi Mario,

I have been experimenting with both. I have found that the 7.1 L&R outputs seem to give me a more cohesive soundfield than using the main stereo outs. Both are controlled via the 105D pre-amp.

M

Posted on: 20 January 2016 by fernar

I suspect that the dedicated stereo outputs are down-mixes of the surround channels.... this might explain why 7.1 L/R outputs give a more cohesive sound..

Posted on: 22 January 2016 by Adam Zielinski
fernar posted:

I suspect that the dedicated stereo outputs are down-mixes of the surround channels.... this might explain why 7.1 L/R outputs give a more cohesive sound..

That is correct - this is the defaul setting of the 105. 
L&R stereo outputs (doubled up by XLR) located on the side of the player, are dedictaed to music playback.

For surround sound L and R channels, use the L and R in the middle of the Oppo.

Posted on: 27 February 2016 by Mr Underhill

Hi Fernar/Adam,

On the 105 you can set the main front L/R to be the L/R of the multichannel setup, setting in setup.

According to the manual the should be BETTER quality. For some reason I did not find this to be the case.

M

Posted on: 27 February 2016 by Adam Zielinski

So much for theory
The multi-channel L&R outputs would force you to down mix the signal. Which is not going to be optimal....

I stick to the dedicated L&R balanced outputs.