[Matt Cooney]

I know I could figure this out with experimentation (or research...or more thought!), but perhaps a wise member can spare me that:

I want to play a movie tonight off my laptop, which has HDMI and USB outputs.  I would like to route the audio into my (2 channel) system, but I have no inroad do that (using a DAC2 and passive preamp, so no HDMI or USB inputs).  But my BDP2 (which connects to the DAC2) has USB inputs.  Do you think I could run HDMI out to the TV for video, and a USB out to the BDP2, and would the BDP2 play or pass through the audio to the DAC? THanks.

[unincognito]

Your best bet would be to see if your tv has a digital spdif or analog out that you can connect to either your dac or preamp.

Chris

[Doublej]

You should be able to separate the audio signal from the video signal at the laptop and route the audio to any audio device the laptop shows.

You might wind up with a lipsync problem but the experiment is free. The media player on the laptop might let you address this through a delay parameter.

If you have an analog input on your preamplifier you should be able to connect the headphone jack on the laptop to an analog input on your preamplifier.

[Matt Cooney]

Thanks guys. Chris,your comment assumes that I did not, in an effort at a flush fit, make a custom TV mount that makes it utterly impossible to access any outputs it may have....