Thanks again, Kosh2258, and howdy-do, SP3 fans:
I think my gear has time zone lag. My SP3 would not work correctly for two days after I received it last Wednesday; like the BDP2 and BDA2 I received at the same time, it miraculously self-healed on the third day (weird religious allusions, eh?). If you have DOA electronics, just send them to me and see if they resurrect.
James referred me to Stan at Bryston, who was very helpful. He confirmed that the optical signal from our TV was not getting to the SP3. He also noted that the G in the SP3 display indicated that the settings were global, rather than for individual inputs.
I cogitated on this optical signal matter for awhile and thought, what could be the gigantic pain causing this problem? HDMI, of course! And that was it. I called Pioneer tech support, and they confirmed that connecting an HDMI input locked out the optical output (of course, there's no documentation on this in the Pioneer manual). The content providers have to protect their audio streams from being stolen by we criminals who actually purchase the hardware and services. I hope all of you feel extremely guilty, as I do. Moving the optical cable from the TV output to the output on our DVR solved the problem immediately. Whew. Now we can watch the Sharks with decent audio. Game on!
One odd glitch remains: when getting Dolby Digital 5.1 through the DVR-OPT1/Digital settings on the SP3, the input reads Dolby Digital 5.1, but the output only allows the ProLogic and other synthesized modes; there is no passthru option. Weird, eh? I've emailed Stan about this and will report his findings.
Now, I need to talk with Oppo and see which settings for the 105 will let it play well with the SP3 and BDA2. Until Bryston releases their BOT1 optical transport, the Oppo should be a good match with Bryston's D/A converter.
Toodle pip,
Rich
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Whiney Napa Valley