Would I hear a noticeable difference in sound quality if I got these speakers/deck installed?

home theater setup for vcr, dvd, sat.

• I recently bought and installed a home theater system (RCA RT2500R), and am currently having problems interacting with the VCR. I cannot seem to record any source, and can only play tapes when an S-video cable leading to the tv is removed. I'm guessing the problem is either in the VCR's configuration or it may not be possible, but to solve this, I'll explain the entire setup. This may get tedious as I explain the entire setup, but hopefully it's enough detail to solve the problem. First off, the manual for the home theater unit (here on out, I'll just call it "receiver") is here: http://www.rca.com/documents/RT2500_IB_ENG_47216_25.pdf Page 7 of the pdf shows the back of the unit. The following is a list of components and how they are attached. Components, and how they connect to the Home Theater receiver (view pdf while reading): --------- - 1 general electric VCR with RCA in/out (2 sets total) connected to the receiver's provided RCA jacks (2 sets) as directed in the receiver's manual (rca out from VCR hooked to the "play" ports, rca in from VCR hooked to the "rec" ports). - 1 panasonic DVD player, connected to the receiver's DVD s-video jack, audio connected to optical 2 port via optical digital cable. - 1 DirecTivo (combo DirecTv satellite receiver and TiVo recorder) unit connected to receiver's SAT s-video jack, audio connected to optical 1 port via optical digital cable. - 1 Mitsubishi 27" TV (about 4 years old, don't know the model number), that has two sets of RCA ports and a s-video input on the back. Currently connected to the receiver via both the s-video and a single rca video cable. All audio is handled by the home theater. Typical use of the system: -------------------------- I watch satellite tv, either live or recorded shows on the tivo combo unit, most of the time. It works perfectly with the sound playing through the theater system (set to SAT as input) and the picture clear and crisp via the s-video connections. Occasionaly I watch DVDs, and simply switching the receiver over to the DVD input on the remote plays movies beautifully. The problem arises when I want to watch a VCR tape and less frequently, record something from the satellite television signal. The VCR Playback Problem: ------------ At first, I only had the s-video cable running between the TV and the receiver, figuring all inputs into the receiver could be output via that single cable, but when I set the receiver to "VCR1" and played a tape in the VCR, I could not see any video (audio played through the receiver fine). I only got a picture on my TV when I attached the rca video out cable from the receiver to the TV and disconnected the s-video from the back of the TV (The TV can't seem to figure out which cable is the one carrying signal and switch itself, I have to physically do it by hand). That's a minor pain, but I can still watch tapes occasionally and deal with it. The VCR Record Problem: ----------------------- I can't seem to record anything, period, and this is the reason for this question. Since the s-video/rca problem exists, if I plug both the s-video and rca cables from the receiver to the TV, and play television from the sat dish, hitting record on the VCR, then stopping it, taking out the s-video to watch it and switching the receiver to VCR reveals that it tapes nothing at all. If I disconnect the s-video cable while the sat dish is the input, I can hear sound but see no picture, and when I record with the VCR I also get nothing. Ideally, I'd like to tape things from the sat dish, but it doesn't seem possible with the current setup. How can I set things up so this works? Is my TV the limitation? Is the home theater system the bottleneck? Image quality and sound quality are a priority, so I would not like to daisy-chain the devices together, but if that's the only way for the VCR to see the sat signal, I will do it for special cases (when I really, really have to tape something). Any ideas?

• Answer:

  The crux of the problem appears to be that your receiver does not transcode s-video to composite video (single yellow RCA cable) and vice versa. This, combined with your TV not knowing how to automatically switch between s-video and composite video inputs, makes your setup a bit more confusing, but does not make it impossible to do everything you want without getting up from the couch. The VCR playback problem is tricky to solve in detail with the information you've given. It would be useful to know 1) exactly what inputs are on the back of the TV, and 2) how you switch between them. Because you said that the TV has two sets of RCA inputs, I'm going to assume that there is a way of remotely switching between them. When an s-video input is available, it is often considered "part" of one of the inputs. For example, there would be one group of inputs (audio left/right, composite video, and s-video) and then a second set of inputs without an s-video jack (i.e. just audio left/right and composite video). I would suggest moving the composite video connection you have now to the TV to the other composite in, and then switching the TV between inputs using the remote when you want to watch a tape. To enable you to record from satellite, I'm going to make the assumption that what's currently showing from the DirecTiVo box is the only thing you will ever want to record on the VCR. If this is the case, this solution is easy -- simply connect the VCR inputs directly to the appropriate outputs on the DirecTiVo. You have more than enough outputs on the DirecTiVo, which are all always active, to do this. Make sure your VCR input is set to the aux-in or "video" channel, and in VCR mode, and you should be able to see what's showing on the DirecTiVo when you have your receiver and TV set to watch the VCR and there's no tape in it. Then when you hit record, that's recorded. (Regardless of the settings on the receiver and TV.) If you're having difficulty setting up the system in this way, or don't understand something I said, please post a request for clarification and I'll be glad to help further.