Expert: Wayne Tapia - 2/5/2009

Question
I am having a real problem hooking all my stuff up and making it work the way I want it to. I have a Panasonic 42" plasma tv, a VIP612 sat receiver, a cyberhome 1600 DVD recorder and a Sony DG520 AV receiver. All I want is to have surround sound when I watch a dvd, be able to listen to the tv over the speakers, and be able to record from the tv on my dvd recorder. I have composite cables, 2 hdmi cables and plenty of av cables and y connectors. No hdmi input on my dvd recorder though. any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you, Chris"  

Answer
I would go this route:

Plug the sat receiver and DVD directly into the tv via hdmi. From those units. run digital audio lines into the Sony receiver so you can have the surround sound if you want it, plus you won't HAVE to have the receiver turned on just to watch regular TV.

By no means is this the ONLY way to hook this stuff up, but it's merely how I would if it were my system. I hope this helps you out.