Plaidophile

So, all the video output stuff on my Sony receiver just crapped out, since I guess it didn't like me re-plugging stuff around for probably just the third time since I bought it two years ago. The receiver itself is under warranty but in order to get it serviced I need to ship the receiver to Texas at my own expense, and need to find a proof of purchase date, which will be rather difficult since I bought it on Amazon via a third-party merchant and even if the merchant did provide an invoice (which I don't think they did), who the hell keeps packing slips two years later?

For now I'm just using my TV's plethora of video inputs, and only using the receiver for switching audio, which of course is more of a pain in the ass since now I need to remember what things are hooked up on BOTH sides. Also when the Wii arrives I'll either need to get an HDMI-based upconverting DVD player (which would be nice), or demote the PS2 to S-video (which is more likely since really it's not like I play the PS2 that much and most of the games I do play don't support 480p anyway). (5:53 PM Or, duh, I could just use my Mac mini to play DVDs, and just find a 5.1 output thing for it, even if that means switching to VLC as my player app.)

Dear technology: why do you have to be so annoying?

Also, I don't actually know if the TV does HDMI passthrough or not since it turns out the TV wasn't even getting audio from the Apple TV via HDMI anyway. Probably some mis-setting somewhere, or maybe the Apple TV doesn't send audio out on HDMI if it detects an active TOSlink connection (though I don't see how it would since it's a passive optical connection and I think the LED is always on whether I have a cable in or not). So, meh. 7/24/07 The TV does not do HDMI passthrough, as verified both by an upconverting DVD player a while ago and by a Sony PS3 last night. Um, yeah, I guess I'm still buying Sony products after all. Ooops.