Sounds like issues

Ok - after a week, the Onkyo amp is officially on Probation.

What's the problem ? First movie played back just fine but when watching Attack of the Clones, the sound was repeatedly blipping out. There'd be a few minutes good and then a half a second where the sound cuts out. Revenge of the Sith tonight was better, only a couple of blips through the movie. Music afterwards was bad though, a couple of blip-outs per track. I suspect a few causes at the moment :

New cable isn't up to the job. I got my new HDMI cables before watching Clones.
Heat - this is what I don't want it to be because it's cooler now than it will be in the summer.
Other cables went loose and are interfering.
(edit - add in "insane copy protection interference" to that list)

I have a big suspicion that it's a heat problem because the top case of the amp is a little too warm for comfort. This is really not what I want the problem to be though because that's a definite Return Of Goods scale issue. I have the amp sitting in reasonably open space on a wicker basket, so there should be no problems with cool air getting in to it.

I have my doubts about the cables too. When I first got the amp, the iTunes sound came in through proper wires. You can trust wires, they usually stay in where you put them. Not so much with the optical fibre method which I switched to on Monday. Point proven tonight, where for 20 minutes or so after finding out why the music was cutting out (fibre plug had come half out) the playback's been fine.

What I said about wires holds true. Before, it was a little headphone jack. You'll know what I mean by those, it's how your headphones plug into iPods. Solid and reliable, unlike the gimmicky optical link that's far too flimsy. I'd like to keep using the optical because it's marginally better quality but may be forced to fall back to proper wire.

Crossing my fingers that the optical thingy was making the amp go "Hey ! New source, let's check it", which could be why the movie playback was cutting out. I shall have to test that Very Soon. (Star Wars A New Hope is next - but not tonight) I've power cycled (pull plug, walk away, count to 5, put plug back in) the amp and after 20 minutes it seems better. I'm a bit happier now because I have a supportable theory, I just really do hope it's not a heat problem.

I have a few years of guarantee, so there shouldn't be issues (except parking !) if I have to go as far as taking it back. I just dislike giving up like that. I see more evaluation time coming :-)

(Techie PS bit - there's no real difference between "proper" wire and optical fibre for domestic use. But there's plenty for bigger scale data cabling. Optical is far superior when the distance is more than a few metres but again, the issue is in connections which are far more sensitive)