How to Make Your Sony Receiver 3D Compliant November 16, 2010

For all my surround sound needs, I use a Sony STR-DH810 7.1 reciever.  My father uses it’s little brother, the STR-DH710.  However, the flaw with these units that was always in the back of my head (even when I bought them) was that these receivers would have to be replaced if I ever upgraded my HDTV to support 3D.  I don’t have that concern anymore.

Sony released a fix for their current line of receivers on their official support site.  But what puzzled me was how can you update one of these receivers?  There are no USB, Ethernet or WiFi connections on the units, pushing data into them (I believed) would be impossible.  I was surprised by the solution.

In a blast to the past the likes of even Steven “The Woz” Wozniak did not see coming, the receivers update themselves through a pre-programed set of sound tones which have to be burned to an audio CD and played through a very specific input.  Take a look for yourself what I had to do to get mine running.

Sound tones to create programs is not unheard of.  The early Apple II, since disk drives were so expensive, would use cassette tapes (the ones your car plays) you would have to play entirely to get your program to load.  If there was a jam or error, you’d have to play it through all over again.