Home Theater Bypass Explained

Ever since the birth of home theater, there has been a chasm between having a great-sounding two-channel stereo system and a home theater surround sound system in the same room.  Audiophiles cringed at the idea of listening to their vinyl, CDs, or digital music files through a less-than-ideal home theater receiver.  And on the other hand, some home theater enthusiasts who wanted to dive into the world of high-res music or analog wondered how this could work with their home theater setup.  

In the early days of surround sound, accomplishing this goal was daunting and might involve combining two systems, then physically moving cables around, which was extremely inconvenient.  Then, the makers of better-sounding two-channel audio gear recognized this need and added a new feature to their products that made it all simple as could be.  That new feature had several different names depending on the brand, but they all did the same thing, which we will call the home theater bypass.

Why Implement Home Theater Bypass into Your System?

A home theater receiver is a pretty amazing piece of equipment.  For this example, we will discuss a popular home theater receiver, the Onkyo RZ50.  This unit provides switching for all your video sources and processes the incoming surround sound information, whether Dolby Atmos or DTS.  This circuitry sorts out all the different channels of surround sound and sends them out to the built-in amplifiers.  In the case of this unit, there are 9 separate amplifiers inside.  Some home theater receivers have up to 13 different amplifiers inside.

Most home theater receivers also have some type of room correction software built-in, which requires a lot of software horsepower to run.  And almost all of them also have the capability of running sound to another room separately called zone 2 or even zone 3.  You’ll find a good chunk of them have many streaming services built-in or Airplay, Chromecast, or all of them. That is a whole lot going on inside this one box!  This particular one is pretty beefy and weighs in at about 30 pounds, but that is still an awful lot happening inside one piece of gear, especially the 9 separate amplifiers.  

Now, on the other hand, let's discuss a piece of two-channel audio gear, such as the McIntosh MAC7200.  This piece of gear is built like a tank. It only has two channels of amplifiers built-in yet weighs two and half times as much as the Onkyo receiver.  It's got a great array of inputs for the two-channel audio enthusiast, including both a moving magnet and moving coil phono input, lots of other analog inputs, and even a cool digital board that you can switch out and upgrade should digital technology change over time.  But there is no video switching, no surround sound processing, no additional amplifiers, or any of the other things you’ll normally see in a home theater receiver.

Now, if we were to connect this beast of a two-channel piece up to a nice pair of speakers and listen, then install the Onkyo in its place, which one do you think will sound better?  It's the McIntosh, of course!  It has far more real power available, and it is designed to do one thing, make stereo music listening an amazing experience. 

Scenario 1

The first scenario would be someone who owned either this exact piece of McIntosh gear or something similar to it. They would have a great two-channel system with high-performance left and right speakers and nothing else.  But they really want to enjoy surround sound too, but worry adding to it will mess up the sound of their main music system.

Scenario 2

On the other hand, you could have someone with the Onkyo receiver.  Perhaps they have gotten into listening to music more and upgraded their left and right speakers to better models, but something still seems missing to them.  They would like a way to improve their music experience but love how the home theater portion sounds. 

Enter the home theater bypass to turn both of these situations into dreams come true!

How To Connect Them Up!

In the first case, the person with the stereo system must add a home theater receiver and the number of speakers they want to get into surround sound.  Since they already have their left and right speakers, it will be a minimum of three with a center channel and two surround channels.  One key, if this fits your situation, is you will want to pick a home theater receiver that has front preamp outs, which the Onkyo RZ50 has. 

If you have any questions about which home theater receiver might be better for your system, our passionate team of home theater experts is here to help.  We love helping people improve their sound and can give you great advice to help you pick the right one for your home theater.  

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We will take a pair of audio cables and run them from the front left and right outputs over to the McIntosh.  In the case of the MAC7200, it is pretty cool in that you can turn any of its analog inputs into the home theater bypass input.  We are going to connect them to analog 1.  Then we will jump into the menu and make those what McIntosh calls Pass Thru. 

We just make this input set to Passthru.  Then you’ll need to go through the setup process for your new home theater receiver. 

So How Does All This Work?

We have basically bypassed the volume control circuitry in the McIntosh.  The Onkyo will send the feed for the left and right channels out through its preamp outputs over to the McIntosh, and your left and right speakers will be powered by it for home theater use.  When you want to use it in a home theater, you simply select the pass thru input we set up. If you have a smart remote, you can even automate this.  The volume for the home theater will be controlled by the home theater remote control.

When you want to enjoy great two-channel music, there is no need even to turn on the Onkyo.  Everything two-channel stayed connected up to the McIntosh, and for two-channel listening, the Onkyo is completely out of the signal path.  As you can see, this gets you the best of both worlds.

For the second situation, the basic wiring concept is the same, except for a few more changes.  If you added a high-performance two-channel piece of gear to your home theater system, you’d want to move your left and right speaker connections over to the two-channel piece.  You will also want to move any of your two channel sources over to it as well. Then the rest will be the same as what we just did.  Once done, you should rerun your home theater calibration, as your main left and right speakers will probably play at a slightly different volume level after you move things around.  And in this case, we have given a nice home theater a really great two-channel setup now.

Conclusion

I hope this has helped you understand how you can have both great home theater AND amazing two-channel listening all in one room, using your high-performance left and right speakers for both systems and getting the best of both worlds with no compromises.  You only need a home theater receiver with front-channel preamp outputs and a two-channel piece with a home theater bypass option. 

Should you have any questions on equipment selection for either situation, please contact our team of enthusiasts at Audio Advice. 

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Are there any disadvantages to this setup?  Well, if you want to run a subwoofer with both two-channel and home theater, it can be a bit more complicated.  However, most people who do this have full-range left and right speakers and do not want to use a sub with them. But if you do, please reach out to us so we can help you determine the best options there.  It will vary based on your subwoofer and how it can connect up, but we can help you there as well.

I hope this video has helped you understand home theater bypass and how it could be a great option for you. If you have more questions, reach out to our team of experts at audioadvice.com via phone, chat, or email, and we will be happy to help you out. And if you stop by one of our award-winning showrooms, we can show you how we set up home theater bypass in our own demo theaters. 

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