Sgr. A few quick things to be aware of and I'm assuming that in every case you will be using analog outs and lossless audio formats.
1) You won't get room correction and the bass management that offers. That's a big deal. I suggest looking at external sub EQ options.
2) You can only set speaker distances in one foot increments on the oppo vs. 1/2 foot increments on a processor (unless that's changed with newer oppo units). There is also a limitation with the maximum distance of speakers. I don't recall the details but it is something like you can't have anything greater than the mains. So if your subs are further away distance wise than the mains then you can only have the max distance as the mains. Again I'm fuzzy on that as its been years sine I looked at it but it was a problem for me when I was transitioning from 5.1 to 7.1 and was using the oppo directly much as you are describing
3) you don't get additional processing modes like PLII or DTS:Neo6 or any THX re EQ that comes with a processor that handles the HDMI signal.
4) I'm assuming that the Carey has 7.1 channel analog input? When I set something up similarly with my Anthem AVM20 I only had 5.1 channel input.
So it's doable especially if the OPPO is the only source. You just need to weigh the trade offs.
1) You won't get room correction and the bass management that offers. That's a big deal. I suggest looking at external sub EQ options.
2) You can only set speaker distances in one foot increments on the oppo vs. 1/2 foot increments on a processor (unless that's changed with newer oppo units). There is also a limitation with the maximum distance of speakers. I don't recall the details but it is something like you can't have anything greater than the mains. So if your subs are further away distance wise than the mains then you can only have the max distance as the mains. Again I'm fuzzy on that as its been years sine I looked at it but it was a problem for me when I was transitioning from 5.1 to 7.1 and was using the oppo directly much as you are describing
3) you don't get additional processing modes like PLII or DTS:Neo6 or any THX re EQ that comes with a processor that handles the HDMI signal.
4) I'm assuming that the Carey has 7.1 channel analog input? When I set something up similarly with my Anthem AVM20 I only had 5.1 channel input.
So it's doable especially if the OPPO is the only source. You just need to weigh the trade offs.