Convenience of a Sound Bar without the speakers

[mrschwarz]

I live in my new motor home full time. I have an HDMI matrix switch to connect my Dish receivers and computer to all of the TVs using HD Base T. The motor home came with LG TVs and an LG Blu Ray home theater that powers the speakers built into the living room ceiling. The living room TV is a model 55LH5750. The home theater is a BH6730S. The TV is connected to the Blu Ray home theater by both an HDMI cable that I added, and an optical cable. Both are about 30 feet long.

According to the manual for the TV, it is supposed to control the home theater using ARC and CEC.The problem is that it rarely works properly and is unpredictable as to what it will do. When I turn on the TV, here are some of the things that can happen:

1. The home theater turns on and the TV sound comes through it and can be controlled by the TV. This is what is supposed to happen and it seldom works that way.

2. The home theater turns on and the TV sound comes through it and CANNOT be controlled by the TV.

3. The home theater DOES NOT turn on and the TV sound comes through the built-in speakers.

4. The home theater DOES NOT turn on and the TV sound doesn't come out at all because the TV is sending the sound to the home theater which is off.

When one of the undesired behaviors occurs, I will attempt to turn on the home theater manually. when I do, one of the following occurs:

1. The sound automatically gets redirected to the home theater and the I can control it using the TV remote. Like number 1 about, this is what is supposed to happen, but seldom does.

2. The home theater comes on, switches to the optical input and the TV sound comes out of it, but I CANNOT control it using the TV remote, but I can control it using the home theater remote.

3. The home theater comes on, goes to its home menu and automatically switches the input of the TV to the HDMI connection to the home theater.

4. The home theater comes on, but the TV doesn't switch the sound from the built-in speakers to the home theater. I can switch them in the TV setup menu.

Two other LG TVs have LG soundbars connected with optical cables. The TVs and soundbars interact so that when I turn on a TV, the attached soundbar automatically comes on. I control the soundbar volume through the TV remote. This happens without fail every time I use them. The TVs control the soundbars using a feature called 'LG Sound Sync (optical)'. This feature doesn't work with the home theater.

So...Here's my question. Is there a 5.1 amplifier that would use the sound sync feature (I don't know if this is an industry standard with a fancy LG name) that I could use instead of the home theater to control the speakers that are built into the ceiling of the motor home? Barring that, can anyone suggest a way to make the connection between the TV and home theater reliable?

 

[klang]

I wonder if the 30 foot HDMI cable is too long for CEC to work reliably?

 

[harshness]

Is there a 5.1 amplifier that would use the sound sync feature (I don't know if this is an industry standard with a fancy LG name) that I could use instead of the home theater to control the speakers that are built into the ceiling of the motor home? Barring that, can anyone suggest a way to make the connection between the TV and home theater reliable?

Lip sync is a simple timing adjustment between the audio and video portions of a signal. No special hardware is required but adjustments to the timing (done within the TV) may be different for different gear.

 

[Horsepower]

Brand new? Today's RV's have lots of complicated wiring/plumbing/electronics/slide outs etc. Almost all will have some problems from the factory. I would take it back now while everything is under warranty and let them sort it out.

 

[Tampa8]

Over multiple TV's it is now my opinion CEC and ARC does not work or at least not all the time as it is supposed to. In fact there are time the answer to other problems it turn them off. That's not to say it never works and if in a particular set-up it works well with no side affects no reason not to use it.

 

[klang]

I've had decent luck with CEC and ARC as long as the equipment is all from the same manufacturer. Samsung in my case. Had a Yamaha sound bar that didn't play well with the Samsung TV all the time.

 

[harshness]

Too many planets have to come into alignment for ARC to work.

1. CEC must be enabled and fully functioning and that's a real problem if you're someone who uses best of breed rather than being brand-loyal.
2. The involved components must all support HDMI 1.4. to employ HDMI lip sync (an HDMI 1.3 feature).

eARC will likely require upgrades of pretty much everything from the TV to the cable to the AVR and you get what in return (maybe a pun, maybe not) that you couldn't get with the technology you have used in the conventional way?

 

[Nascarken 91xg]

Good luck with that you need too tock with LG good luck

 

[Foxbat]

I had the most bizarre CEC/ARC occurrence on my ?TV4K connected through my Yamaha RX-V663 AVR (circa 2007) and my Samsung 2nd gen LED HDTV (circa 2006). The Apple TV will wake up the TV and switch its input to the Yamaha (HDMI 4 on the Samsung) but will not turn on the Yamaha. What I don't get is why the Yamaha passes the CEC commands through to the Samsung, especially since the Yamaha does not have CEC or HDMI Pass-thru. Since I need to update everything to support 4K at some point, I'm not going to lose sleep over it, just thought I'd share.

I did switch the inputs on my Sony Bravia to use the ARC on the Sony speaker base in my bedroom. As you might expect using Sony with Sony, it works nicely. Of course, it would be even better if it didn't take 15 seconds to power everything up, but that's 2018 electronic devices for you...

 

[harshness]

What I don't get is why the Yamaha passes the CEC commands through to the Samsung, especially since the Yamaha does not have CEC or HDMI Pass-thru.

The RX-V663 features HDMI 1.3a so it must indeed have at least some low-level support of CEC and pass-through. I get that the receiver manual doesn't make any mention of the CEC but that's probably because you aren't afforded any software control over it other than lip sync.