Yes, absolutely.



The input on the Beam is looking for an HDMI-ARC signal, not an HDMI signal. In your scenario, the audio would be on the wrong pins, and the Beam wouldn't play anything. However, it's only a minor issue, you just need to get a splitter that has an optical output, and you could connect an optical cable to the HDMI Switch (look in the home theater area for lots of discussions about which ones are good, I've no idea) and then run that to the adapter that comes with the Beam, which would plug in to the HDMI on the Beam.

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so the hdmi arc input on the beam won't accept a non hdmi arc input and just accept the audio? The reason i ask is that i'm assuming the optical/hdmi adapter that is provided is not an HDMI ARC cable, so if a "normal" HDMI cable has audio going through it, then it seems the Beam should accept that?

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HDMI-ARC depends on a device to "echo" back the audio signal on a separate set of pins. In your setup, you have no device that accepts the HDMI audio signal, and then "echoes" it back along an HDMI cable to the speakers. Any HDMI cable after version 1.4 should have the necessary connections to carry HDMI-ARC, but it needs to be from a device. Your normal HDMI source, the Apple TV, doesn't generate an HDMI-ARC signal, just a normal HDMI signal. Normally it's the TV that does the echoing back along the HDMI-ARC path, but you don't have a TV in this scenario to do that work for you.

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Having a similar challenge, however mine is one where the ARC function in “buggy” on my TV.  Whenever I turn on the the TV, the audio doesn’t pump through to the Beam, until I unplug the hdmi on the TV and re-plug it in.  Annoying.  Are there any good options to “force ARC to function” on TV start-up better, or perhaps an HDMI switch that I can string inline, so my family to toggle a button to force the ARC to function properly without having to crawl behind the TV and unplug/replug the HDMI cable into the ARC port?  Any thoughts welcome and appreciated

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