I’m a little confused. I have an Apple 4K going into a TV that’s older than a few years. Will the Atmos sound from the TV be pushed through the TV via the eARC/eHDMI connection even though Atmos isn’t native to the TV itself?
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the update came last night for 2020 LG nanocells in Europe. :-). version 03.11.10. i have a 2020 75nano906 so my apple tv4k and dolby atmos works now with sonos arc...3 months after purchase. i had been checking lg updates everyday since khaz22 reported the fix release in the US, which is 03.10.60 from 28 Aug.
I’m a little confused. I have an Apple 4K going into a TV that’s older than a few years. Will the Atmos sound from the TV be pushed through the TV via the eARC/eHDMI connection even though Atmos isn’t native to the TV itself?
If your TV is older than a few years, it has no eARC. eARC is barely on many brand new TV’s. As for HDMI-ARC, if your TV has HDMI-ARC capability, then it is able to pass Atmos/DD+.
ETA: There are really no “Atmos native TV’s”, except for a few units that have built-in Atmos speakers. Atmos is a codec, and only requires the TV to have ARC (DD+) or eARC (TrueHD) for support.
Thanks! I’d love to upgrade to the the Arc but was unsure of my potential benefits. My Beam is underpowered for the room and my Playbar is under-featured.
Yes, my TV has HDMI-ARC but not eARC.
With the Apple 4K, this will be an excellent addition then. Thanks for the reply.
At the end of the day, any Sonos speaker can only play what is handed to it. If the source device isn’t feeding the TV the correct data, or the TV isn’t feeding the correct data to the Sonos, there really isn’t much Sonos can do about it.
Sonos has never said they could interpret those signals. I said “everything that they say it can” , and not everything.
For instance, Sonos is still unable to accept a DTS signal and interpret it.
Yes, there are other manufacturers out there that can accept different codecs.
You’re interpreting what I said to an extent I didn’t intend. Sonos could, indeed, either pay the appropriate licensing fees to the companies who own those codecs, or add processor power / new inputs / what have you to their devices so that the devices could “read” the codec.
Yes, anything can be “fixed”, with enough time, money, and intent. Sonos has made the choices for their company. I can’t change that. My point stands. Sonos will play the sounds they say the will, as long as they are sent to the Sonos device in that fashion.
As pure speculation, Sonos’ definition of ‘majority’ is different than yours. I certainly don’t know what numbers they look at, nor what marketplace they’re trying to hit. Perhaps if there is an AMA with Patrick Spence, you might ask him.
Just think that AppleTV, Xbox, PlayStation, Google Stadia (Chromecast) to Name a few all output LPCM. Why would you not support that? As much as I love Sonos, I’ll probably look somewhere else for an Atmos capable sound bar.
Basically, if you are a gamer stay away from Sonos, thats the message I’m getting here.
If you just want a basic product that plugs into your tv and plays sound, Sonos is there.
They should have just kept making the Playbar and dumped the Arc.
I also think Sonos attempting to do surround sound was a mistake, they should just keep a 3.1 channel as standard with the playbar and sub and not add others into the “room”. Thats to make the product even more simple for the target market.
Personally I’m an all or nothing person and it annoys me when companies do things half
Moderator edit: Removed profanity
Userlevel 7
+17
The Arc would tell the TV LPCM surround is not supported and then the TV would only output stereo to the Arc I would presume.
If you choose Sonos you’re stuck with the choices Sonos makes. DTS or LPCM surround formats are not supported. To Sonos this must not be a big problem - if it was, they would have fixed it. So the large majority of Sonos users will not own a game computer (LPCM) or a blu ray player (DTS) - so will stream from their native TV apps, for which DD+ and Atmos are more important.
Above it is mentioned the PS4 outputs LPCM - it will also output DD, so the problem is not as big as it is with, say, a Nintendo Switch - I have read this will only do LPCM.
It also depends on the codec conversion of the TV. If the TV can convert LPMC to a codec like DD+ then it can output it to the beam. I don’t think the TVs can pass LPMC via ARC so some sort of conversion would be required. I think the next generation of TVs will probably be more capable of this If not you’ll just get stereo pcm.
Userlevel 7
+17
Since you can only connect the Artc to an HDMI-ARC connection, the receiver would have to have such a connection, that would act as an HDMI-ARC to the Arc. I do not no think this is possible.
If you ar thinking about buying a receiver with this kind of capabilities; I would rather go all out and not bother to go the Sonos route - the Arc is a 3.0 speaker, not a center, so your receiver would act as a (very capable, very expensive) HDMI-switch. If you want Sonos for such a receiver, buy a Sonos Port.
I find your logic odd. It’s Apple that is apparently restricting the Dolby Atmos signal to MAT, not Sonos. Assuming you can hand the appropriate signal to Sonos, it will play it. Sonos has zero control over what systems you TV supports. I’m not sure what Sonos can do, other than to petition Apple to change their stance, and we’ve seen how well that has progressed on the ‘on this device’ front.
If, and I stress the if, this is a problem with Apple TV, it lies directly on Apple’s shoulders, and the TV sets we’ve purchased. Sonos has said they’ll play Atmos encoded in Dolby Digital Plus over HDMI ARC, and in TrueHD over eARC. How can this be laid at their feet?
I will reserve my judgement on Apple TV until I see how my Vizio passes the signal to Sonos...and if it still doesn’t work for me, I’ll reserve my complaints for Apple’s refusal to use anything other than MAT, and me for purchasing a TV that Doesn’t support eARC, probably in equal measure. But it’s not a Sonos issue, by any stretch. They’re just the receiver of the signal.
I’ll reserve judgement too. It’s early days - the product isn’t shipping yet!
But I’ll be on the lookout for guidance from Sonos on how the Arc can be used (or not) with an Apple TV and a modern (2020) TV with eARC. If not, well, being handed a reason to buy a new AVR wouldn’t be the end of the world. :-)
Dave Ings
I’m in a similar boat — currently I have a non-ARC projector connected to a Sonos Beam via an HDMI switch that has an S/PDIF optical output. This works well enough, but looks like it would have to change if I upgrade to the Sonos Arc and wanted Atmos audio.
I understand Atmos is not supported with optical, so I’m looking this “HD Audio Extractor” which splits HDMI into HDMI + Audio-Only HDMI: https://smile.amazon.com/OREI-60Hz-Audio-Converter-Extractor/dp/B07T6CDPQJ/ (It claims to support Atmos).
So in theory I could plug my HDMI sources into the input, with HDMI out to the projector and Audio-HDMI to the Arc. Maybe that would work?
Userlevel 2
I’m in a similar boat — currently I have a non-ARC projector connected to a Sonos Beam via an HDMI switch that has an S/PDIF optical output. This works well enough, but looks like it would have to change if I upgrade to the Sonos Arc and wanted Atmos audio.
I understand Atmos is not supported with optical, so I’m looking this “HD Audio Extractor” which splits HDMI into HDMI + Audio-Only HDMI: https://smile.amazon.com/OREI-60Hz-Audio-Converter-Extractor/dp/B07T6CDPQJ/ (It claims to support Atmos).
So in theory I could plug my HDMI sources into the input, with HDMI out to the projector and Audio-HDMI to the Arc. Maybe that would work?
Won’t work. The Sonos hdmi is an output not an input and only supports ARC/eARC audio so it will ignore audio on regular hdmi channels.
Sonos isn’t know for budging on these things so I think the best bet is to reach out to the support at hdfury (a third part company known for similar products) and continue to let them know their is an interest in such a product. Enough interest and one may be created.
It would also be interesting if someone did a teardown of the optical to hdmi adapter that comes with the beam and arc since it is the only known device that is able to input audio to Sonos device hdmi ports and my give some of the more tech inclined forum members clues as to a solution.
Won’t work. The Sonos hdmi is an output not an input and only supports ARC/eARC audio so it will ignore audio on regular hdmi channels.
This device does claim to have ARC audio out, but yes, hard to know until the Sonos Arc actually ships and we can test it out for real.
These devices seem to support eARC pass through coming back from the TV and sending it out. They don’t appear to create their own eARC output from an HDMI source input.
Userlevel 5
+13
Hi folks. Thanks for your responses and updates here.
https://en.community.sonos.com/troubleshooting-228999/no-dialog-through-arc-from-apple-tv-4k-6847888
You can try a different source like the built-in apps on your TV and see if it will make any difference. If it shows playing Dolby Atmos, meaning it does playing it.
Try to submit a diagnostic to further check on our end. Reply to us with the confirmation number.
Just let us know. We and the community are always here to help.
Userlevel 1
This does seem like a strange oversight. I had planned to use the following chain of devices: Apple TV 4K —> LG OLED TV (eARC) —> Sonos Arc. With the lack of support for LPCM, will that cause this setup not to work with Atmos? Anyone know if the 2020 LG OLED TVs can downmix the Apple TV audio to something the Sonos Arc can accept, while keeping the Atmos track?
You will be fine if you have eARC. The Apple TV will pass the Atmos to the Arc just fine, if using eARC. Consider yourself lucky - for many people (myself included), our TV’s without eARC will not be able to send an ATMOS signal to the Arc because Apple TV does not use DD+ as a container, and thus what they do send is too large to send through the legacy HDMI arc connections.
Hey
Thanks for your help.
Will this also work for my LG E6 ?
There is an option in the settings to output Dolby Digital Plus.
Userlevel 7
+23
Will this also work for my LG E6 ?
There is an option in the settings to output Dolby Digital Plus.
Who knows, this TV doesn’t do eARC, so we have to wait for someone to actually try it, or for Sonos to tell us which TVs are compatible with Apple TV + Atmos over ARC. They must have some idea as one assumes they have tested it with a bunch of different devices.
It may be overkill but I’m considering purchasing a relatively affordable LG SM90 (SM9000) tv which has EARC to act as a ‘receiver’ between the Sonos ARC and my projector.
i would also need a HDMI splitter to feed both the TV and projector from an Apple TV / Blu-ray player.
The TV could sit behind the projector screen and could be used for occasional viewing when the screen is up. I also believe LG TVs have a ‘screen off’ setting.
In this way I could have lossy Atmos from the connected Apple TV and lossless Atmos from a connected Blu-ray player.
If and when a company develops a HDMI matrix with arc capabilities it would probably cost a few 100 anyway.
Why wait for this technology which would be fairly niche and may never happen.For a few 100 more you could have the solution now with the added benefit of a second screen.
Any thoughts ?
.
Any thoughts ?
I’m considering the same thing but with a smaller Samsung 43" Class TU8000.
Anyway, what splitter have you found to support everything?
Userlevel 2
Trying to get an answer to this question via this discussion: will I get Atmos to my Arc if I feed the Arc directly from Apple TV, bypassing my TV audio, where the ATV app supports Atmos? I believe the answer is no, as a result of the limitations of the type of ATV output - is that correct?
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