Playbar surround sound and Apple TV

Scott, I have a similar setup that I have working by doing the following: 1. AppleTV (gen 2) connects to TV via HDMI 2. AppleTV connects to Playbar via optical 3. Set Audio Output to Auto as shown in picture in this thread 4. Set Dolby Digital to ON if you want 5.1, otherwise you can leave in Auto mode and get stereo This is not an ideal setup, but my TV does not pass any audio through optical when using any source other than "Over the Air"

Thank you James and yoyoyo88. Apple tv is already set to auto. Hooking the digital optical out directly to the play bar is working well. Just have to change the digital audio plug every time i switch between components....not ideal, but it works. Is there such a thing as a multibox adapter? I'd like to plug all of my opticals in one place and then plug that multbox into the playbar's optical in. Thanks again.

In case anyone is having a similar problem on the optical out from Apple TV to their Television or directly to the Playbar:  I had a similar problem where the audio from a movie was not functioning, I "restarted" the Apple TV and then my audio reappeared.  

Hi, I am having the same problem. Although I tried all of the above tricks, my Playbar does not seem to recognize my Apple TV as well as my BlueRay player. I tried to restart my Apple TV, confirm the output audio setting, etc., with no success. Is there anything else I can do? It does work when the "cable" tv is on or when playing music from Sonos on my iPad. Thanks for your help.

I'm having the same issue with Apple and the Playbar. I have my optical going from fios box to playbar. Now that I added in Apple TV, I have no sound for Apple TV. Any new tricks?

Well, the sound is carried as data on the optical cable, which is currently connected to your fios box, so of course the Apple TV won't have any sound. I assume you've got it connected to the fios box because your TV doesn't output Dolby Digital? If that's the case, you would be a candidate for one of the switches that many people talk about here, and connect both your fios box and the apple TV to that, then connect the Playbar to the optical out on that switch in addition to the HDMI connection to your TV.

I connected the optical directly to fios and the playbar worked. When I added apple, I removed from fios and went back directly the tv. Our sound settings have TV Speakers=On or Off and Surrond=On or off. No dolby indicators. I tried searching to see if our Vizio was incompatible, but didn't see that in any treads online. So, tell me about the "switches" please.

My other issue is that I wiped out my Dining Room and family speakers when I tried to overide the IP of the playbar.... How do I get that back?

How old is your Vizio? I've got 2, and they both work fine with the optical cable, with multiple devices connected via HDMI.

Your ideal setup is to have both FIOS and Apple TV connected to your TV with HDMI cables. Then the Playbar connected to the TV via the optical cable. Go back in to the TV audio setup and turn off the TV speakers. Then it all should be coming out of the Playbar, and nowhere else. You should make sure that both the FIOS and the Apple TV are set up to output Dolby Digital only, in their respective audio menus.

Then with the TV playing something like Monday Night Football, go in to "about my sonos system" on the app, and look at what is listed under the Playbar. It should say "stereo" or "dolby digital" (I'm not at home to check this, being on the west coast, I'm still at work). If it says stereo, go back to the fios and reset the audio output until you get a dolby digital on that page.

I'm not sure about what you're talking about with overriding IPs? If the speakers are no longer connected, try unplugging them and then plugging them back in.

Hmm, still having board problems.

If the speakers don't come back in your system after plugging them back in, go ahead and add them again, as if they were new, using the app and the "add a new player/speaker" link. My terminology might not be 100%, I'm not able to see it on my phone right now, since I'm not near my sonos system, but it's something like that.