I have a Sonos Beam 316-75-792 connected to a Samsung UN55J6201AFXZA via the Sonos Optical Audio Adapter and a Monoprice S/PDIF (Toslink) Digital Optical Audio Splitter that connects to a 6’ optical audio cable to reach the back of the TV.

I recently attempted to swap my 6-ft optical audio cable to a 10-ft one to allow the TV to swivel out and ran into two problems/issues that I could not resolve:

Problem 1:

The new optical audio cable did not work; rubber caps were removed from the tips…I thought maybe the new cable got damaged even though the red light/signal from the TV was clearly visible at the other end of the cable.  I purchased another cable with the same result and no caps on the second cable.  Tested the longer cables with another device, and they both worked fine.

Problem 2:

I went back to the old optical audio cable, and it only works in one direction, meaning if the correct end is not plugged into the back of the TV, there is no sound...flip the optical audio cable around, and you get sound.

I thought I had entered an alternative universe where optical audio cables are directional and tried the longer cables again with no success.  Didn’t matter which side of the optical splitter I plugged into on the out ports, results were consistent with only one cable working in one direction and either of the out ports on the splitter.  Flip the cable around or use a different cable, and no sound.

Any ideas about what could be going on with the longer cable or even the one-way issue?  I have never encountered this issue before and don’t understand what could be causing it.  Not an expert by any means, but it seems to defy common sense.

It has to be a cable or splitter issue, and at this point, I’m going to get an extension optical audio cable, but I wanted to throw this out there as a question while waiting for the extension to arrive.