Can no longer turn OFF Vizio TV with Google Assistant and Sonos Amp over HDMI ARC

First of all HDMI (CEC) implementations can vary by TV manufacturer. Therefore it can be hit or miss as to how well your devices respond to voice commands. 
 

If I were you I’d change the device type that shows at the bottom of your screen shot to something else… like Radio??  Or unlink the control device from Sonos. 
 

However, there’s really no guarantee that any if the suggestions will completely resolve your issue. It may be something you have to live with. But rest assured it’s not Sonos… it the TV implementation of HDMI (CEC). 

FYI, I had a Samsung that my Beam would not turn off via Alexa voice. However, on and off voice commands work on my LG and Sony TV’s

i hope this helps your understanding.  Cheers!
 

Thanks. What’s interesting is that it used to work fine before. I’m now thinking that it was working when I had my Google Home Mini controlling the TV only and Alexa controlling Sonos before Sonos added the Google Assistant support.

What I’m noticing now that is strange is that when I say: “Hey Google, turn the TV” it responds: “Ok, turning Sonos Amp On” (and that seems to turn the TV ON) and when I say: “Hey Google, turn the TV off”, it says: “Turning Sonos Amp off” and nothing happens.

This is despite the fact that this Sonos Amp device doesn’t say “TV” anywhere in its name anymore in Google Home. I’ve included the devices hooked up in this room. It’s the Chromecast built-in to the Vizio TV, Sonos Amp hooked up to the TV over ARC, and the Den speaker which is the Sonos Amp as a speaker I guess. The Chromecast is named TV and the Sonos Amp is just Sonos Amp. And yet, it’s the Amp that responds when I say turn off the TV.

Interestingly, what does work is actually playing stuff. So if I say: “Hey Google, watch Stranger Things on the TV”, the Chromecast (I presume?) correctly starts playing Stranger Things from Netflix.

I’m thoroughly confused about what’s actually controlling and sending signals about the on/off state of the TV. Is it the Chromecast or the Sonos Amp? Seems like it must have previously been the Chromecast since I used to use a Google Home mini to do it before Sonos had the Google Assistant support.

Is there a way to deregister just the Sonos Amp TV Control while leaving the Den speaker (technicaly the same device) hooked up?

Den:

Sonos Amp which I’ve named Sonos Amp and doesn’t say “TV” anywhere except in the Name from Sonos and the Device Type.

Sonos Amp (again?) which I guess is just the Sonos Amp as a speaker?

Chromecast device which I’ve named “TV”:

Boo Radley,

Google Home/Assistant unfortunately has some limitations as there is no way to disable or unlink a single device, like you can with Amazon Alexa. You could however try removing the Sonos TV Home Control from the room and the Home itself and give it another name/nickname to see if that solves the problem.
 

You may also find that installing the chromecast TV after the Sonos skill/device, will hand back the control to the TV.

Worth a try, at least.

Thanks for the suggestions. Unfortunately that didn’t work.

Interestingly, I found a way to get the TV itself to respond rather than the Sonos Amp and that was to address it as “Chromecast”. So turning Chromecast off/on results in the TV turning off/on. This is pretty bizarre as that name is nowhere in the device info. It’s name is just TV and the Sonos Amp has no reference to TV but it is the only thing that responds to the word “TV”. This also must have been how it was working before the Google assistant support in Sonos as I mentioned previously. Because at that point only the chromecast would have been a Google Home device .

What should “turning off Sonos Amp” actually do anyway? My assumption was the Amp itself is always on.

so in summary, I’m not able to turn the TV off through the Sonos Amp. But if I address the built in chromecast  in the TV by calling it chromecast rather than TV, that works despite the chromecast being the only thing named TV.
 

This still seems like some kind Of limitation of the Amps connection to Vizio though as turning the Tv it on through the Sonos Amp (the Sonos TV Control and not the output speaker) works fine.

Boo Radley,

The instruction is not to turn on/off the Amp, but rather for it to send a CEC instruction over the HDMI port to switch on/off the connected device. That’s why the CEC commands have to be switched on within the TV Settings.. The different TV manufacturers have their own implementation of the CEC ‘standard’ and call them by various names as follows. Just a few examples (for your info) …

• Samsung - Anynet+
• Sony - BRAVIA Link or BRAVIA Sync
• LG - SimpLink
• Sharp - Aquos Link
• Vizio- CEC
• Hitachi - HDMI-CEC
• AOC - E-link
• Pioneer - Kuro Link
• Toshiba - Regza Link or CE-Link
• Onkyo - RIHD (Remote Interactive over HDMI)
• Panasonic - VIERA Link or HDAVI Control or EZ-Sync
• Philips - EasyLink
• Mitsubishi - NetCommand for HDMI
• Runco International - RuncoLink
• Insignia - InLink
• JVC - CEC
• Magnavox - Fun-Link
• Sylvania - Fun-Link
• Sansui - EasyConnect

I see. Thanks. I’ve confirmed CEC is definitely enabled on my Vizio TV. So it seems like that link is working to turn it on but not off. I’ll hold out hope this gets addressed in either a Vizio TV update or perhaps a Sonos update if it ends up being related to Sonos at all.

Any thoughts on that other stuff I mentioned above with the Sonos Amp always trying to respond to “TV” requests? I tried everything under the sun to rename those devices in a way that only the built-in Chromecast would be “TV” but to no avail. I’m thinking it must be because the Sonos Amp still has a device type of TV and a name from Sonos of: Sonos TV Control Den as seen in the screenshot above. I’m not sure where the latter is coming from either. Must be part of the process of registering the device with Google Assistant or Home.

As best I can tell, when I do, i end up with two devices: the Den speaker and the Den Sonos TV control which are the same logical device (the Amp) though perhaps used for different purposes. Any idea what the difference is between those two things?

Boo Radley,

In my experience, the CEC ‘standard' implementation really does vary across the board, not only by each manufacturer, but by actual TV model too… in my particular case, I have a Beam that’s attached to an old 2015 LG TV and that has the (Simplink) CEC command for  “TurnIng off the TV” disabled, but my other (more recent) LG TV appears to have it enabled.

I don’t however user either, as I prefer to control my TV’s via infra-red instead with a Logitech Harmony Hub and Alexa voice control. As mentioned earlier, I find it’s much easier to rename and/or disable/unlink individual devices when using Alexa, but I still use Google for a good many things about the home.

With regards to some devices responding to the name “TV”, my guess is that behind the scenes of the installed devices/skills from the various manufacturers, that there are “alias names“ for some things, which we cannot see, nor get to change. That’s why I mentioned earlier to try reinstalling your TV chromecast device/skill after installing the Sonos device/skill in your Google Home… my thoughts being that the last one installed may get priority and take back control, including control of any hidden alias.

This is just my personal guess as to what might be happening in this situation, where names like “TV” are being used by various different providers.

I’m still quite surprised though that device nicknames are not working for you in this situation and that by giving the ‘Sonos TV Home Control” a nickname like “Den TV”, for example, didn’t work when saying “Hey Google, switch on/off the Den TV”.

I guess the same thing also applies to the chromecast TV device and you could perhaps try changing the name of that device from “TV” to something else instead, for example “Vizio TV” and then try the commands “Hey Google, turn on/off Vizio TV”

Thanks for that tip. You’re right that naming the Chromecast “Vizio TV” and addressing it that way did the trick! “TV” still goes to the Sonos control. Must just not be enough to distinguish them. So basically, as long as I can find a way to address the Chromecast directly, it works. It doesn’t seem like the OFF option works over Sonos Amp + HDMI ARC.

I can do that for now. Thanks again!