HDMI eArc - QE50QN90CATXXU

[Yam-Yam]

My second post today on this TV

I have just recently bought a QE50QN90CATXXU.

I don't know if I need to give the entire product identification or there's an abbreviated form. Perhaps someone can tell me.

I've gone through the set up and I've connected some peripherals up via the four available HDMI sockets. The peripherals were those I was using with my old TV, namely:

Humax FOXSAT-HDR FreeSat receiver and PVR (via HDMI4)
Panasonic 6 speaker SA-BTT400 Home Theater System (via the HDMI3 (eARC)
Panasonic DMR-HW100 HDD Recorder (Via HDMI2
Amazon Fire Stick (Via HDMI4)

When playing a DVD or BluRay disc with the SA-BTT400 Home Theater System the sound comes through loud, clear and rich through all the six speakers connected (wired).

When watching anything from the other devices connected to the other HDMI ports, the sound reverts to the TV speakers.

Why is this, and is it possible to change the settings to channel the sound through the Home Theatre System?

Things were so much easier when all the devices were Panasonic using Vierra!

Even with the 17 year old Panasonic system, it did it all for you!

[AndrewL]

@Yam-Yam: If you head to Home > Menu > Settings > All Settings > Sound > Sound Output, are you able to select your home theatre system as the main audio output option? 

[Yam-Yam]

First of all, I make sure that the Theatre system is turned on via its own remote.

Off the remote, (not the Smart Remote), I don't see Home > Menu > but I do see the Settings button (lower left below the red A button).

If I press this the Settings Menu comes up.

I select Sound> Sound Output - I get a list:

TV Speaker (which it is set to - must be the default)

Receiver (HDMI)

Receiver (Optical)

Bluetooth Speaker List

There doesn't seem to be anything appertaining to my Theatre system.  So I'm a little lost.

Does that help you to help me?

I've fiddled with the settings on the Theatre system which indicate that it is connected via AUX.  I have changed them to ARC but it doesn't seem to make any difference.

[TG20]

It should work if you select ===>    Receiver (HDMI)  on the TV.

That's telling the TV to send the audio signal out the eARC HDMI port. 

[Yam-Yam]

That is one of things that I've tried.

It doesn't work.

It's not recognising the theatre system as a receiver, although I was sort of on the same track as you regarding the HDMI eARC port.  I thought that it shouldn't really matter what is attached as the output is the output.

All the other ports are HDMI apart from HDMI3, which is HDMI (eARC).  My understanding, which may well be wrong is that the output from the other "ordinary HDMI" devices, should feed through the Theatre sound system when that device is switched on.

It was simple with Panasonic Vierra.  It sorted itself out without having to do any complicated settings.  Even non-Panasonic devices such as the Humax FoxSatHD receiver came through as surround sound.

I'm still stumped.

[DaveHu]

I had this problem and it turned out that my Amazon Fire cube was the culprit.  My Sonos Arc would work for a while and then sound would revert to the TV speaker.  You can try turning off Anynet + but on my 2 year old Samsung, the Sonos disappears as an option.  There is a cheap device, the BlueRigger adapter, available on Amazon that you put in line with the offending device that will fix the problem. However the TV won’t automatically switch to that device when you go to use it. I wasn’t using the cube anyway and finally disconnected it.   No amount of tinkering with the fire Cube settings worked, BTW.  Hope this helps. 

[Yam-Yam]

I've managed to work a way around it.

I've connected the Fire stick directly to the TV via HDMI2.

I've connected my Humax FoxSat-HDR directly via HDMI4.

I've connected my Panasonic Theatre System SA-BTT400 via HDMI3 (eArc).

I've connected a Kinovo 501BN HDMI Hub via HDMI1.

The Kinovo Hub has a Panasonic BluRay Player, a Tower Majority Multi-region DVD player, a Sony PS3, and PS4 and a Panasonic DMR-HW100 HDD Recorder all attached via it's 5 output ports.

It doesn't automatically switch all of the time but it works OK of the Kinovo remote.

I finally received the free Samsung sound bar which I've set up.  It gives excellent output.  I now only use the theatre system when watching BluRays and DVDs and listening by switching the sound the the theatre system.

I have give up trying to get the other peripherals to output sound through the theatre system.  It would have been nice though!

[DaveHu]

It would be nice if mfgs worked through these issues before releasing their products. Everything might work if you used optical out but you might be giving up some surround options. 

[Yam-Yam]

The sound bar works off optical OK.  I've got the bar and the sub-woofer.  It's just a bit lacking at the rear which I understand you can buy separately and work off Bluetooth.

Not looked into it to deeply but I've got a couple of JBL Charge3 Bluetooth speakers and I'm wondering they could be paired.

[DaveHu]

Bluetooth can be flaky with some Samsungs. On my 2 yr old Samsung, Bluetooth doesn’t work unless you disable Anynet + and if you disable that, you disable the eARC port. That’s ok for my purposes - using earphones. Not good. If you use the Bluetooth speakers as surrounds. For your other problem, make sure you test your system with one peripheral connected at a time, to see if one device is causing problems with speaker output. I guess you may have already done this.