Poor sound

hardtimes

I have a Sky hd box and the sound is terrible when watching programmes. I have the box connected via HDMI and the volume needs to be at max. I have tried the box on other TV's and same problem.
There is not a way to alter volume of the box.

Moneymaker

hardtimes wrote: »

There is not a way to alter volume of the box.

Correct. How have you connected its audio output to the TV?

Connect its audio output to a decent sound system. A skinny TV with no resonance cavity for speakers will not produce a good sound.

hardtimes

Moneymaker wrote: »

Correct. How have you connected its audio output to the TV?

Connect its audio output to a decent sound system. A skinny TV with no resonance cavity for speakers will not produce a good sound.

Connected to sound bar

yangptangkipperbang

hardtimes wrote: »

Connected to sound bar

You should have the Sky box connected to the TV (by HDMI) and the TV optical audio o/p connected to the soundbar

nickcc

yangptangkipperbang wrote: »

You should have the Sky box connected to the TV (by HDMI) and the TV optical audio o/p connected to the soundbar

Just bought a LG soundbar and woofer, tried the optical connection into my Samsung TV but get no output. Have now connected the sky HD box to the soundbar then soundbar to TV using HDMI, considerable improvement over the TV's speakers which I've turned off. If the Sky HD box has optical can this be used rather than going into the TV ?

yangptangkipperbang

nickcc wrote: »

Just bought a LG soundbar and woofer, tried the optical connection into my Samsung TV but get no output. Have now connected the sky HD box to the soundbar then soundbar to TV using HDMI, considerable improvement over the TV's speakers which I've turned off. If the Sky HD box has optical can this be used rather than going into the TV ?

If it works ..................:)

I connected my TV and soundbar my way, 'cos that's the way Panasonic said to do it

WTFH

You should really connect the soundbar to the TV, that way it will work when you play DVDs etc.

Your problem may have been that when you plugged it into the TV you didn't change the settings in the TV to say that you had an external digital audio. That would automatically disable the TV speakers, and if the soundbar is smart enough, would mean its volume is controlled by the TV remote.

almillar

You should really connect the soundbar to the TV, that way it will work when you play DVDs etc.

I know what you're getting at, but no. The TV is the end of the path. It's audio output should only be used for the TV's internal tuner to output sound. Everything else should be connected to the soundbar.
TV's will often only pass out 2.0 sound at best, even on optical, so if you're feeding it with lovely 5.1 sound from a DVD, that won't get passed onto the soundbar.
For hardtimes, we have the answer - try connecting the Sky box to the TV via HDMI, and from Sky box to soundbar with an optical digital (TOSLINK) cable. There are a couple of sound settings you've probably already found in the Sky box - you want to set it to DOLBY D instead of stereo. You also have delay settings in there in case the sound isn't in sync with the picture.
Hopefully the soundbar has enough inputs for all the devices in use (we don't know what it is?) or else it shouldn't have been bought.

WTFH

almillar wrote: »

Hopefully the soundbar has enough inputs for all the devices in use (we don't know what it is?) or else it shouldn't have been bought.

My soundbar has 1 optical input. I'm happy with the output from it

hardtimes

I have solved the problem,on my new LG Smart tv there is a setting called clear voice 11 I have set this to the maximum and I can now hear without the volume having to be set to the max

lolly5648

I have just bought a Panasonic Viera smart TV and the sound via Sky is terrible. If I watch a programme on Freeview the sound is acceptable. Having spent a lot of money on the TV, it is really annoying to have to pay for a soundbar.

Is there a cheap way to get better sound? The tv is used mainly for watching Sky sports and catchup tv. No DVDs or gaming.