Freesat box connection to hearing aid device

fatfairy · 30 Nov 2023 at 15:56

I'm planning to connect up my Freesat box to a Bluetooth device that works with my hearing aids. Currently the Freesat is connected to an avr by HDMI which then passes on the video signal to the TV, with sound passed to 5.1 speakers. If I now connect a Toslink cable to the optical out on the Freesat box in order to pass audio to the hearing aid Bluetooth device am I likely to run into any problems, i.e. conflict between the optical out and the HDMI out? Many thanks for any thoughts on this.

fatfairy · 30 Nov 2023 at 16:34

The link between the receiver and the TV is HDMI (Arc) and no use is made of the sound signal from the receiver, i.e. the TV sound is set at zero. Only the video signal is utilised. (All initial signals (Freesat/BlueRay) are first processed by the receiver before going to TV and 5.1 speakers.)
Did wonder about the extractor concept, and also worried that there might then be sync problems between hearing aids and screen. I need to keep the speakers working for others in the room by the way.

fatfairy · 30 Nov 2023 at 17:03

Hiroofheroes I considered that but rather assumed that the TV speakers would have to be working for the signal to be output from the optical connection. This is probably not a 'deal-breaker' but I was hoping to keep the TV speakers silent. I need to check the settings. There was an option on the TV to have sound processed by the sound system or the TV speakers. Currently that is set at sound system so the question then is whether that affects the optical output as well. Guess I'm going to have buy the device and fool around until it works!

fatfairy · 30 Nov 2023 at 17:05

Barry Smalley said:
Do exactly what you have suggested. You should run into no problems.

Thanks, that's what I'm secretly hoping.

fatfairy · 30 Nov 2023 at 17:21

hiroofheroes said:
If you set the TV audio to sound system and output to optical it should pass all audio from HDMI in to the optical out.

The TV doesn't know the receiver is acting before it receives the signal from HDMI and will just pass it to the selected sound system output (ARC or in this case Optical)

Added benefit from going from the TV is it'll work on all sources not just the Freesat.

Excellent, now to get an order in and then I can hear what is being said when watching films. Thanks for your help on this, much appreciated.

fatfairy · 1 Dec 2023 at 21:06

Bubo said:
All the Sony TV's I've ever had have outputted audio to the optical out all the time, regardless of whether the TV is set to sound system or not, and even with TV on zero volume, so if yours is a Sony then you'd very likely be able to use the AV speakers and the TV optical out at the same time as you want. Maybe all tellys are like this, you can check right now to see if red light is coming from the TV optical out, if it is then likely to be outputting sound as is.

Thanks for that and yes there is light out of the optical output on the TV as there is from the Freesat optical output. Likewise the headphone socket on the receiver provides output to phones but has no effect on the adapter. The bottom line is clearly there is something wrong with this adapter so a new one looks necessary.