I Have an LG HD TV in my den with a Sony Blu Ray player and a Roku hooked up to a Vizio soundbar with a wireless sub-woofer with 2 rear speakers. Television service is via Time Warner with digital cable box.
Last week the box started responding tremendously slow and some of our channels were missing. Reset the box a couple times to no success. Customer service was no help so they sent a service tech over the next day.
Service tech explained that when TW switched to Charter Spectrum they added different bandwidth and programming and such, and some of the older boxes couldn’t handle it. So he swapped out the box.
Which would be great, except then I got no sound out of the left & right rear speakers. Cable sound still came out of the sound bar and sub-woofer. Checked all the connections and nothing was different than with the previous box.
What’s weird is, the rear speakers work fine when playing a DVD or when I switch over to the Roku. He tried running the home theater directly out of the cable box to no success. Rear speakers simply do not respond to the new cable box.
Then he brought in 2 other boxes and tried them. Same thing. Sound for the DVD/Roku in both rear speakers, sound in the bar & sub-woofer for the cable box, but no sound in the rear speakers from the cable box.
And it didn’t matter what kind of cables he tried. HDMI, composite, optical, etc… The 3 cable boxes simply don’t broadcast sound out of the left/right rear speakers.
He went into the internal programming of the boxes and everything and could not find out why this was happening.
Cable tech was perplexed. He said he was going to get 2 different boxes that are a new kind and bring them over this Thursday.
Until then I’d like to find some clues. Why would the older box that I had for years work so well and the new ones don’t? Even directly hooked up to the box output the rear speakers are silent, yet sound great with the Roku/DVD player.
The dynamic is completely different without those speakers working. Like the difference between shooting a bullet and throwing it.
Has anyone else had a problem like this? Any idea why brand new boxes wouldn’t have left/right channels?
I am assuming your input on your receiver is set to digital AUTO, which should send out exactly whats being fed in
My only guess is that these “NEW” boxes are not outputting in digital 5.1, maybe putting out dolby prologic or some such. That or the “NEW” broadcast itself is only being sent out in limited surround left Right Center or something?
Everything is set correctly. What’s really weird is the cable box provides sound on the front sound bar and on the sub-woofer, but the rear 2 speakers are silent. The Roku and Blu ray provide sound on those speakers but not the cable box. Why would the cable box provide sound on the front bar and the sub-woofer but not the 2 rear speakers?
A Google search revealed a lot of folks have the same problem with the exact same cable box (Cisco 8742HDC. Don’t know what brand the other boxes were that he tried).
I can’t say if this is your issue, but some programs and channels do not broadcast in 5.1 Dolby. I would check your programming guide to make sure you have a 5.1 source. In my setup, I have the output (HDMI) from the cable box going to a Yamaha home theater amplifier, and it powers my speakers. If you television has some kind of incompatibility, the purchase of an amplifier may solve your issues. Of course I would research your cable company’s forums prior to a purchase.
Naw, that’s not the issue. The home theater worked on every channel with the old box, and it works on every channel when watching the Spectrum app on Roku.*
*Watching cable TV through Roku is not the answer as it robs me of rewinding the program and recording it on my DVR. I should not have to alter my viewing habits or buy other add ons because Charter Spectrum has fucked up equipment,
We tested every scenario using different cables and connections and the issue is definitely the box. Also, there are oodles of people online that are bitching about the same issue with the same box. But I can’t use the old box because it is obsolete now.
I’m assuming you’ve gone through the STB menus to make sure it’s outputting full 5.1 audio, or at least that you aren’t telling it to only output 2 channel stereo
Have you connected the audio output (coax or optical) directly from the cable box to the Home theater receiver? If so, disconnect the HDMI between the STB and TV and try again - change channel a few times too to see if that helps - heck, reset the STB if you’ve got some time.
The HDMI spec allows for source and display components to negotiate what digital audio format they support. So if you plug an HDMI cable into a TV that’s only 2 channel audio capable, HDMI will only send 2 channel audio to the TV, not the full 5.1 audio.
That shouldn’t affect the digital audio out directly from the cable box. But I could see a software or hardware bug causing exactly that - HDMI negotiates down to 2 channel audio, and the STB sets all audio to 2.0, even on the separate output. So if you disconnect the HDMI completely it may set the audio to full 5.1.
Not that that helps you, since you presumably want to watch TV as well as listen to it, but it may explain what’s going on.
So you did connect the digital audio between the cable box and home theater receiver, and disconnect the cable box and TV, and still got no surround? I got nothin then - the cable box is flat out refusing to send 5.1 audio.
And the cable guy didn’t receive the other 2 boxes he ordered so we have to reschedule when they come in. Not his fault for any of this, but still: :mad:
We can actually watch all our cable channels via the Spectrum app on Roku and they’re in surround sound. But that prevents us from rewinding a show we’re watching, recording them from the Roku, and to change channels on that app you have to scroll through all of them not use the digit pad. I have the Roku programmed onto the same remote I have the cable box/Blu Ray/etc but the digit pad doesn’t work for it. AKA it’s a pain in the ass.
So we only watch channels on that app when we won’t need to record/rewind and surround sound is a must (like for movies and music).