Can you use ARC?
Check the HDMI connections on the back of your TV, sound bar, or receiver. If the HDMI port has ARC, it should be marked as such. Both your TV and the sound bar/receiver must have ARC for it to work.
Setup
Most HDMI cables should work with ARC. Plug one end of the HDMI cable into the ARC-capable HDMI input in your TV and the other into the ARC-capable output on your sound bar or receiver.
There are basically two main ways to connect a system using ARC. For our purposes, we'll assume you have: a TV, a receiver or sound bar, a Blu-ray player and a game console (Xbox/PS4).
Setup 1: Connect the Blu-ray player and game console to the TV, then connect a single HDMI cable from the TV to the sound bar. The TV becomes the central hub of your entertainment system.
This setup lets you use your TV's remote to switch between the Blu-ray player and game console sources, and in most cases, you can use your TV's remote to control the volume.
The potential downside of this setup is you might not be able to get 5.1 surround sound. This is more of an issue if you are using a receiver instead of a sound bar. We'll discuss this more in the next section.
Setup 2: Connect the Blu-ray player and game console to the receiver/sound bar, then a single cable from the receiver/sound bar to the TV. Some budget sound bars might not have enough HDMI inputs for all your sources, in which case you'll have to use Setup 1.
In this setup, your receiver/sound bar is the central hub of the entertainment system. You will switch between your sources and adjust the volume using your receiver/sound bar's remote. You'll only use your TV's remote to turn the TV on, and access any apps built into the TV.
Out of these two, I certainly prefer Setup 2; I am used to the traditional method of using the AV Receiver (and therefore the soundbar nowadays) as the ‘central control’ of my Home Cinema set-up and don’t like the idea of having to go through the TV for everything unless I have no choice. But this article suggests that I do have a choice and I request you to please think about it.
Also, I would rather have separate remote controls for each unit than let a single remote control two or more devices. I have found that there is less room for accidental changes of setting that way.