How to get 4.1 sound out of old tv.

[spiderman12341]

Hey,

I have a gift for my friend which is a 4.1 sound system. His tv is a Hitachi-P50H401- which was made in 2007. I would be hooking it up vice optical cable.
Link below is a the sound bar.
click below on amazon link to see soundbar model.
amazon 4.1 sound bar made model click here

My question is if i plug in optical out to the tv and choice either normal surround or wide surround will 4.1 work? I know the tv is very old 2007 so it's codec may be really old to use. I know that hooking optical out to chromecast will auto configuration 4.1 but will it auto config apps like netflix, crave, amazon prime to 4.1 just out of curiousty? Shold I always use wide surround?

 

[-Jim-]

I appreciate you giving a Gift to a Friend, so I'll try to assist.

The TV, according to it's Manual (Page 14) will output Dolby Digital (often called AC3) which is a 5.1 lossy signal, and PCM (but no specifications given); so I'll focus on Dolby Digital which is common for the sources you listed. Of course the signal coming into the TV has to be encoded with Dolby Digital for the TV to send it to the soundbar. A lot of program material isn't encoded, or encoded correctly. So don't expect perfection every time.

The information on the soundbar is dismal, but the ray of hope is you "know that hooking optical out to chromecast will auto configuration 4.1". I take that to mean if a Dolby Digital signal is sent to the soundbar, it will automatically decode it.

Selecting wide surround on the TV shouldn't affect what is transmitted via the optical Cable. It just passes through the signal the TV receives from it's input. So provided the sources selected are Dolby Digital, then the soundbar will operate as desired.

I hope this is helpful.

 

[spiderman12341]

i will try netflix and make sure its set to 5.1 then do a 5.1 test thank you for the help.

 

[Antares]

Assuming surround and wide surround work like Prologic did as long as the signal is in stereo it will matrix it into surround.

 

[Trebdp83]

The linked soundbar does not have a Dolby decoder of any kind and needs to be sent a two channel PCM signal. The TV’s sound output setting and any devices connected to it via HDMI should be set to PCM. The soundbar features DSP to simulate Surround sound from the two channel input signal.

 

[-Jim-]

The linked soundbar does not have a Dolby decoder of any kind and needs to be sent a two channel PCM signal. The TV’s sound output setting and any devices connected to it via HDMI should be set to PCM. The soundbar features DSP to simulate Surround sound from the two channel input signal.

Can you advise where you found the information on the soundbar?

Thanks.

 

[Trebdp83]

Assuming the link took me to the correct soundbar, here is the information:

When connected to a system that is not equipped with a Dolby decoder, the audio output setting of the TV would need to be set to PCM as printed in this particular TV’s manual on page 38.

If the linked soundbar is not the correct unit, the correct one will need to be provided by @spiderman12341

 

[spiderman12341]

if i keep it at stereo audio would there it use ac3 at the same bitrate as the 5.1? I know if I set the tv to surround that if it say aac 2.0 it would downsample but is the downsample to stereo more of a lose then just running stereo on tv?

 

[Antares]

if i keep it at stereo audio would there it use ac3 at the same bitrate as the 5.1? I know if I set the tv to surround that if it say aac 2.0 it would downsample but is the downsample to stereo more of a lose then just running stereo on tv?

AAC 2.0 is already stereo.

 

[spiderman12341]

ok so when I took a look at my friends tv want into menu then audio it had Dolby Digital but it was blanked out so I couldnt change it to anything even pcm any ideas?

 

[Trebdp83]

Dolby Digital will not be an option here. Is sound being output?

 

[lovinthehd]

In the advertisement materials for this tv, it mentions nothing to convey that it had 5.1 capability (let alone a slight downmix to 4.1)

 

[spiderman12341]

will i cant change it to pcm it wont let me it just say Dolby and it blacked out i cant change it so.. Too bad pcm may have sounded better.

 

[lovinthehd]

will i cant change it to pcm it wont let me it just say Dolby and it blacked out i cant change it so.. Too bad pcm may have sounded better.

Sounded better? I think you've read too many silly reviews....

 

[Belleleon]

And how did you manage to get a good sound?

 

[ThomasS11]

Hey,

I have a gift for my friend which is a 4.1 sound system. His tv is a Hitachi-P50H401- which was made in 2007. I would be hooking it up vice optical cable.
Link below is a the sound bar.
click below on amazon link to see soundbar model.
amazon 4.1 sound bar made model click here
View attachment 72184
My question is if i plug in optical out to the tv and choice either normal surround or wide surround will 4.1 work? I know the tv is very old 2007 so it's codec may be really old to use. I know that hooking optical out to chromecast will auto configuration 4.1 but will it auto config apps like netflix, crave, amazon prime to 4.1 just out of curiousty? Shold I always use wide surround?

The main thing to check is what audio formats the TV can actually pass through over optical. Since that Hitachi is from 2007, I wouldn’t assume it will handle every modern surround format. Optical (Toslink) is limited, so you’re generally looking at PCM stereo or compressed formats like Dolby Digital 5.1 if the TV supports passthrough.

For a 4.1 soundbar, the TV itself doesn’t really “create” 4.1. It just sends the audio signal, and the soundbar processes it. If Netflix, Prime, etc. are being played through a Chromecast or another streaming device, the Chromecast is more likely to handle the surround output correctly than the TV’s older internal processing.

I’d start with the TV audio settings set to Bitstream/Dolby Digital (if available) rather than PCM, then test some known 5.1 content. The “wide surround” mode is usually just a soundbar processing effect, so whether it sounds better is personal preference. It doesn’t necessarily mean you’re getting a true surround signal.

For a simple setup, I’d let the source device handle decoding and use the soundbar’s surround modes to fine-tune the sound. The older TV should still work fine as long as it can pass the correct optical signal.