Buying a TV. Help required!

[mark]

I am in the market for a new TV.

I have a mains socket and an aerial socket installed in the wall at the proposed height of the TV. The idea being to have no wires showing.

Now the bit I don't know is regarding a future sound system. Ideally I would like the TV to communicate with the speakers without wires, ie., no wires between TV and speakers. Speakers///sound bar will sit on a cupboard below and powered from a normal level socket.

Getting to the point, is this do-able? If so, what function would I need to look for in a TV to facilitate this?

mark

[John Rumm]

Yes

You can get TVs with built in bluetooth capability and soundbars to match. Failing that you can also get a bluetooth dongle to add to any TV with a line level audio out or headphone socket.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Plenty will do this via Bluetooth.

What I find strange is that you have to do this. Why are TVs sold with such crappy speakers you have to buy better ones? Would they sell a TV so poor you had to buy an external monitor?

[Davey]

Hear, hear! My personal solution was to buy a set of PC speakers, but it's still not as good as the sound was from my old TV with a big case, and forward-facing speakers.

[Tim Watts]

Yes. It's called a Roku

;->>>

[Tim Watts]

I agree - it may not be the ultimate in High Fidelity (who remembers that?) but it is pretty good and *standard* which means no propriety lock in.

It would be the route I would take unless for some reason I needed the ultimate HiFi.

Anything with a decent set of speakers over bluetooth will sound several times better than 95% of TV's built in sound.

[Lobster]

On 18 Sep 2014, "Dave Plowman (News)" grunted:

I spent a happy Sunday last weekend hacking a 2" deep channel in the brickwork behind my TV leading down to where a cupboard will be, into which I'm burying a wide length of trunking, after which it will be plastered over leaving large, open, concealed flush, brush-plated holes top and bottom. This will take mains, roof aerial lead, HDMI cable to the amplifier, cable TV lead, ethernet cable and anything else I've forgotten. Bit more work than Bluetooth!

AFAIK it's all about the drive towards ever-thinner and more lightweight TVs - they simply haven't got the bulk to have decent speakers inside.

And if the industry can make an extra fast buck out of selling another piece of kit to the hapless punter, what's not to like?

[News]

May I hijack this thread? My 'hi fi' is primitive, but works. Last time I added anything was a CD player about the time Brothers in Arms was released. Everything is hard wired. In an ideal world, I would have additional pairs of speakers around the house, and be able to connect the TV to the amplifier. Reading above, I can attach a Bluetooth dongle to the back of the TV, but what do I attach to the amp? Is there a Bluetooth 'thing' that would receive the audio signal from the TV and feed it into AUX on the amp?

[Tim Watts]

Probably.

My new car "radio" has bluetooth and a USB socket for MP3 playback.

Some amps have bluetooth built in.

[The Natural Philosopher]

ive got an old sony midfi sytem coupled up to mine...

[The Natural Philosopher]

senders and receivers are available from about a tenner each to a lot more

check with amazon: 'bluetooth transmitter' 'bluetooth receiver'

[www.GymRatZ.co.uk]

Or you could argue that why should the punter pay for speakers that are obsolete in his existing surround sound system (essential because TV's don't have decent speakers)

:)

[John Rumm]

Yup - I have a bluetooth gadget designed to turn wired headphones into wireless ones - something similar would do what you want.

[John Rumm]

Not enough volume in the cabinet with a flat panel display...

Many people are very unfussy about sound quality.

[Davey]

For some reason, the small Samsung TV in the bedroom has better native sound quality than the living room Toshiba set. It's more intelligent, too.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Only when it's adequate. When it becomes poor they get 'fussy'.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

As long as you're happy, pet.

[John Rumm]

Not some I have met... questions like "How on earth can you listen to _that_?" get an answer like "what's wrong with it?"

(but then again, I am very fussy about sound!)

[Dave Plowman (News)]

And then complain it's the programme maker's fault when they can't follow the dialogue. Which of course it frequently is.

I've not used the internal speakers on any TV here since the '60s. ;-)

[sm_jamieson]

I am too. What is the point in having a high definition television without correspondingly high quality sound? I have an AV amp that takes a digital c onnection from the freesat box to give Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound fro m HD movies (at least on BBC and Channel 4). And lots of 2 channel programm es are encoded in Dolby ProLogic so I get 5.1 from them too. The amp (Onkyo) is currently under recall for a common fault to be fixed, s o I am stuck with the TV speakers for now. I didn't realise how bad they we re.

Simon.