TV and Hi-Fi

The question is, what audio outputs the TV has (if any). Some "modern" TVs don't have an audio output, or only optical, but you can get HDMI adapters to extract the audio from one of the TV sockets I think.

My Sony has a 3.5mm jack socket, and it can be configured (through the menus) to act as a line output rather than for a headphone, but the headphone output should work all right, as the mismatch in level compensates for the mismatch in impedance.

Thanks for this but I think I really need to replace the 2:1 computer sound system with the hi-fi system.

It looks like you have clarified this. The grren socket aotputs analog sound and that can go straight into the amplifier.

Thank you.

Yup in theory fine, as long as the amp has some spare inputs and you can get a suitable line level signal to feed them. Note that the PC will see the audio device on the end of the HDMI lead and its own analogue outputs as separate audio output devices, so you may need to switch between them if swapping from TV to HiFi audio.

(or take a feed to the amp from the the TV to capture whatever its "playing". Sometimes this may need to be via a optical to phone converter since not all modern TVs have analogue audio outputs for some daft reason, but most have a SPDIF / Toslink out)

yes. I am driving my hifi from a 'headphone' socket. that way the volume control on the TV works.

I think on that TV the only other alternative is optical, and that needs a converter.

I don't see why not. I have an optical to phono output on the Samsung bought from Amazon. The only issue I had was that hdmi lead to pc, put pc sound into tv after the optical output, so had to pretend it was not hdmi by using a vga to hdmi box and leaving the sound going via my external sound card which has phonos too, so one could simply switch it as another source. I have an annoying pulse though tht goes sheesh every few seconds if the hdmi is connected on any input, Suspect some polling from the TV even in standby is actually getting in via an earth loop somewhere, but I guess I will find it in the end! I do find however that modern tvs max output via line on these dongles is a lot lower than the sound effects the TV makes and all other sound inputs so one obviously does need some kind of level adjustment device I think. Too many different standards, clearly!

Brian

My hi-fi unit has an optical input. To be coupled up today or tomorrow.

When I lived in a much smaller house with my settee only about 4 feet from the (14") TV, I had my hi-fi unit next to the TV, and took a line-out feed from the VCR to the hi-fi, and listened using wired headphones. This was because the sound circuit and speaker in the TV were fairly poor - and anyway they were mono because the TV predated NICAM. I very rarely, if ever, had the volume turned up on the TV.

One thing that was interesting was to play the sound of ITV (Southern/Meridian) through the TV and sound from ITV (Thames/LWT) through the hi-fi and headphones - I could receive from both regions - and there was a time lag that was just perceivable, especially on the "bongs" of News at Ten. Nowadays, with fully digital feed to the transmitters and from the transmitters to the TV, I imagine that the time difference might be *much* greater depending on buffering.

A modern TV may well not have phono outputs. It likely has a headphone socket, but maybe an ugly way to do it. But it will have an optical sound output - toslink. You can buy toslink to phono adaptors for not a lot. But they are mains powered.

If you don't want to run cables between them, pass.

Lip Sync ?.

I have a Denon mini hifi system upstairs in my computer room/office and a 20? YO Phillips cassette/radio in the kitchen. If both are on and tuned to the same BBC FM channel I can hear that they are out of sync for some reason.

Is the Denon playing from its FM tuner, or is it playing from a computer based online radio?

Just don't put the speakers close to the TV. I've a pair of good KEF but wouldn't want them within a yard of the TV - but don't have room for them anyway. I bought a reasonable sound bar and it's agreat improvement. No point in paying too much as I don't want a sub and going for excellent sound would be wasted on my hearing.

There's a whole world of connectors out there, to go from

The red and the white coloration are to suit the standard for labeling Left and Right.

Paul

Not a problem if you are taking the feed off the TV itself. The delay in the optical to DAC converter is at most a few us.

Are you sure one of them isn't on DAB or using a DAB digital tuner of some sort for FM reception which introduces an interesting delay on programme content (as well as being highly inefficient).

Most noticeable when the pips are on the hour and you can hear more than one tuner in different rooms. A classical FM decoder should produce a radio output with at most a few us timing error.

Keep it simple. Selecting a gazillion switches just to watch TV is not fun.

On the other hand, you probably have multichannel outputs from your computer sound card.

And I'm now counting that you effectively you have 5.1 speakers.

Do you enjoy films?

Don't think that applies with a flat screen set. Only CRT types.

No audible delay between any FM tuners I've ever heard. But may well be within the computer, which likely changes the analogue to digital and then back to analogue for its speakers.

Roberts Play using FM has a bit of an echo with other (frequency synthesiser type) FM radios.

Motorola smart phone FM radio function has a delay of about 1/3 second. So there must be some digital processing, even with FM.

(DAB is about 3 seconds behind.)

I used to have a big speaker right next to a CRT TV; it must have "got used" to it being there, as removing it resulted in faint colour effects on a plain white field.

Think with all modern computers there's no analogue side chain. So all analogue is digitised, then converted back to analogue for the headphones.

And all digital has latency.