Frustrating problem Blaupunkt Bpsb21dw

[mrtor]

Good morning everyone, compliments of the season to you all
I purchased a little blaupunkt 2.1 soundbar for my wife to go on our foxtel box and sanyo tv, the tv is quiet old

Soundbar had aux in, optical in and hdmi arc

I thought my best bet was to by an active hdmi splitter and run 1 cable to tv and other to soundbar
No audio when hdmi input selected, nothing direct from hdmi out on foxtel iq4 to soundbar
Offto jbhifi and purchased toslink optical cable, we get audio but it’s really crappy background crackle

Wheni checked Bluetooth with my iphone the sound from the soundbar is really quite good

So firstly it does show it’s a hdmi arc input, should it work directly from the hdmi out on the foxtel box or is it completely different?

Secondly, the optical out port on the iq4 didn’t have any dummy cover plug, it’s a good few years old, could it be dirty and thus cause the crackling

Or

Is my $16 cable from jb hifi the issue ?

I have nothing else to test the sound bar in optical mode to rule out the cable but it was brand new

Thank you in advance from someone needing help

Mike

[mtv]

A direct HDMI ARC connection from the iQ box to the soundbar should work.

You need to ensure your HDMI cable is ARC compliant.

Any cable from V1.4 upward should work.

An HDMI splitter would need to be ARC compliant.

[wotnot]

Weird one ... blaupunkt don't actually state which HDMI standard they're using. and at the same time foxtel iq4 states it only supports HDMI 2.0 ports (HDCP2.2).

As 'HDMI/ARC' appeared as of HDMI v1.4, it'd be nice to know what the soundbar is using (and if it doesn't support HDCP2.2 then it's likely have problems with protected content) --- as you mention iq4 - direct to soundbar not working, that asides the HDMI splitter from the scenario.

There are 2 types of HDMI cable....okay, reneg...make that 3 types if you include cheap chinese made crap...<grin>....but typically they're either standard(cat 1) or high speed(cat2)....ie; there's really no difference between a HDMI 1.4 & HDMI 2.0 cables.... a standard(cat 1) HDMI 2.0 cable doesn't have bandwidth enough to do 4K 60 FPS signal....and a high speed(cat2) HDMI 1.4 cable does... HDMI cables can come with/without ethernet connectivity ..

Toslink is digital ...it's shouldn't crackle like audio signals used to sound (loose speaker wire syndrome), however toslink is limited in bandwidth () so I'm not sure how the DACs in the soundbar would behave if say the iq4 was throwing dts or dolby encodings at it.

What model sanyo teevee is it out of curiosity?

I grew up knowing Blaupunkt as an awesome German brand of audio equipment.... 'After the 2011 take-over, became a managed brand name with all production outsourced to China' ....now it's just rebranded 'junk' by comparison =)

[mrtor]

Found a dvd layer with optical out, plugged in the soundbar and away it went.
Put the toslink back into foxtel box and it was happy. Stuffed if I know what was the issue but it’s now happy

I have learnt a lot about hdmi from what mtv and wotnot posted,thank you for that.

This site is so worth it, thanks
Mike