Q: New Apple TV--Missing optical connection

I found them for £ 12.00 on Amazon, I think I saw them on eBay for £ 5.00

Dave Calhoun2 wrote:

The optical output is mostly useful for those of us wanting to run audio from the Apple TV to a stereo without turning on the TV which would be impossible with the new AppleTV.

Without turning on the TV, how do you navigate through the ATV menus? Are you maybe using this only with AirPlay or something?

Also note that protected content may not play unless the ATV is connected to an HDMI chain that supports HDCP from end to end. Some TV's do not respond to HDCP queries unless they are turned on, which could cause problems for users with those TVs.

Winston Churchill wrote:

I found them for £ 12.00 on Amazon, I think I saw them on eBay for £ 5.00

Do you mean the J-tech products or functionally similar ones? I don't know how common it is but from reading some of the comments on the U.S. Amazon site there seem to be a lot of cheap knock-off products for sale that offer inferior performance because they cut corners, like by omitting power supply stabilizing components.

I don't know what make they were.

I've found of late that price doesn't always reflect quality, there are some cheap products that just do what they are supposed to and not so others, fortunately consumer law is on our side and we can return things that don't work.

planochoi wrote:

The current AppleTV allows an optical link which assures 100% sound fidelity which is critical to listening to the best sounds from Itune and other audio and video streaming services without any disruptions due to various issues associated with Airplay.

It isn't quite true that optical assures 100% fidelity, at least for all surround sound sources. That's because consumer optical (TOSLINK) does not have the required bandwidth to support uncompressed 5.1 audio streams, so you are limited to the lossy compressed surround sound formats. The lossless surround sound formats like Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD Master Audio, & LPCM can only be delivered over HDMI, which does have the required bandwidth.

Of course, if you only need two channel (stereo) audio, this won't matter, but even so 100% accurate conversion between electrical & optical formats requires very high quality (& expensive) hardware. For most users the difference between the very expensive "audiophile" grade & less expensive "consumer" grade stuff isn't significant, but it is something to be aware of if you want the best possible sound.

The adapter mentioned seems to solve the problem as it provides optical audio and also passes the HDMI though. I don't think anyone would try to run a surround system off optical when the HDMI port is right there. The optical port is for listening to stereo music when a person doesn't want to turn on the TV (airplay) or perhaps doesn't want to leave it on after selecting their music. Apple's omission of the optical port is annoying to a small group of us but I'm quite sure apple won't miss us. :-)

Dave Calhoun2 wrote:

I don't think anyone would try to run a surround system off optical when the HDMI port is right there.

Except not all surround sound systems have an HDMI input. For instance, I use a 5.1 sound-bar based system with the L/C/R channels in one long box & builtin wireless connections to the subwoofer & rear speakers. It has lots of inputs but the only digital ones are optical & coax S/PDIF. The TV has only one digital output, an optical one that passes through 5.1 sound from any of its HDMI inputs or its builtin broadcast TV tuner. So in my setup, my ATV 3 & cable box are attached to the TV via HDMI, & the TV supplies digital audio signals to the sound-bar's surround sound processor via the optical connection.

Well firstly I was very excited to know that there will be a new Apple TV, but got disappointed straight away finding that it does not have Optical audio port at the back. Well at the moment I play my music on my iPhone through my Bose speakers through Air Play. All I have to do is select AirPlay on my iPhone and turn on the music system. It automatically turns on the Apple TV and starts playing music through the Bose speakers. However, my the speakers are about 10 years old so I had to buy the digital to analogue audio converter so I could use the Optical Audio from Apple TV to play music on my music system. I really love this setup and wish to continue to use it. Not having Optical audio port is the only drawback for me not to go for the new Apple TV I hope they read this thread.

I'm an absolute Hi-Fi nut, but I don't use the optical straight out of Apple TV. I plug the HDMI into the back of the Samsung 7000 series and use the optical out from the TV. I have no issues with it. It also means that I don't have to switch the sound at the amplifier from one source to another. Whatever's on the screen is what goes into the back of the amp and out to the speakers.

Parallax View , So you're saying that if I just run the HDMI cable from the Apple TV 4 to the TV, and then run the optical cable from the TV out to the amp built into my speakers (Aperion Alliare), the AirPlay with ALAC will work fine for music streaming from iTunes? I'll just need to have the TV on in order for the music to work?

This is very disappointing.  Had Airplay out of AppleTV 3 to (via digital to analog converter) old (wonderful) amp and then to 4 pairs of speakers throughout the house.  Now I will need to have two apple TV modules in operation.

Features of Apple TV 4 are great, but why take features away?  Will be much more careful upgrading in the future.

Hi

All you need to do is connect Optical cable from your tv to your sound bar sound will go from

Atv 4 using  HDMI lead.

Cheers

Brian ( UK )

Thanks Brian, but the TV is 50 feet away from all my audio and video components.  It would involve dragging another cable through the attic.  Just reinstalled the Apple TV 3, named it airplay, works fine.  Just stupid that I didn't check out the new one more carefully.  Thanks again.  Jim

The new Apple TV supports 7.1 audio encoding. The Toslink optical port only supports 5.1. Therefore the optical port has been removed. End of story. The new Apple TV also supports Bluetooth Audio. Newer sound bars and AVRs also support Bluetooth Audio.

Be as disappointed as you want, complain all you want. The optical port is not coming back. It’s obsolete just like RCA and Composite video inputs.

All the ports you cite as "obsolete" exist on all high end audio equipment.  Thanks for your useless post.