The sound output for Apple TV 3 is distorted

have you tried to use the remote to lower the audio output ?

- is dec

+ is inc

Also make sure that your HDMI cable is facing the right way, most "High Speed" HDMI cables come with directional audio (look for the arrow markings on the cable). If you install them correctly, you'll get awesome sound but if you reverse the cable it might cause weird noise / choppy audio.

The volume from the Apple TV is a fixed volume, you cannot adjust it. Turn down the volume on your TV or sound system.

Sonicray wrote:

Also make sure that your HDMI cable is facing the right way, most "High Speed" HDMI cables come with directional audio (look for the arrow markings on the cable). If you install them correctly, you'll get awesome sound but if you reverse the cable it might cause weird noise / choppy audio.

LOL.

I have the same problem the only way around is though airplay and only when i can lower the volume from my devices. It *****. Sometimes it goes without a prob it happens when it wants to!! Im about to return this atv3. But i dont want to cause there is no ther way for me to play hd videos stored on my pc on my tv. Fix this apple!!!!!

Having a similar issue with my ATV 3 since the latest update. When I AirPlay from my iPhone or iPad there is terrible distortion on the optical output to my audio system. I have found that if I go to Settings>Audio & Video>Audio Output and change the option from Auto to 16 bit (or vice versa) the distortion dissapears. When the ATV is turned off and on again the distortion returns and I need to follow the same steps to remove it.

Same setup (and cable directions....if this is a possible cause) worked perfectly before the update!

Your missing the point. The audio is to "hot" BEFORE it enters the Receiver or TV and overloads the front end preamp on those devices. The distortion cannot be corrected by changing the level after the fact. Doing so only raises or lowers the fixed amount of distorted sound.

Hi. I have been having the same problem with my brand new Apple TV. I was using the HDMI to send the signal to a Proscan LED TV and then running the audio signal from the TV's analog stereo outputs to the left and right analog aux inputs of my stereo system. It didn't matter whether you listen to the sound from the TV alone or out of the stereo system, the output of both were distorted. The signal level coming out of the HDMI cable is WAY to hot/strong and overloads anything it feeds.

I have found an exceptable workaround however. I am now using the optical output from the Apple TV to feed an optical input on my stereo system and using this to listen to the audio from the Apple TV. The picture portion still comes in on the HDMI input of the television and I simply turn the volume all the way down on the television. PROBLEM SOLVED!!!

Message was edited by: vetteman01

You could try plugging the Apple TV into into a different HDMI port on your TV.

I was getting a similar issue with my samsung tv, so I just tried another port. So far, so good! The sound distortion problem seems to have gone away.

Hi. I tried all 3 HDMI inputs. All exhibited the same distortion/overload. Using the optical output on the Apple TV has (so far) been fine.

Hi, I think I have a similair problem with Airfoil.

I have an apple tv 3 with iOS 5 (I didn't apply the update to iOS 6) and using Airfoil to stream audio from my windows laptop to the apple tv. Programs that provide the audio are winamp, spotify and IE. Airfoil uses Airplay and the Bonjour service to stream audio to Apple devices.

The apple tv 3 is connected to my receiver via the optical out. But I can clearly hear that the sound coming from my speakers is slightly distorted and every minute or so I hear a little 'crack' or 'click' like the audio stream is corrupted or something, similair to a corrupted mp3 file. The distortion is worse when higher frequenties sounds are played like hi-hats or synthesizer effects often used in techno music.

I tried several thing like turning down the volume from within the Airfoil software and Winamp to no avail. The problem lies with the apple tv and the sound coming from the optical output is already distorted before it enters the DAC of my receiver. Is there a solution to this? As a lover of music the distortion and cracks and clicks are very annoying 😟

KingLondon wrote:

Unfortunately the latest apple tv remote does not come with volume control.

I can get rid of the distortion if I am streaming from my iPhone or iPad as I can turn the volume down on the iPad/iPhone , but if I want to use the radio and movie channels on the apple tv I can only turn down the volume of my av receiver which is too late as the hdmi audio has already left the apple tv.

Turning off the eq on the av slightly improves thing but the distortion is pretty bad.

You should be able to adjust the input sensitivity on your receiver this will do the trick

So it seems that many apple tv 3 users have this problem, I've read quite some threads on this issue now.

I am going to try a 'solution' I have found in this thread: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3814687?answerId=19939696022#19939696022

This guy Jens_O said the clipping and distortion went away after he disabled the sleep funtion of the apple tv. Other things I will try is to disable dolby digital and changing the audio stream from 16 bit to automatically and vice versa.

Since I cannot adjust the inpunt sensitivity on my receiver as Mikes1 suggested, I hope above solutions will help..