Apple Event: May 7th at 7 am PT
I just received my Apple TV, and hooked it up to my older Toshiba HD TV through a ViewHD HDMI Splitter that speaks HDCP and converts the HDMI signal to separate R, G, B channels. This same converter has worked successfully with Apple TV 3 and my Roku box.
However, with the new Apple TV hooked up I just get a blank screen and no audio at all.
Has anyone else attempted this setup?
There will never be any guarantee when using a converter, it won't be HDCP compliant, and even if it were to work functionality can cease at any time
Yes, I understand this, but the problem isn't HDCP, as that only impacts protected content. In this case, I don't even get a menu. After speaking with Apple we believe that the problem may be a difference between HDMI 1.4 (used by Apple TV) and HDMI 1.3 (used by the converter). I've contacted the company that makes the converter in hopes that they have a newer model that has been tested against the new Apple TV.
HDMI is the only supported method, as I said there will never be a guarantee with a converter and functionality can cease at any time
Again, I understand this. My question is meant to generate discussion with others who may be attempting to use the new Apple TV with a converter, so that we may all learn from one another's experiences and identify a compatible solution.
And, yes, HDMI is the only supported means of communicating with an Apple TV, and the many converters that are on the market for communicating with HD TVs that lack a HDMI port are, in fact, HDMI devices. HDMI is nothing more than an interface that supports a well-defined signaling protocol. Lots of devices support HDMI — televisions, of course, but also AV receivers, DVRs, computers, test equipment, and... converter boxes. Each of these devices must understand the signaling protocol of connected devices. You TV, for example, has to pull in the signals traveling via HDMI and turn those signals into images and sound — just as an AV receiver will turn the signal into 5:1 audio, or a piece of test equipment may analyze the protocol. Similarly, a converter will receive the HDMI signal and turn it into images and sound.
It it important to note that there are older televisions that provide HDMI ports that don't work with various other HDMI devices, whether that's a Apple TV, a Blu-Ray player, or an AV receiver.
It's all about devices understanding the signaling — especially handshake signaling that might say:
"Hi! I'm a 4th generation Apple TV and I support this, that, an this other thing! Who are you?"
"Hi! I'm a brand new spiffy TV, and I support all of that too!"
"Yay!"
"Yay!"
"Let's play!"
In my case, n perhaps others, the exchange is going something like this:
"Hi! I'm a 4th generation Apple TV and I support this, that, an this other thing! Who are you?"
"Hi! I'm a converter box, and I support this and that... but I've never heard of the other thing."
"Oh... I but the other thing is really important to me..."
"Aw, that's okay... Why don't you go ahead and start giving me all of your picture and sound signals, okay?
"..."
"Hello?"
"..."
"Hello?"
"..."
<tap> <tap> <tap> "Is this thing on?"
"..."
I wasn't debating that, but the Apple TV only officially supports HDMI. It is not tested to work with anything else, and there will never be a guarantee. Even if it were to work for another user, that doesn't necessarily mean it will work on your system. When it does work, functionality can cease at any time because it is not a supported method. There are older TV's that lack the proper port, but if it has HDMI it will work unless there is an issue with that specific TV.
John, I have the same converter, and I am having the exact same problem. I would guess that it is the HDMI 1.4 vs 1.3 issue that you stated. I'd be interested in what you find out from the converter company about a new model that supports the latest AppleTV.
I am using a very old HDFury HDMI-to-RGB converter successfully. However, I had to set the ATV4 output to 720P, as the my old RPTV cannot accept it if in 1080P setting. The default setting on the ATV4 seems to be 1080P
Yes, I tried setting ATV4 to 720P also, but it didn't seem to work on the ViewHD converter.
I have a similar model from a different vendor. My converter worked fine on a v2 and a v3, but would not work on a v4 until I used the usb power cable attached to a spare iphone charger. Guess the v4 does not provide sufficient voltage to power the converter.
Here's my "good news / bad news" response...
Good News!
The company that sold me the ViewHD unit I purchased through Amazon has been extremely helpful in trying to determine why the new Apple TV would not work, where the same unit works fine with a 3rd generation Apple TV and virtually every other HDMI device. Upon receiving my report they immediately went out and bought a new Apple TV to see if the problem could be duplicated. As it turned out, they could not duplicate the problem, as the Apple TV work with their HDMI-to-RGB converter straight out of the box. This is very good news, in the sense that the device will work with the Apple TV for some set of users.
So what's different? Probably the TV on the other side of the converter, which brings us to...
Bad News...
Working through 5 days of test we were unable to get the Apple TV working through the converter to my TV. It really wasn't possible to do thorough testing to pinpoint the problem, as I lack the equipment in my home that you'd usually use for such troubleshooting (scopes, protocol analyzers, etc). I was able to do enough "process of elimination" testing to arrive at a general idea of where the problem may lie — with the video synch sent by the Apple TV through HDMI, and on to the connected TV. Without this handshake you're never going to get a video signal sent to the TV; the endpoints just aren't talking. Is Apple sending the correct video sync? I'm not sure. Is the converter interpreting sync from the Apple TV and forwarding it on to the TV? I'm not sure. Is the response coming back from the TV, through the converter, and on to the Apple TV the point of failure? Again, I'm not sure.
Perhaps a little more Good News
If this is where the problem lies, it's likely something that future converters will be able to handle, or maybe something Apple is able to address if feedback is received from their customers (and, you should definitely report such things to Apple!).
The company that sold me the converter is graciously allowing me to return the unit and they plan to do additional testing with Apple TV.
In the meantime, though it was a somewhat expensive solution, today I bought a new TV that supports HDMI and the Apple TV is quite happy (as will be my cleaning lady, as I plan on giving her family my old Toshiba flat screen.
I'm glad others are contributing to this thread, as this is how progress is made and problems can be solved for our community of users. Frequently, it is tempting to point out obstacles and plant of flag of policy and dread — though solutions are out there, whether you are dealing with a new piece of hardware or a quirk in a piece of software.
Remember to think different. :-)
John, Thank you for bringing happiness to a family by giving them your Older Toshiba TV. They will appreciate it as much as we appreciate our new gadgets.
I believe I have figured out what the issue is here. In my setup, I have the ViewHD converter outputting to my 720p projector, and I have my receiver's cdmi outputting to the ViewHD. My AppleTV is connected to a HDMI input of my receiver. My receiver is able to output HDMI to dual monitors, so I hooked up a 1080p TV to the second monitor output of the receiver. At that point, I was able to see the AppleTV on my 1080p TV. I changed the AppleTV output resolution to 720p 60Hz, and bingo, the 720p projector (through the ViewHD converter) displayed the AppleTV output. So the ViewHD converter does work with the AppleTV 4.
The remaining issue is that if the AppleTV goes to sleep (or you reset it by unplugging it), once it comes out of sleep, it goes back to 1080p even though the AppleTV output resolution was set to 720p 60Hz previously. My guess is that the ViewHD converter handshake tells AppleTV that it can handle 1080p, so AppleTV either ignores the 720p setting or gets confused. If I use voice-over on AppleTV and navigate to the AppleTV output resolution, it says that the currently output resolution is 1080p coming out of sleep, so I manually set it back to 720p, and the AppleTV display appears on the projector.
So I think there are only 3 solutions. Force the AppleTV to never sleep, so that the 720p resolution sticks. Or use voice-over to reset the 720p resolution. Or find a converter that handshakes with AppleTV properly so that the 720p setting sticks properly (I imagine that the FuryHD IV may work in this way, but it's expensive). I guess there's a fourth solution if Apple fixes AppleTV 4 to output 720p always if that setting is enabled, although I wouldn't place any bets on them doing this. For me, I'll probably just use my existing AppleTV 3, as it works fine for the time being. When I decide that the switch to the AppleTV 4 is worth it (with more apps and stations, etc), I'll either do option 1 above (disable sleep) or break down and upgrade my projector to something more current that doesn't require the ViewHD converter box. I've had my projector for 14 years, but it still works very good, so I'm trying to extend it's life.
Anyway, hopefully this helps others that are having this same issue.
this is due to the hand shake feature of new HDMI devices. the converter is not recognized by the Apple TV. even some blue ray DVD players will not work out of the box and handshake to the converter and will require you first manually set up the players output to something the converter likes usually 720p. I had to connect a older SVHS cable to one to see the setup screen and set it to 720p, this had no effect on the SVHS output as that will always work. a work around would be to use a powered HDMI 1 to 2 splitter that has a default to lowest HDMI output feature. These powered splitters are about $30. Connect a cheap 720p TV to one side of the splitter output and turn on the TV and than turn on the Apple TV and the TV should handshake with the Apple TV now and than connect the HDMI to RGB converter to the other splitter output and it should see the same signal. The only problem would be if the cheap handshake TV output is too high compared to what he HDMI to RGB likes best.
Apple TV 4 - no picture with HDMI to RGB converter
