4th Gen Apple TV Audio stops working

I've had the issue come up a couple times since last I posted, once or twice on two of my AppleTVs. It's pretty common for our AppleTVs to get left on and for them to turn themselves off after a while. Another thing that seems to have helped is to change the resolution from auto to the actual resolution of the TV, 1080p in my case.

It is just the audio from the Apple TV to the TV. When it happened this evening the Apple TV was set to 16 bit and best available on the Surround Sound setting. Until today it wasn't been set to 16 bit and still done it. Toggling any of the audio settings makes no difference. I hate to do it but completely resetting the unit seems like the next step. I don't want to do it because I have no reason to believe it would solve the problem.

Switching or connecting another device to the same input proves it's not the TV. The same thing happens on two different units on two different TVs.

Definitely not, switching to another input and you'll hear audio without any problems.

Winston Churchill wrote:

gadgetvirtuoso wrote:

Switching or connecting another device to the same input proves it's not the TV.

It doesn't.

Switching to another input uses a different port, connecting another device, temporarily disconnects the input.

It may well be the Apple TV in the end, but your trouble shooting procedure has holes in it and doesn't prove anything because of this.

Rather making condescending remarks you could make a suggestion to resolve the issue. Everything suggested so far has been checked, including power cycling the TV. It's less likely that it's the TV since both units have suffered the same problem with two different model TVs.

Winston Churchill wrote:

There's nothing condescending about pointing out your trouble shooting is flawed, I thought you wanted to solve the issue, you aren't going to do that without the truth. However if you have restarted the TV, then whilst you could have said so initially, that would now likely eliminate the TV.

It's less likely that it's the TV since both units have suffered the same problem with two different model TVs.

I can understand your conclusion, however I'm quite regular in the Apple TV community and haven't seen this particular issue mentioned before, so hopefully you can understand my conclusion, in that it's likely to be something in your environment rather than the Apple TV.

Agreed, it is a strange behavior and since many people aren't reporting the issue it is more likely something in my environment. That said it occurs on two different makes and models of TV with both a 32GB and 64GB models. I can't reproduce the issue on demand. I spoke with AppleCare last night and finally did a full reset of the 32GB unit as a test. It will probably take a day or two before the issue recurs, if it happens at all.

Diana.McCall wrote:

Just guessing here, but have you paired any bluetooth headphones or speakers with either ATV? I wonder if one of them is suddenly connecting and stealing the sound. When it happens, you could check whether the audio output is still "AppleTV". I'm trying to find a reason for the intermittent occurrence. Does restarting ATV fix it, or does it stay failed?

Neither ATV have been paired with a bluetooth speaker or anything, other than the included remote. Restarting the ATV fixes the problem until it occurs the next time. To me it acts like a failed audio driver if it were a computer.