No signal from Apple TV 4k unless I unplug power

If I don't use the Apple TV 4k for a while, when I turn my TV on the TV says there is no signal from the Apple TV. I have to unplug the Apple TV from power and plug it back in, and then everything works fine (including HDR 4k).


I thought it was related to the ATV going to sleep, so I set it to Never sleep, but no change in behavior. The light on the front of the Apple TV flickers when I press buttons on the remote, even though there's no picture. I have tried multiple HDMI cables and HDMI inputs on the TV. The TV is a Samsung that supports HDR and 4k. Did I get a bad ATV?

Posted on Oct 8, 2017 8:31 AM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Oct 16, 2017 6:22 AM

For those of you needing to pull the plug and then plug it back in to have your TV see a signal, note that you can hold both the Menu button and the Home (TV) button on your atv4k Remote for about 6 seconds and it will cause your atv4k to cycle power off and bak on. This will only save you a trip to your physical plug to get the signal.


On the other hand, even though I am convinced that in future Apple will find a software fix for this issue, I actually exchanged my apt4k at the nearest Apple Store because I was within the return period. When I connected the new atv4k to my TV i have seen no sign of the problem.


One has to realize that the Customer has no way to actually totally Restore an atv4k. In other words, you cannot actually reload the Operating System or Clear the atv4k completely and start from scratch. You can only Reset the atv4k which is not the same. Consequently if this issue is truly a software issue where some corruption or other flaw occurred in manufacturing you can't really do anything to resolve or mitigate this. On the other hand if this is a Hardware issue, which it probably is not, you can't do anything about that either. I have no idea if the Apple Store or an Authorized Apple Service Provider has the capability currently to totally Restore the atv4k in the field as yet.


My feeling is that if your connected atv4k is showing a great picture when the signal is viewable on your TV, your HDR appears to be working correctly, and your sound is correct then the wakeup signal issue is probably not your cable or your Settings on either Device (i.e., the atv4k or your tv).

70 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Oct 16, 2017 6:22 AM in response to rezpso

For those of you needing to pull the plug and then plug it back in to have your TV see a signal, note that you can hold both the Menu button and the Home (TV) button on your atv4k Remote for about 6 seconds and it will cause your atv4k to cycle power off and bak on. This will only save you a trip to your physical plug to get the signal.


On the other hand, even though I am convinced that in future Apple will find a software fix for this issue, I actually exchanged my apt4k at the nearest Apple Store because I was within the return period. When I connected the new atv4k to my TV i have seen no sign of the problem.


One has to realize that the Customer has no way to actually totally Restore an atv4k. In other words, you cannot actually reload the Operating System or Clear the atv4k completely and start from scratch. You can only Reset the atv4k which is not the same. Consequently if this issue is truly a software issue where some corruption or other flaw occurred in manufacturing you can't really do anything to resolve or mitigate this. On the other hand if this is a Hardware issue, which it probably is not, you can't do anything about that either. I have no idea if the Apple Store or an Authorized Apple Service Provider has the capability currently to totally Restore the atv4k in the field as yet.


My feeling is that if your connected atv4k is showing a great picture when the signal is viewable on your TV, your HDR appears to be working correctly, and your sound is correct then the wakeup signal issue is probably not your cable or your Settings on either Device (i.e., the atv4k or your tv).

Dec 2, 2017 11:55 AM in response to Cappachino

My AppleTV was approaching the 30 day mark and my wake issue was getting worse (instead of every other day, to once a day, it was becoming multiple times a day; and it no longer was able to reliably output Chroma 4.2.2 to my TV that supports it).


Due to the issue getting worse I decided I was no longer waiting for 11.2.


I've now exchanged my AppleTV 4K for a new one, and while it's only been a few days I have not had any wake issues. Where as my last AppleTV 4K with issues started on day 1.


Both of them running the same TV OS 11.1

Jul 1, 2018 12:41 AM in response to msprygada

Hi,

I experienced the exact same problem with my Apple TV 4K that I bought two days ago. I also tried to update the Apple TV to ios 12 beta, but nothing changed. However, simce I updated the firmware on my Samsung tv the problem seems to have disappeared and the Apple TV now finds the Hdmi signal. Have you tried to update the firmware on your tv?

Jul 1, 2018 12:29 AM in response to gfunkdave

Hi,

I experienced the exact same problem with my Apple TV 4K that I bought two days ago. I also tried to update the Apple TV to ios 12 beta, but nothing changed. However, simce I updated the firmware on my Samsung tv the problem seems to have disappeared and the Apple TV now finds the Hdmi signal. Have you tried to update the firmware on your tv?

Oct 20, 2017 6:42 AM in response to WiseJD

Had the exact same issue. Thanks for the tip of holding the menu and home button!


I resolved this by changing the port hdmi2 to hdmi1 on my tv, restarting the Apple TV, and going into settings -video settings reset .



Had to reenable Dolby Vision after and click on the “test my cable” as well. Everything worked for now... report more tomorrow... cheers

Nov 9, 2017 5:59 PM in response to gfunkdave

I also have this issue on an AppleTV 4K that just arrived to me direct from Apple last week.


Had to power the power to get it to register again, now cutting that step thanks to WiseJD's info on: hold both the Menu button and the Home (TV) button to restart the AppleTV.


I tried resetting video settings as mentioned in a follow-up, not sure if that will help yet.

If not I'm probably going to try to exchange mine.

Feb 22, 2018 7:42 PM in response to Keith Moreau

I have the Belkin cable and it did not help. Enabling the "Enhance 4K HDMI signal Format" setting and signing up for Beta updates has helped the need to unplug the device, however I still run into the "no video" problem while playing videos in apps after waking from sleep. This requires a reboot, but at least you don't have to unplug it. I agree with you on the interface...and it's a silly thing, but we like the screensaver that scrolls through my photo stream. We paid a pretty hefty premium to not deal with issues like this.

Dec 31, 2017 5:37 AM in response to Griswald34

Griswald34 wrote:


I've been having a similar issue since day 1 of having my 4K Apple TV and it's beyond annoying. What I see is the Apple 4K TV not turn on at all sometimes when pressing any buttons on the remote, the power light on the Apple TV does not turn on ... is getting an exchange the only solution?

It certainly sounds like a hardware problem. It could be the remote or the ATV. An exchange would be the simplest solution.

Feb 5, 2018 5:36 AM in response to jolejniczak

Post update...update. My ATV no longer flashes as it did before and I have not had to yank the power since updating to TVOS 11.3 (not sure if this is beta software or not as I signed up for those as well). One small issue remains...video playback doesn't work for any app after a sleep/wake cycle. Where the ATV would flash and the power would have to be pulled before now only requires a reboot via the remote. This is still very annoying, but one step closer to being fixed. At least I don't have to get off of the couch to fix it.

Mar 6, 2018 7:57 PM in response to Vigilante99

I have a Sony 940e TV. I am kind of a Home Theater enthusiast, expert, etc. I posted previously. The expensive high speed cable that Apple sells and recommend to resolve the problem (after I called support) didn't resolve the problem, though I'm not necessarily experiencing the intermittent HDMI problem. It seems that in addition to a HDMI problem there is a HDCP problem when trying to play most copyrighted content. Restarting the Apple TV seems to resolve it. I did develop a workaround, which was to put an inexpensive HDMI 4K high speed switch in between the Apple TV 4K and my Sony 4K TV. At the end of my viewing session, my Harmony Elite remote powers everything down (except the AppleTV which doesn't power down) including the HDMI switch. I believe when I restart the system, and the HDMI switch and the TV power up, this resets the buggy Apple TV HDMI port / state and things work well. This saves me a little time so I don't have to back out of what I was viewing and restart the AppleTV to get it to play content such as Netflix. Its a cludge but it makes this combo work better. It's not without problems and occasionally I still have to restart the AppleTV as it seems to get kind of stuck when going back to it's home screen with digital noise blanking out the top half of the image. However this is somewhat rare and turning the HDMI switch off and on seems to resolve this. I'm hoping that Apple can get it together and get this to work, unless it is just an inherent hardware problem with the AppleTV components, which I'm beginning to think it might be or Apple would have resolved it in firmware already. I'm pretty sure that Apple has reproduced this problem as it seems to be a widespread problem. I'd like to hear somebody in this thread say that they don't have the problem we are having, that would are refreshing.

This thread has been closed by the system or the community team. You may vote for any posts you find helpful, or search the Community for additional answers.

No signal from Apple TV 4k unless I unplug power

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.