Forum Discussion

butron's avatar
butron
Reel Rookie
4 months ago
Solved

Using Roku Streambar SE with my TV and another audio source

I want to connect the streambar to my TV using the HDMI-ARC ports in my TV and the bar. At the same time I want to connect other purely audio devices (such as a CD player) to the Roku soundbar using the optical port. In other words, I would like to "sometimes" use the streambar as a simple speaker for my audio player, not as a video source. Can I do that? Can I switch the audio source for the Roku soundbar between HDMI and optical inputs on demand? Using the remote?

Audio Setup
  • RokuHaz-M's avatar
    RokuHaz-M
    3 months ago

    Thanks for bringing this to us! butron 

    I'm glad to inform you that it is possible to use your Roku Streambar as a soundbar by connecting it to your TV via HDMI ARC and connecting the CD player to the Roku Streambar using Optical. If the TV is off and not producing any sound, the streambar will receive audio from the optical port, which is connected to the CD player in this case. However, if the TV is on, the HDMI ARC will take precedence and output the audio instead. Just a heads up, you can't have both of them at the same time—that's the main thing to keep in mind. To learn more about your Roku Streambar, here's a link that might help you. 

    I hope this answers your questions; if you need further help, just give me a shout!

    Cheers!

    Roku Community Team

  • RokuHaz-M's avatar
    RokuHaz-M
    3 months ago

    Thanks for the update! butron 

    You are absolutely right! Thank you for your understanding. Happy streaming!

    Cheers!

    Roku Community Team

3 Replies

  • RokuHaz-M's avatar
    RokuHaz-M
    Community Moderator
    3 months ago

    Thanks for bringing this to us! butron 

    I'm glad to inform you that it is possible to use your Roku Streambar as a soundbar by connecting it to your TV via HDMI ARC and connecting the CD player to the Roku Streambar using Optical. If the TV is off and not producing any sound, the streambar will receive audio from the optical port, which is connected to the CD player in this case. However, if the TV is on, the HDMI ARC will take precedence and output the audio instead. Just a heads up, you can't have both of them at the same time—that's the main thing to keep in mind. To learn more about your Roku Streambar, here's a link that might help you. 

    I hope this answers your questions; if you need further help, just give me a shout!

    Cheers!

    Roku Community Team

    • butron's avatar
      butron
      Reel Rookie
      3 months ago

      Thank you! Your reply is very informative and may explain what is happening with my current setup. Instead of a CD player, I connected my cable settop box to a USB-C input in my Samsung TV monitor, then I connected the Roku streambar to the monitor's HDMI-ARC input. For reasons that I do not understand, I can get the video from the settop box display in the TV monitor by selecting it USB-C as the video source,  but no sound (this is with Roku on or off). To get around this problem, I decided to connect the optical audio output from the settop box directly to the Roku streambar hoping to recover the audio through the streambar. What happens now is that for that to work, I have to disable in the settings of the monitor the ARC aspect of the HDMI input (something that has some other inconvenient effects). It appears, as you say, that when ARC is enabled, and both the TV and Roku are on, audio can only come through the HDMI-ARC connection in the Roku streambar, and that there is no way I can override this and have the Roku streambar take its audio input from the optical connection. Is that correct?

      • RokuHaz-M's avatar
        RokuHaz-M
        Community Moderator
        3 months ago

        Thanks for the update! butron 

        You are absolutely right! Thank you for your understanding. Happy streaming!

        Cheers!

        Roku Community Team