Discussions

[milkfromhome]

I currently have the Roku TV Wireless Speakers paired with my Roku TV and I'm considering adding the Roku Wireless Subwoofer and possibly the Roku Smart Soundbar  for a surround sound experience, but I'm hoping to avoid using the built-in Roku OS in the soundbar. The documentation and forum posts about my specific use case seem to be lacking, so here are a few questions:

1) Can I connect the Roku Soundbar wirelessly directly to my Roku TV the same way the Roku Wireless Speakers connect? If not...

2) Since I'd prefer not to waste an HDMI port solely for audio, can I use the optical port on my Roku TV instead? Am I missing out on any of the Roku TV integration features of an HDMI-ARC connection when I do this?

3) For actual surround sound from my Roku TV, do the Roku Speakers (which would now be rear channels) and Roku Subwoofer pair directly with the TV or do they have to be paired with the Roku Soundbar w/ the soundbar's Roku OS? If they can only be paired with the Soundbar, does that require me to use the Soundbar OS/UI instead of the built-in RokuTV OS (which I would prefer)

4) I've heard rumors that an OS-less Roku Soundbar that pairs with Roku TVs like the Roku Wireless Speakers might be in the works. Is this true? And if so, would surround sound be supported with rear Wireless Speakers? If not...

5) Are there any plans to allow a second pair of Roku Wireless Speakers to act as both rear and front channels that are paired directly with my Roku TV?

6) If I'm forced to use the Roku Soundbar OS for surround sound, would I be bottlenecked by any features that my RokuTV has that the Soundbar doesn't (such as DolbyVision HDR)?

Basically, if I need to bypass my RokuTV OS to get surround sound, this will probably be a no-go for me, so I'm hoping there is a plan to allow RokuTV owners to have surround sound natively with Roku sound products if there isn't one already. If I have to use HDMI-ARC to achieve this (although optical is preferred), that might be an acceptable trade-off.