Optical-out audio problem... please help!

[Rosomack]

Hi,

I just bought a samsung 40b6000 led tv and the picture is just stunning if calibrated properly. The problem is they cut corners to lower the price tag and the built-in speakers are utter trash. They are worse than I thought they would. An easy way to omit that would be to buy a cheap 2.1 speaker set, plug it in and voila!

The problem is, Samsung decided not to make it easy for you to do that and included just one optical-out output. Why is that, I have no idea, but it's totally and utterly stupid and I HATE HATE HATE it ! I wouldn't want to return the tv though, the picture is awesome. I don't want to buy expensive amplifiers, home cinema systems or THX-certified speakers... I just want my tv not to sound as if the speakers were made of cardboard... Does anyone have any ideas?

I thought of plugging speakers into the sattelite decoder, which would be perfectly fine for everyday tv, but the tv can play lots of content straight from a pendrive or external drive, a feature which I will probably use extensively. I also thought of sending audio through a PC with a decent audio card, but that eats up both space and energy so it's also out of the question...

Please help, anyone?

[crim3]

Only optical output for sound! wow, big companies are really driving us like a herd just to where they want us to go.

What about cutting the loudspeakers wires and rewire them to others of matching impedance? TVs have lots of holes for ventilation so you can easily take the wires out of the TV and put the quality loudspeaker behind it.

[UndeadD3vi1]

crim3, not only would that void his warrenty but it would sound like utter puke as well. (The TV will not provide enough power to the speakers, it's little amp circut is designed to match the wattage of the speakers its provided with)

Other than running the audio through your PC then back out I can only suggest getting a Optical to RCA Box. I wouldn't imagine these cost much?

Are you positive their isn't a Headphone Output? As thats what I used with this Samsung 22" screen (On mine its very well hidden on the Right side) - Worked fine with my 2.1 system.

[crim3]

crim3, not only would that void his warrenty but it would sound like utter puke as well. (The TV will not provide enough power to the speakers, it's little amp circut is designed to match the wattage of the speakers its provided with)

hmm.... rethinking about it, yes, you are completely right, I said nothing. Furthermore, keeping the warranty is specially important in this case, being a new thechnology display.

[Rosomack]

Other than running the audio through your PC then back out I can only suggest getting a Optical to RCA Box. I wouldn't imagine these cost much?

No headphone output, just the optical one. As for what you suggested, it isn't that easy, unfortunately. The optical signal is digital, while RCA is analog - it would require an expensive DAC (digital/analog converter). I pretty much gave up. I think I'll just live with the built-in speakers until I save enough to buy a decent home cinema system, as I don't have any more ideas.

[UndeadD3vi1]

A box would not be that expensive, the components required to do it are not expensive. You can grab a decent (Not Soft-DSP) PCI Sound Card with Optical IN for around $30. So I don't see why you thought it would be!

Anyways, as for Set-top-boxs, here is one such product that should be suitable. (I say should because its possible it may refuse to process the audio without a video signal)

http://www.av-cables.net/switch_boxes/s ... 28731.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ($66)

I also found this but its "No Longer Available" from this site and I can not find it anywhere else. However it would be 100% suitable for your needs.
http://www.topmicrousa.com/dav-2100.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ($60)

$60 is only just a little more than a iz3D License, which people here say is not expensive!

[Rosomack]

Hey, that's great! I'll look for something like this over here at my country. Thanks for the help, mate.