Will SONY provide firmware update to support eARC?

[nucleoXXI]

Hello,

I've been trying to find further information, but so far no luck. Perhaps someone here knows?

Do you know or is it feasible to think that SONY will provide a firmware update to i.e. A1 OLED sets to support eARC?

What I've been told is that the competition, SAMSUNG will support it later for  i.e. KS8000.

Reason why I would like to know is that I would like to update my home theather setup with a new A/V receiver. The model that I'm interested in (2016 line-up) will not support eARC and will not be updated via firmware (but better news is that the price will drop). The new model (2017) which is set to be released any week now will however support eARC onboard, but for much higher cost.

[nucleoXXI]

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@Kuschelmonschter wrote:

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But as everything looks right now for lossless HD Audio from i.e. Netflix, Sony Android TVs must be updated to support eARC?

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I am just speculating here, not knowing the very details of ARC or eARC specs, but I think that eARC is the common denominator for lossless audio.

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But for lossy HD Audio (Netflix Dolby Atmos) everything is up to date for running from Sonys Android sets (granted you have an AV receiver which has Dolby Atmos support)?

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From what I have read, yes. I am not sure whether every AVR which supports Atmos also accepts it over ARC. But I suppose most do...

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Thanks for your input, appreciate your effort to shed some light into this subject. Hopefully news regarding this will be released from Sony.

[dutchice]

Been reading this interesting topic for quite long already. Thought I give the Helicopter demo a try this evenig. It surprised me to see that the A1 does passthrough ATMOS/DD+ (HDMI2->TV->HDMI3->ATMOS_AVR) eventhough itself (Video app) cannot read and pipe it out through ARC. Don't think this was there prior to the v6.285 FW update. I see this as positive. At least it proves that the current HDMI/ARC circuitery is "eARC -Ready". In the sense that we soon could see an update to enable the lossy digital audio signals (ATMOS and maybe DTS:X) on apps like Netflix, Prime Video pipelined over ARC.

[Kuschelmonschter]

You are drawing a wrong conclusion I think. The limiting factor about ARC is mostly the S/PDIF speed IMHO. The fastest transmitter is somewhere around 6mbps (you can actually calculate it... 2 uncompressed PCM channels at 32-bit with 196KHz I think). While you can stream compressed lossy multi-channel audio over that, which includes DD+ based Atmos, you can't do uncompressed/lossless audio like PCM with more than two channels or Dolby True HD, True HD Atoms or DTS-HD, as those are typically >20mbps. At least that's how I see it.

[dutchice]

Of course. You are totally right. As a matter of fact if you read carefully, you can see that I am talking about the lossy digital audio formats. Supporting Dobly Atmos + Dolby Vision (for native apps) has been on Sony's roadmap for 2018 if I'm correct.

For lossless streams over ARC, there is the need for a different proccessing chip on the HDMI jacks. Something which just won't be there untill next CES.

[D-Law81]

Hi i have just got a 43xg8396 TV and i am asking if it will run hdmi 2.1 and dose it also run earc, cos i also got the sony xf9000 sound bar.can anyone help with the info i need.

[rooobb]

You should have asked before buying it if it was important to you. Neither HDMI 2.1 nor eARC is supported by your tv and will never do. There is no issue in using your soundbar though, you'll just won't get lossless audio track pass-through such as DTS-MA or Dolby HD

[Kuschelmonschter]

Keep in mind that even for newer high end models with eARC, you won't get HD audio via apps as the MediaTek application SoC does not support it. You will only get HD audio over HDMI inputs to an eARC capable receiver via the X1 Ultimate image processor (which supplies the HDMI interfaces).

[D-Law81]

So sony should not say tv runs atmos. Thanks for your answer.

[Kuschelmonschter]

Atmos doesn't necessarily require eARC. DD+ based Atmos as used by streaming services works via ARC. Only TrueHD based Atmos (BD) requires eARC due to the high bandwidth.

[D-Law81]

So why can't sony do a firmware update to ARC to eARC as some company's are
doing this to some of there TVs as I have found on the Internet. But if not
then OK. Picture is great and sound bar is good to. Just may have to find
other way to run atmos and dts x. 😊 Thank