HT-ZF9 - play music whilst watching TV

[Elmacca1]

Hi all

Proud owner of a new HT-ZF9, which looks and sounds great next to my Sony Bravia XD-8305 and PS4.

One small but important issue; I can't find a way to play music via Chromecast whilst watching TV.  I have a Sky Q box connected to the TV directly and was hoping to be able to watch this whilst having music playing on the soundbar.

Anyone know how I do this? CUrrently when I play music via Chromecast on the soundbar, it changes the input on the TV away from Sky Q (HDMI 1 on the TV) to the soundbar (HDMI 3). If I disable HDMI control in the settings of the ZF9, will this solve the problem?

Cheers

[Anonymous]

Hi there,

Hopefully a community member will be able to help.

Best wishes,
M

[Vanilla_]

Hi Elmacca1,

That's interesting. But just to make sure we're on the same page, Are you looking to watch Sky on the TV using the TV speakers, and listen to music using the built-in chromecast on the soundbar at the same time?

 Let us know if switching off the HDMI control settings will resolve this.

Thanks,

Vanilla_

[Elmacca1]

Hi there

Actually its just about listening to music whilst watching TV. Not bothered about sound coming out of the TV when the happens .

If I turn off HDMI control then this works but it's a bit of a pain. 

Thanks for responding!

Cheers 

[Win_88]

Hi,

So what happens if you start casting music (which then changes the input to HDMI 3 as you mentioned) and then leave the music playing and manually switch the input back to the Sky box?

Win_88

[Elmacca1]

Hi there

If I cast music to the Zf9 then select the input for Sky on the Bravia, both sound and video switch to Sky.

I can cast music the soundbox with the TV off (great, means I can use as a proper sound system for music, podcasts etc) but is no good if I want to have the TV on in the background whilst listening to music. 

Am thinking the only way is to switch off HDMI control on the ZF9 everytime I want to do this. A pain!

Cheers

[Win_88]

Hi Elmacca1

I don't think this is a fault with your set up. Since the TV starts putting through signal to the sound bar (while control for HDMI is enabled), it will be able to switch the input of the sound bar to play whatever is running on the TV. So the only workaround would be to disable Control for HDMI in this case as you have found.

Win_88

[Elmacca1]

Thanks, I thought as much .

Appreciate the feedback. For Sony, I think this should be built into future updates to this soundbar. Watching the screen / TV whilst playing music isn't exactly a complex request. A very basic 'feature' missing .