Please Help

[baconsarney]

My Denon amp stopped putting out good sound... a few months ago now... So, I have (had) a 5 unit surround sound speaker system, Denon Amp, and 55 inch LG TV. The surround sound was awesome, the picture brilliant, and I bought this kit around 2012-13... so it's knocking on for 10 years old... I have sky, and courtesy of a firestick (into the back of the Denon Amp) I had Amazon, Netflix, and Disney.... The TV isn't smart so I can't (as far as I can see) plug the USB firestick in to it.... Where do I go from here? What are the options? Speakers are amazing, But worked through the amp.. Picture quality on the old LG is good... I'm a numpty with this stuff....

Can I get the Amp fixed? Is there a cheaper option than repairs? If I could get the amp repaired I now have no idea how to wire it all back together again

All help will be very much appreciated....

[nebpor]

The fire stick connects to an HDMI port on the TV. not a USB port - you should be able to plug it straight in!

[baconsarney]

nebpor said:

The fire stick connects to an HDMI port on the TV. not a USB port - you should be able to plug it straight in!

OMG.... All back! For some reason I was convinced the stick was a USB... I would buy you many beers if I could....

So... What to do to get the surround sound back?

[nebpor]

That I can’t help with sorry but at least you can watch your subscriptions!

Happy to help - no beers necessary

[Douglas Quaid]

Either get the denon fixed or buy another. There are plenty of people around that fix them the only thing is if it’s a decade old it might cost more to fix it than it would just to buy another used one of similar spec. If you get an old one that isn’t 4k compatible you can just run an optical cable from the tv into the av receiver and still get surround sound.

[baconsarney]

Douglas Quaid said:

Either get the denon fixed or buy another. There are plenty of people around that fix them the only thing is if it’s a decade old it might cost more to fix it than it would just to buy another used one of similar spec.

Totally get that..

Douglas Quaid said:

There are plenty of people around If you get an old one that isn’t 4k compatible you can just run an optical cable from the tv into the av receiver and still get surround sound.

totally don’t get that.. sorry Douglas I’m a numpty with this stuff… I can rebuild a 60’s Ford 1600 xflow though

[QJumper]

First thing I'd be doing is checking all the cables between the amp, tv and speakers before assuming the amp was faulty. Maybe try a different HDMI port on the amp too, as they can fail.

[Lucid_AV]

What he's saying about Optical is that's a way to get sound from the TV - and the Fire TV stick that's plugged in to it - in to an AV amplifier.

Optical (the fibre optic light-carrying cable) and digital coaxial (an electrical signal via RCA phono connection) were what was commonly used when DVD was the prime source for home entertainment.

Sky HD boxes have digital audio out via optical or coaxial depending on the model of box, so you might have already been using Optical for that. It would be the same then for TV audio out.

I use something similar in one of my rigs. The 4K Fire TV stick plugs in to a HDMI on a 4K TV, but the sound system is something like your old Denon + speaker combo. It's not 4K compatible, but that doesn't matter because all it needs to deal with is just the sound signal from the TV.

In my case the Yamaha AV receiver has HDMI ARC, and I use that so that I get control via HDMI from the Fire TV remote over both the TV and the amp. (Power On/Off, Source input, Volume).

I could use Optical from the TV instead. The sound quality would be no different than HDMI ARC into a 5.1 surround system. I wouldn't have HDMI control though. Depending on the age of your LG it might have HDMI Control even if it doesn't do 4K or sound via HDMI ARC.