Whether upgrading your home theater or building one from scratch, the Insignia F30 4K TV has everything on the stat sheet. It presents all of your favorite content in breathtaking 4K resolution, and HDR technology provides a wide range of color details and sharper contrast, making movies more immersive and things like sports more impactful. Versatile connectivity ports make it easy to connect home theater peripherals. This TV also offers smart features like Alexa voice control, DTS Studio Sound, and Apple AirPlay. The Insignia 70-inch F30 4K TV is also a Fire TV, which gets you instant access to over 500,000 streaming movies and TV episodes, and access to thousands of channels and apps, including Netflix, Apple TV+, Disney+, Hulu, Prime Video, and more. TOSLINK connections were initially designed to run to a maximum of 48 kHz. However, many newer devices increased the supported resolution to 24/96. A DAC performs this process, so a poorly designed device may create audible differences when using optical or coaxial inputs. In contrast, a high-quality device shouldn’t sound any different. Some TVs will pass through Dolby Digital 5.1 audio and not DTS – or vice versa. Alternatively, others may downmix all external audio to stereo.

A common issue for some people is they can’t get 5.1 surround sound from their TV’s optical output to their sound system or soundbar. Some optical ports have a protective cap over the hole, which you must remove before you plug in the cable. You can see an example of this below: Optical output with a protective plastic cap Also, HDMI has the advantage of HDMI ARC and eARCconnections, where you can send audio from a TV to a soundbar or AV receiver. DVD or CD Players - An optical cable can be utilized to exchange sound from one segment to another, for example a DVD player to a receiver. Since optical cables are perfect at recreating a signal and barely any transfer is lost in the exchange, they make exceptional solutions for generating great sound with CD players. Optical audio cables are used extensively for digital audio applications, providing clean audio signals without interference. These types of digital audio cables are often used with entertainment systems and devices such as:Although the cables are fiber optic, the output isn't very powerful. The laser system your local fiber internet service provider uses might be able to shoot a signal down several thousand feet of fiber optic cable, but your TV's TOSLINK port certainly won't. While this might be technically true regarding bandwidth, you are unlikely to find many devices supporting these audio formats via their optical connections.

An optical digital audio connection sends uncompressed stereo or compressed 5.1 surround sound digital audio between devices using light transmitted through optical fiber cables. HDMI can transmit all uncompressed stereo and surround sound audio and eliminates the need for a separate audio connection. Along with HDMI, optical and coaxial are the two primary connection types for sending digital audio. You may see cable manufacturers claim that their optical cables support the transfer of high-resolution audio and Dolby Digital Plus. This can be a problem because the optical audio outputs of some TVs don’t pass through a surround sound signal from external devices.

You may be tempted to buy the most expensive optical cable because you think it will sound better. But it won’t sound any different. In addition to our overview above, people often have specific questions about optical audio cables and connections. Here are some of the common ones. Are TOSLINK, Optical Audio, and Digital Audio All The Same? The consumer version of the TOSLINK standard has stayed stable for decades. A TOSLINK optical audio cable from the 1990s will work just like one you buy today. Let's look at three common situations where it is beneficial to use TOSLINK over HDMI. Keeping Older Audio Gear In Service For more detailed information on this, go to how to connect an optical audio cable to your TV and soundbar. Problem: Does Your TV’s Optical Output Support 5.1?

Long HDMI cable runs can sometimes cause signal issues, so optical audio provides a reliable separate audio path. Here is a handy table comparing the differences between optical and HDMI ARC and HDMI eARC connections: Optical, HDMI ARC and HDMI eARC Connection ComparisonUse an HDMI audio extractor to split the 5.1 audio from the DVD player’s HDMI output and send the optical signal directly into the soundbar. You may also need an optical audio switch if your soundbar only has one optical input. Optical and coaxial offer comparable audio quality for the same audio format – and both send S/PDIF digital audio signals.