The simplest action, switching inputs, has become a major headache. I don't have many components in my home theater setup.

- Pioneer Receiver (VSX-1122)
- Pioneer Blu-Ray Player (BDP-52FD)
- TCL TV (55S401)
- Tivo Roamio
- Raspberry Pi (running Kodi).

All devices are connected to the receiver via HDMI which is output from the receiver to the TV also using HDMI. The Tivo is the ONLY device that will switch over 100% of the time. The Blu-Ray player, which is also a Pioneer, NEVER switches over, even if it's powered on first before everything else.. The most that will happen is I will get a glimpse of the Pioneer logo from the BR player for a second, Basically, I can't use it at all unless I connect it directly to the TV. The Rasp Pi switches over maybe half of the time but if it's the first device powered on then it always works.

I've tried different cables, switching inputs, turning HDMI control off on all components and turning on the devices in different orders. If any device is connected directly to the TV, it works fine & I would keep everything connected this way but the TV will not output DTS-MA, Dolby True HD, 5.1 PCM audio from DVD-Audio / SACD's, etc.

Anyone have any ideas because I'm out of them and don't know what else I can try. Thanks!

Just to be sure I'm understanding this properly, you're saying that even if you manually switch your receiver to Blu-ray input, it won't do it?

You're not saying your receiver won't automatically switch to the device you've turned on, correct? Although it sounds like it won't do that, either.

And you didn't say it, but I assume you tried plugging your Blu-ray player into the TiVo input, with the same result?

Have you tried resetting your receiver?

Agreed, try resetting the receiver and see if that works. Looks like this model came out in 2012, so check to see if there are any firmware updates for it.

My issues with my Onkyo 606 receiver weren't exactly the same (it was only specific HDMI ports that were wonky...) but eventually came down to replacing the capacitors on the HDMI daughter board.

In your case, it sounds like the Pioneer receiver is the source of your problems... so maybe it has an HDMI board that can be repaired/replaced too.

What you could do is buy a cheap HDMI switcher, and plug everything into that. Plug the HDMI switcher into HDMI port 2 on your TV. Then plug the Receiver HDMI IN 1 to into HDMI port 1 on your TV. HDMI 1 is "ARC" on the TV so it will send audio from any other input back to the receiver. If the ARC audio is passthrough and not processed by the TV, then everything should work as desired with the best audio quality desired. I think.

Functionally, you'd always have the TV set to HDMI 2 and the Receiver set to HDMI 1.
The HDMI switcher will auto-switch to whatever is powered on, but if multiple inputs are powered on, there's usually a remote and a button to switch inputs manually.


edit: I bought this one:

This is what I mean (sorry... I was bored...)


*drawing is not to scale

And good visual to boot.

The problem is that ARC is implemented differently depending on the TV. I think my panasonic will only do two channel, for instance, which kind of defeats the purpose.

If the receiver doesn't switch over to different inputs even manually, then it's time for a new receiver (or some kind of fix like Dan suggested). If it doesn't automatically switch, it may come down to how it detects and automatically switches to a component... for instance, the TIVO might always be outputting a signal even in a dormant state and that could screw with automatic switching. I remember the dumb WiiU was like that where it would always switch on at weird moments when it was doing an update.

Good point about ARC implementation.

JZ1276 could just plug the BD player directly to HDMI 2 (bypass the switch entirely at this point) and plug Receiver HDMI 1 to TV HDMI 1 just to verify that the audio works as desired. That said, I would think the TV would have some options for the ARC output. Some might default to 2-channel, but there should be a straight passthrough option. If there isn't, then that sucks. (note: I haven't really researched this myself... so I'm doing a lot of assuming, and you know how that goes...)


edit: Dang it. I found the user manual for the 4-series TCL, which is what the OP has.
https://www.tclusa.com/sites/default...S-CA-8.1_3.pdf
However...
So... this isn't a showstopper... I'd still test it... but it sounds like the TV will process the audio into a Dolby stream, which may or may not be lossy... but probably is.

Actually just checked firmware last night, the latest is installed.

The TV does not passthrough audio using ARC and does process it. DTS-MA & TrueHD is downconverted to the core track and surround audio from SACD's / DVD-Audio discs is output to stereo.

Yes, manually switching does not work. If I have HDMI control set to ON then it will auto switch to the powered on device but there's no audio or video from the Blu-Ray player. It will switch over to the BR player for a second but the signal is immediately lost.
And yes, same result when connecting the BR player to HDMI2, which the Tivo is plugged into and always works.

This makes perfect sense and probably explains why this is the only device I never have an issue with. I put the Tivo into standby mode where no audio or video is output but that didn't resolve it. I didn't have this problem before replacing my 10 year old Panasonic plasma with the TCL TV. I don't think one of the devices is the issue but all of them combined. I'm gonna do the hard reset on the receiver like andicus suggested.
Thank you everyone for all the suggestions.

.

OK so I just tried a reset. Pressing the BAND & POWER buttons as instructed on the YouTube video didn't work. However, I read on the YouTube comments holding down a different combination of buttons works on other models so I followed those instructions but still never got the display to read "RESET" like in the video. The receiver did however "freeze" up for around 10 seconds until I was able to power it back on and all the settings are still saved so I'm not sure if it even reset but whatever it did it got everything working properly so thanks again guys!

BTW LOL