@Pete_Carr
Are you using the TV and soundbar now? Do you need, or use, the soundbar remote very much, if at all?
My soundbar switches on and off with the TV, goes to the ARC input automatically*, and the TV volume control controls the volume on the soundbar, so I rarely need the soundbar remote.
Is the ARC between your TV and soundbar just plain ARC, or is it actually eARC, (which it will be only if both devices support eARC)? If it’s plain ARC, then it can’t pass rich audio formats like true Dolby Atmos, so anyone with a BluRay player, say, would have to connect up in @Steven3 mode to get uncompromised audio.
Can the Pro box put out true Dolby Atmos or DTS:X? If it can, and you aren’t running eARC, then it’s better plugged into the soundbar. But with eARC, the sound is just as good with it plugged into either TV or soundbar**.
@Steven3, do you have to switch anything when going from the input with the Pro box on, to ARC from the TV? If so, this would be a consideration when connecting like this in an eARC setup.
And just to prove that nothing is ever simple, and there are all sorts of exceptions to these general rules:-
* If I turn my YouView DTR-T4000 box on when the TV is in standby, it turns the TV on just fine, but the soundbar, which also turns on at the same time, goes to its HDMI input, not to eARC. So I get no audio, until I reach for the soundbar remote and switch to eARC again. I have no idea why the switch to HDMI occurs, but I blame the TV, though perhaps I should blame the YouView box.
The workaround is always to turn the TV on first, which turns the soundbar on in eARC mode, and only then turn on the YouView box.
** My TV doesn’t do DTS in any flavour, though the soundbar does. So the BluRay player has to connected directly to the soundbar. Ho hum….
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*** Longtime YouView box owner, BT Broadband customer, finally an EE TV subscriber ***
