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99.9% of the time Soundbars or HTiB (Home Theater in a Box) systems are not a good investment of your time and money. It is the general consensus of r/hometheater not to recommend these things and instead simply steer a user toward a 2.0 or 2.1 system made of quality, Audio-Centric name brand components which are easy to assemble and cheap enough for low budget or space conscious buyers. Most can be expanded to 5.1 if you buy the correct items in the correct order. For further explanation please read Why You Shouldn't Buy a Soundbar Please be aware r/Soundbars exists as well as you will be met with opposition to posting about soundbars here.
And boy do they. I run 85’ from the office PC to the living room TV. Parallel to that I run USB signals via an ethernet cable with USB extender devices on either end (two boxes which, respectively, convert USB to Ethernet on one end and vice versa on the other). Use a Bluetooth dongle on the living room end and voila, the PC is in the living room.
I know there are home network solutions for this, but I wanted 4k games with surround sound and 0 additional latency, and I don’t think that’s possible without hardwiring. In any case this was cheap and totally reliable.
If you’re new to optical HDMI like I was, just know that it’s directional…and observe that before you run it 85’…
Edit: The only painful thing is switching between Bluetooth in the office and the living room. I have to go into Device Manager to disable my tower's native Bluetooth so that the dongle in the living room will be recognized. Then I have to go back and re-enable when I want to use Bluetooth in my office. Thankfully that latter case is infrequent for me. Would love to be able to toggle between Bluetooth receiver options on PC.
OK, the other annoyance is changing which desktop you're looking at, especially if you try to do it "blind" when the other display is being used exclusively. Win+P is your friend, but as of Win 11 you have to login blind before Win+P works, which was a very frustrating change (shakes fist). Obviously you can just walk to the other room, but who has time for that.
Optical cables support longer distances and are thinner.
I have got a PS5, a Nintendo Switch, a PC, a Steam Deck and a 32:9 Ultrawide Display that are all connected via hdmi/displayport and different hdmi-switches across two rooms and two sound systems. One is a soundbar with wireless sub and rears in the living room, the other is a 5.1 system for my desktop pc.
I had issues with cables above 5m where audio/video was cutting out. I replaced those cables with even longer optical hdmi cables and everything is working like a charm since then.
You should be aware that optical hdmi cables are unidirectional and one side is for the input while the other side is for the output. As for ARC/eARC, you gotta do some research for this as i am currently not using ARC/eARC here (due to switches and direct connection to the sound system).
Regarding ARC/eARC to a receiver you can still use it, you just need to pay attention to the ports on your TV.
Most TVs only have one HDMI port that supports ARC/eARC. It is usually marked but might be hard to read. Some menus will label it when you look at inputs. Do NOT use this port for the long optical HDMI connection. Use any other HDMI input port for that. Connect a shorter regular HDMI cable between the TV and the receiver over the port thar supports eARC/ARC.
You might need to do some setup on your TV audio settings and maybe your receiver as well.
I have a 20m optical hdmi cable from aliexpress, and it works great, only gripe I have is that my gpu is hdmi 2.0a so it can only do 4k60 or 1440p120.
They normally offer greater distance at high resolutions and frame rates. If you have issues with signal then they are worth it. Always make sure they're certified though, I've got some cables that won't do 4k 60hz hdr.
99.9% of the time Soundbars or HTiB (Home Theater in a Box) systems are not a good investment of your time and money. It is the general consensus of r/hometheater not to recommend these things and instead simply steer a user toward a 2.0 or 2.1 system made of quality, Audio-Centric name brand components which are easy to assemble and cheap enough for low budget or space conscious buyers. Most can be expanded to 5.1 if you buy the correct items in the correct order. For further explanation please read Why You Shouldn't Buy a Soundbar Please be aware r/Soundbars exists as well as you will be met with opposition to posting about soundbars here.
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They allow greater distances
And boy do they. I run 85’ from the office PC to the living room TV. Parallel to that I run USB signals via an ethernet cable with USB extender devices on either end (two boxes which, respectively, convert USB to Ethernet on one end and vice versa on the other). Use a Bluetooth dongle on the living room end and voila, the PC is in the living room.
I know there are home network solutions for this, but I wanted 4k games with surround sound and 0 additional latency, and I don’t think that’s possible without hardwiring. In any case this was cheap and totally reliable.
If you’re new to optical HDMI like I was, just know that it’s directional…and observe that before you run it 85’…
Edit: The only painful thing is switching between Bluetooth in the office and the living room. I have to go into Device Manager to disable my tower's native Bluetooth so that the dongle in the living room will be recognized. Then I have to go back and re-enable when I want to use Bluetooth in my office. Thankfully that latter case is infrequent for me. Would love to be able to toggle between Bluetooth receiver options on PC.
OK, the other annoyance is changing which desktop you're looking at, especially if you try to do it "blind" when the other display is being used exclusively. Win+P is your friend, but as of Win 11 you have to login blind before Win+P works, which was a very frustrating change (shakes fist). Obviously you can just walk to the other room, but who has time for that.
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Only if you need to go long distances
Optical cables support longer distances and are thinner.
I have got a PS5, a Nintendo Switch, a PC, a Steam Deck and a 32:9 Ultrawide Display that are all connected via hdmi/displayport and different hdmi-switches across two rooms and two sound systems. One is a soundbar with wireless sub and rears in the living room, the other is a 5.1 system for my desktop pc.
I had issues with cables above 5m where audio/video was cutting out. I replaced those cables with even longer optical hdmi cables and everything is working like a charm since then.
You should be aware that optical hdmi cables are unidirectional and one side is for the input while the other side is for the output. As for ARC/eARC, you gotta do some research for this as i am currently not using ARC/eARC here (due to switches and direct connection to the sound system).
Regarding ARC/eARC to a receiver you can still use it, you just need to pay attention to the ports on your TV.
Most TVs only have one HDMI port that supports ARC/eARC. It is usually marked but might be hard to read. Some menus will label it when you look at inputs. Do NOT use this port for the long optical HDMI connection. Use any other HDMI input port for that. Connect a shorter regular HDMI cable between the TV and the receiver over the port thar supports eARC/ARC.
You might need to do some setup on your TV audio settings and maybe your receiver as well.
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The only benefit is distance. If you only need like 5ft, a regular cable will do just as well (as long as it's a quality cable).
I'd say anything above 16ft go with optical. Under is fine with a good regular cable.
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I have a 20m optical hdmi cable from aliexpress, and it works great, only gripe I have is that my gpu is hdmi 2.0a so it can only do 4k60 or 1440p120.
They normally offer greater distance at high resolutions and frame rates. If you have issues with signal then they are worth it. Always make sure they're certified though, I've got some cables that won't do 4k 60hz hdr.