[alabastervlog]

It’s mainly useful for getting good surround. If you don’t care about that, sure, not really necessary. That’s like the whole point of it.

Side benefits include:

- Adding more ports to often port-starved TVs or projectors.

- Providing alternative port-switching interface if you hate your TV’s UI and want something simpler.

- An organizational aid—you can put all your stuff somewhere away from the TV, and all that needs to reach it is a single HDMI cable. This can create interesting room layout options that are otherwise impractical.

All of these can also be accomplished by a simple HDMI port switch, but still, it’s handy.

[hedora]

We just ran a wider conduit through the wall It has 4 hdmi cables, a usb extension cord and tv coax in it. (Didn’t bother with Ethernet the closet has a wifi access point in it.)

The appletv is in the closet, but the other devices don’t make sense there. The linux box is about as big as a decent USB hub, and has a few wired game controllers plugged into it. The console is a switch, and going into the closet is too much trouble. I could put the sonos in the closet, but the play/mute button on it is too convenient when I don’t have a phone handy. The other stuff is self explanatory.

Can you not get a surround sound audio receiver/amp anymore? The digital out on the tv presumably would feed it. I had an old one like that, but it died.

[toast0]

> Can you not get a surround sound audio receiver/amp anymore?

No, not really. If you want surround sound audio, you probably want it over HDMI, and then they may as well have video features too.

But, if you have enough ports on your TV, and it doesn't do dumb things, and eARC works, and the TV doesn't forget it's attached to the receiver... You can still plug in everything to the TV, and you don't have to uss the receiver to switch inputs. I typically run the movie disc players through the receiver, because they have high bitrate audio, and tvs like to mess that up.