Stereo Receiver Question--switching from Sonos to TV

Hi, All.

In my living room I have an LG Smart TV hooked up to an Apple TV as well as Sonos. The Sonos hooks directly into an A/V Receiver that I have via a fiber cable. The Apple TV also hooks directly into the receiver via an HDMI cable.

If the input on the receiver is set to the Apple TV, if I turn on the Apple TV it will wake up the TV, if I shut off the Apple TV it will shut the TV. If I switch from Apple TV input to Sonos, it won’t shut the TV but it will be able to read the audio feed from sonos.

Here’s what I need.

I need to know which Receiver that I can buy to replace this one (it’s 6 years old) that can do the following.

Switch input from Sonos to HDMI via a SmartThings Routine
Be able to wake the TV via the same SmartThings Routine (I think that can be done through HDMI though).
Set the Volume both manual and SmartThings Routine.

Here’s how that would work.

1: If I press the Routine I have called “Movie Time” it will shut all of the lights (that works) switch the input to HDMI and set the volume at 50%. and turn on the TV.
2: If I press the Routine I have called “Music Time” it will switch off the TV, set the input to Sonos and then set the volume at 75%.
3: Would also like to create a Routine to shut off the TV.

Anyone know which device/app or combination of I can do this with?

Thanks
Joey

(I’ve moved this to projects so you can get individualized responses based on your particular set up)

Hopefully community members who have similar equipment will be able to give you some ideas.

I have automations set up to switch between different television inputs, but mine is all based on using a Logitech Harmony. The harmony talks to the AV devices, and SmartThings talks to the harmony. But I don’t have a Sonos, so I’m not quite sure how that integration works.

2 Likes

Harmony Hub. You can keep the receiver.

With Harmony hub you can connect to SmartThings and set lighting

I have Harmony modes that change the inputs on TV and soundbar. It sets a virtual switch that triggers a CoRe piston to change the lighting settings.

I would skip the fancy remote and just use the “simple” one. Its cheaper and gets the job done.

2 Likes

So you’re talking about this?
https://www.amazon.com/Logitech-Harmony-Smartphone-Entertainment-Automation/dp/B00N3RFC4Q

I just need it to control the receiver. How does it do that? Via IR? I don’t need it to touch the lights. I have my lights working perfectly within ST with my phone, watch, and Alexa so I don’t want to have to reprogram all of that.

You can look up your receiver model on the harmony compatibility page to see if it’s controllable:

https://support.myharmony.com/en-us/compatibility

1 Like

It says my Pioneer VSX-30 is compatible with the Harmony Hub. Guess I’ll order this! Thanks for the help.

This is the one I have:

http://a.co/bkVHi0K

I think I picked it up for $80 a year ago. I have 2 hubs now, super happy with them.

No worries. I’m not really interested in the remote so I just got the hub! Will let you know how it works out.

1 Like

You can always add the remote for $30 later.

I was going to use a dedicated tablet to control the TV, the Harmony app is not bad. It was just the entire process of waking a device and sometimes the app was not running, made it a pain.

Volume setting cannot be done in ST. Not sure you can do that via harmony, the issue is the remote has no idea what the volume is set to when it starts.

You can start a Harmony Activity from smartthings and control lights/inputs no problem.

Alright everyone! So I have my Harmony Activities working perfectly for both my Alexa and SmartThings. Everything works super clean! There is one last thing I need to figure out and I’m good to go. I have sonos all over the apartment and I want the volume to be normalize across all zones. This was easy in the past because my receives that play sonos in all of the zones EXCEPT FOR the living room the volume never gets touched and its controlled to Sonos. The issue comes up when I have to switch from the Sonos to the Apple TV in the living room. For some reason, the default Apple TV the default volume on the apple TV is way too loud so I have to turn down the receiver when I am watching Apple TV and when I switch back to Sonos, I have to turn it up. IS there a way to tell Harmony to set a default volume for each activity with out having to do VolumeDown or Up 45 times? Also if I do it that way, I run the risk of certain combination of activities being run to where the volume turns down 90x. I can’t believe that no one though to set volume levels during certain activities. Thoughts?