We recently got a JBL sound bar that hangs on the wall under the TV. Sounds nice and has a button to turn off the heavy bass sound (important for me), but now the volume on the commercials jump way up.

The TV had the option to prevent this, but apparently the soundbar doesn't. Does anyone know of one that does? I don't watch too much TV and find I'd rather just turn the TV off than play with all the remotes to switch the volume back to the TV instead of the soundbar.

 

might be worth the 4o bucks http://www.tvsoundregulator.com/

 

Thanks for the tip.

Sounds like what I'm looking for, but advertisements are always supposed to sound great. Anyone have actual experience with this or something similar?

 

40 bucks is cheaper than buying a new bar

 

I thought most of these newer TV's etc had some soft of AVL or automatic volume leveling built in?

I'm in need of a better "sound system" to work with my TV and DVD player, something with the AVL, a remote control AND maybe that center channel (if they still exist) to better hear dialog when playing DVD/BlueRay discs and so on---getting a garbled (to my ears) effect even though voices are clear enough over live or real-time broadcast TV programs.

 

The problem is the soundbar is wired between the satellite box and the tv so there's no chance for the tv to do it's thing.

 

I don't have satellite or cable or anything else subscription-wise---I'm running straight out of a recorder/recording device into the TV which then (for now) feeds a good set of self-powered computer speakers.

I've yet to jump into a soundbar but its in the not too distant future, when I finally settle on a very good one.

 

Get a DVR and fast forward over the commercials.

 

I've got a DVR. I use it to record a football game and watch it. Most of the time I leave the TV off, but every once in a while I get a wild hair and decide to watch the news or tv for some reason.

There are no shows I watch on a regular basis where a DVR would be helpful other than sports.

I did turn the soundbar off the other day and discovered that in comparison, my TV sounds awful without the soundbar playing.

 

i have my cable box, DVR, and VCR direct to the TV. then out of the TV into the home stereo. this way the TV AVL controls all sound output to the stereo.
with this setup i have 3 foot tall speakers at the TV side of the room, and the 5 foot tower speakers 16 ft away on the couch side of the room.

so i have surround sound, and everything runs off one remote.

 

I've been thinking about plugging it up that way Tom. The instructions clearly said to hook it up the way I did, but I hate it. I'm thinking of changing the wiring around just to see what it does.

I won't turn the TV on again till this weekend, and there's a nasty cold front coming, so I'll have time to experiment.

 

when i converted from cablevision to verizon fios the tech that did the install said you can't run it that way.
i told him yea the cablevision guys have been telling me that for 13 years.
by the time he had the fiber optics box hooked up, i had the converter boxes hooked up on the TV. he was amazed it worked and sounded so good. he actually pulled the TV cabinet out to see how i hooked it up because he wanted to do it the same way on his own system.

 

Might be some changes coming to help you out. The FCC is supposedly going to get serious about sound levels for commercials. There are some existing regs, but apparently they're pretty much ignored. The article I read said that there were good reasons to think that things would actually change.

I run all of my sound stuff into some wireless headphones (2.4 gig not bluetooth). I can switch them off,change the volume, or just move the darn thing away from my ears pretty easily.

Good Luck,

hj

 

So they ignore current law, but one more law will help. You must be new here ha ha. Hell, commercials are unlistenable at any level and they cost money.

 

laws and regulations are different Difference between Law and Regulation