Apple TV and external speakers

[temps2020]

Hi,

Forgive me for asking a questions that I'm sure has been asked before. I used the search function in the the forums but didn't find an answer to what I'm looking for.

I just got an Apple TV as a wedding gift and I hooked up it and activated home sharing. When I play music and movies/tv shows through the apple tv (using the remote and controlling everything on my HDTV) the sound comes through great on my TV speakers and my external speakers, which are hooked up to my HDTV.

Just an FYI, the external speakers are connected to my HDTV using RCA cables (not optical audio cables).

The problem I'm having is that when I play music through iTunes on my computer and use Apple TV as my output source for sound the music only comes out of my TV speakers and not my external speakers connected to the HDTV.

Is there any way to get the sound to come out of the external speakers? I figured this would just happen given the speakers are connected to the TV, but perhaps this won't work unless I buy an optical audio cable and connect it directly to the Apple TV to the external speakers. Am I on the right track?

I did have an airport express and that's how I used to play music on external speakers connected to airport express but I just got an extreme base station since my airport was on the fritz. I didn't realize the basestation didn't have an input for my external speakers, which sucks.

Anyway, I'd like to get the external speakers connected to the HDTV figured out so I can use those speakers when using my computer to play music and movies/tv shows through Apple TV.

Thanks for your help and insight.

 

[PNutts]

I also run AppleTV to my TV and have my stereo plugged into my TV. It sounds like the same setup and I don't have a quick answer on why yours behaves differently.

But... Have you tried turning on Home Sharing and instead of iTunes "pushing" to the AppleTV, access your iTunes library from the AppleTV and "pull" it? Personal preference of mine to control everything from the AppleTV.

 

[temps2020]

yeah

I also run AppleTV to my TV and have my stereo plugged into my TV. It sounds like the same setup and I don't have a quick answer on why yours behaves differently.

But... Have you tried turning on Home Sharing and instead of iTunes "pushing" to the AppleTV, access your iTunes library from the AppleTV and "pull" it? Personal preference of mine to control everything from the AppleTV.

i've done this and accessed my iTunes library from AppleTV and it works fine with the external speakers but it's much easier to use iTunes on my computer and playing it through the computer and pushing to AppleTV. It's just easier to navigate all my music on the computer.