Optical Audio Port and Cables — Pros and Cons
August 22, 2023
The vast majority of cabling you use for your media centers, personal computers and audio/visual equipment at home uses electrical signals — analog or digital. The signal is sent as an electrical impulse over conductive wire. Every cable, from the wire between your receiver and speakers to the HDMI cable on your smart TV, contains copper wires inside.
The one exception in home audio/video is the optical audio cable. Unlike other cables, the optical audio system uses fiber optic cables and laser light to transmit digital audio signals between devices.
If you’re wondering how you could use optical audio, or if you should be, first you need to know where to find it on your devices. You’ll find these on the back of computers, HDTVs, media receivers, and more. That little port, that surprisingly few people tend to use, can be of real benefit.
The optical audio port is uniquely different than all of the other ports so you can’t miss it — a squarish port with a rounded top. Even more distinctive than the shape is the fact that when the device is powered on, you may be able to see a faint glow of red light around the port door and at the end of the optical audio cable when you plug it in.
My first introduction to optical audio was through connecting sound bars to smart TVs. We had the benefit in the first home we built to be able to put speaker wire in the walls for a full 5.1 surround sound system. In subsequent existing homes we purchased we didn’t have that luxury. Luckily, by then, sound bar technology had advanced to the point of near surround sound quality without all of the infrastructure. We’ll have speakers installed in many of the rooms of our new build but don’t plan to build out any elaborate surround sound systems. We’ll take advantage of the surround capabilities of the newer sound bars and HDMI ARC (Audio Return Channel). But the sound bars will be connected to the TVs via optical audio cables.
This cable standard was introduced back in 1983 by Toshiba and was originally intended for use with their Compact Disc players. This is why you’ll sometimes hear them referred to as Toshiba-Link, or TOSLINK cables. You can check if your devices support TOSLINK audio cabling by looking on the back of the device for the distinct TOSLINK port. The port is typically labeled ‘optical audio’, ‘TOSLINK’, ‘Digital Audio Out (Optical)’ or something similar, but you probably don’t need a label to identify it.
The optical audio cable had been eclipsed somewhat by the HDMI cable as HDMI is not only simpler, since it carries video and audio together, but it also supports newer high resolution audio formats. These formats include Dolby TrueHD and DTS HD Master Audio. Optical audio does not. So why am I a fan of optical audio? Singularity of purpose for one but more importantly I find most devices that can utilize it, like smart TVs, are lacking in HDMI ports. So, using one for audio seems a waste to me when another great option exists. I prefer to use the HDMI ports for devices like my Fire TV Cubes, Blu-Ray players and gaming consoles.
Optical audio can still carry up to 7.1 channels of very high-resolution audio. For the majority of consumer setups, there will be absolutely no discernible difference between audio quality when using an HDMI cable or an optical audio cable. For most people this is more than good.
And it’s a good solution for connecting multiple devices like I’m doing. You can pipe the HDMI video from the source, like a cable box or Fire TV Stick, into your TV, then turn right around and pipe the optical audio out to your receiver and speaker system or a sound bar.
I mentioned HDMI ARC above. This allows your TV to send audio to an attached sound system that also supports it. If either your audio solution or TV lacks HDMI ARC support, you’re out of luck and should look to optical audio as a solution. Another reason to go the optical audio route is if your devices support HDMI ARC but you run into issues where certain types of audio or audio from certain sources won’t work properly. In that case, you can again fall back on the optical audio connection to link your TV and audio solution.
As a quick breakdown to help you decide if optical audio cables are the way to go, here are the pros and cons:
Pros
- High-Quality Audio: Optical cables use light signals to transmit audio, resulting in high-quality sound without interference or degradation.
- Immunity to Electrical Interference: Optical cables are not susceptible to electromagnetic interference, so you get cleaner audio compared to analog cables.
- Digital Transmission: Optical cables transmit audio in a digital format, which can help maintain audio quality over longer distances.
- Compatibility: Optical cables are commonly used in home theater setups, gaming consoles and audio equipment, making them widely compatible.
- Optical audio supports the following audio formats — PCM 2.0, Dolby Digital 2.0 to 5.1, Dolby Digital EX 6.1, DTS Digital Surround, DTS-ES Matrix 6.1, DTS-ES Discrete 6.1 and DTS 96/24 (96kHz/24bit audio).
Cons:
- Fragile: Optical cables are thin and fragile, making them more susceptible to damage if bent or twisted excessively.
- Limited Distance: Optical cables have distance limitations compared to some other cable types, especially over very long distances.
- Lack of Multi-Channel Analog Audio: Some older audio systems or devices might not support multi-channel audio through optical cables.
- Not Suitable for Analog Audio: Optical cables can’t transmit analog audio signals, so they’re not ideal for certain setups requiring analog connections.
- Optical audio doesn’t support these more demanding formats because of bandwidth and related limitations — 5.1/7.1 multi-channel PCM, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, Dolby Atmos, DTS-HD Master Audio, DTS:X, Auro 3D Audio, DVD-Audio and SACD-Audio.
All things considered I still consider optical audio an excellent solution option. As stated above, it offers options on connectivity and audio quality that are very good.
I’m curious if you’re familiar with optical audio? Do you have devices at home that has optical audio ports? Are you using optical audio in the solutioning for your smart home? If not, will you after reading this?
Let Debbie and I know in the comments, DMs and emails as we really enjoy hearing from you. Thanks again to all those following Debbie and I through our home building journey. It’s great to hear your success stories and suggestions as we move through the process. And if you like the content I’m posting each week, don’t forget to ‘Like’ and ‘Follow.’
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