OT: A/V Receivers

drail14me

Member
Jul 20, 2008
1,344
10
38
Upgrading the home theater system. Looking for a new A/V receivers but I've been out of the loop too long to understand some of it.

Wondering if there are any A/V receivers with built in "Over-the-air" TV tuners built in? I'd like to be able to connect the antenna coax to the A/V receiver and have only the HDMI going to the TV.

Right now, I've got the Coax connected to the TV then audio outs from the TV back to the A/V receiver for sounds.

Just wondering if there's an A/V receiver that will do it all. Google says there is but I can't seem to find one.

Thanks!
 

garddog

Member
Dec 10, 2008
750
83
28
My 15 year old Onkyo let's you hook it like that. If you have a best buy close by, go in and check the ones on display for the connectors you want.
 

WrapItDog

Well-known member
Aug 23, 2012
4,273
650
113
I would call or chat with Crutchfield and see what they suggest. You can then shop the model AV receiver for best price. Crutchfield will price match Best Buy, Amazon......

Crutchfield has excellent customer service and lifetime support if you decide to purchase from them.
 

horshack.sixpack

Well-known member
Oct 30, 2012
9,079
5,082
113
Crutchfield is great. Customer service has been outstanding since i started using them in the mid-80's...
 

fevans

Member
Aug 27, 2012
129
9
18
This is somewhat related to your question, but at one time I used my home theater receiver as an HDMI input mux with a single HDMI out to the TV. My current receiver does not have an antenna input, but I wanted to add that as an alternate TV source mainly for weather events and local high school sports which air on the OTA PBS channels. It was a pain to have to switch between the HDMI input and the antenna input on the TV. I think I looked for receivers with antenna inputs, but I had trouble finding them and they are pretty expensive. Ultimately I upgraded my TV to a TCL/Roku and changed to streaming TV service. With the new TV, I was able to setup the TOSLINK optical cable for sound to the receiver. So, I modified my setup to only use the TV's HDMI/Antenna inputs and stopped using the receiver as an input mux. The only connection between the TV and the receiver is the optical link. For the antenna, I use an RCA clip-on bar antenna that sits very discretely right on top of the TV. It is by far the best OTA antenna I've used. I never have to touch it and I can pick up all of the local stations.

When I got the TOSLINK working, I realized I could actually go in the opposite direction and use the TV for multiplexing all of the input sources that I have and it already has all of those inputs. Hope that all makes sense. Not trying to convince you that either way is better than the other, but maybe this would be another option. You do need a TOSLINK output on your TV and the receiver has to support it, but if you have one the optical cables are very inexpensive.
 

PirateDawg

New member
Jan 9, 2020
1,751
0
0
Upgrading the home theater system. Looking for a new A/V receivers but I've been out of the loop too long to understand some of it.

Wondering if there are any A/V receivers with built in "Over-the-air" TV tuners built in? I'd like to be able to connect the antenna coax to the A/V receiver and have only the HDMI going to the TV.

Right now, I've got the Coax connected to the TV then audio outs from the TV back to the A/V receiver for sounds.

Just wondering if there's an A/V receiver that will do it all. Google says there is but I can't seem to find one.

Thanks!

Best solution is to connect the antenna to the TV and connect the TV audio out to the receiver. Here's a discussion:

Tom's Guide
 

ababyatemydingo

Well-known member
Nov 27, 2008
2,936
1,571
113
Crutchfield is great. Customer service has been outstanding since i started using them in the mid-80's...

Used to love getting that Crutchfield catalog in the 80's. To see what Jenson, JBL, or Pioneer 6 X 9 speakers I was gonna put in the old Cutlas Supreme
 

drail14me

Member
Jul 20, 2008
1,344
10
38
I'm replacing my 15 year old Onkyo. Works great but can't handle 4k. Looks like I'll have to continue to run digital from TV back to the receiver.
 

DoomSlayer

Member
Jan 13, 2018
813
107
43
I started with them in the 90s. I’ve put some ferocious bass in many vehicles through the years thanks to those guys. Even though I’ve mostly moved on to home speakers now I’ve still got an old Dodge Ram with some fosgate 12’s running on a 750 watt amp to rattle some windows when the mood strikes me. Problem is the mood doesn’t strike me near as much as it did in my 20’s.
 

fevans

Member
Aug 27, 2012
129
9
18
I did some more searching for home theater AV receivers with built-in TV tuners and it just doesn't seem to be a thing. If a TV can have a built-in tuner, why can't an AV receiver? It would be a little weird though, because you'd be changing channels on the receiver instead of the TV. I remember looking for this before and had no luck then. It seems really odd that these don't exist. I'd love to talk to someone in the AV industry and ask them why. I wonder if it has something to do with the relatively slow evolution of digital OTA tv compared to cable/streaming HD formats.

As for your problem there is another possible solution. You could get a device with a TV tuner such as a TIVO or one of the digital TV converter boxes that have an HDMI out. Of course you'd need to have another open HDMI input on your receiver. The digital converter boxes are widely available and cheap. Many have DVR capability built in. You just have to connect a storage device.
 

oompa

New member
Aug 23, 2012
13
12
3
If you use a Fire TV Stick, an option is to get a Recast. It allows you to stream live TV to your Stick and includes a DVR.
 

karlchilders.sixpack

Well-known member
Jun 5, 2008
17,212
1,963
113
Mine is not quite 15,

but it does not have the imputs for this. (Not that I can see anyway)

Still does a good job, when I use it.

(actually mine is 17 yrs old. )
 
Last edited:

katfsh

Member
May 15, 2014
191
20
18
I was looking at the Samsung frame tv online tonight sits right up against the wall only has one wire that’s 16 or 49 feet long that is the power supply and goes to a separate box with all the hdmi, optical, etc. inputs. I know this is not a receiver like you asked about but I does solve the problem of removing all the wires to the tv.
 

drail14me

Member
Jul 20, 2008
1,344
10
38
I was looking at the Samsung frame tv online tonight sits right up against the wall only has one wire that’s 16 or 49 feet long that is the power supply and goes to a separate box with all the hdmi, optical, etc. inputs. I know this is not a receiver like you asked about but I does solve the problem of removing all the wires to the tv.

DAMN!!!! That's exactly what I need! Wish I'd seen that before I got this QLED Tuesday! That Frame TV is what I think the industry will start going towards.
 

turkish

Member
Aug 22, 2012
880
211
43
Upgrading the home theater system. Looking for a new A/V receivers but I've been out of the loop too long to understand some of it.

Wondering if there are any A/V receivers with built in "Over-the-air" TV tuners built in? I'd like to be able to connect the antenna coax to the A/V receiver and have only the HDMI going to the TV.

Right now, I've got the Coax connected to the TV then audio outs from the TV back to the A/V receiver for sounds.

Just wondering if there's an A/V receiver that will do it all. Google says there is but I can't seem to find one.

Thanks!

Homeworx converter box or HDHomerun. Either allow you not to have to use your TV to send audio out to the receiver and minimize cables. I use the Homeworx with really good results for the cost.
 
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