I have an installation coming up for a special needs individual. Trying to keep his existing $15 Sony universal remote for simplicity. I gave up on CEC and ARC working well together 5 years ago. I will be installing a Yamaha RX-V681 AVR and a new 50" Samsung 4K (model not available).
Do I dare try to make these 2 play nice together?
Would love to have the AVR power up when the TV is turned on by the remote.
Would love to have the AVR audio controlled as a slave to the TV audio.
Advanced features, such as switching to other inputs, can be done by the spouse.
Thanks!

It works as well as it did 5 years ago.

Assuming you can program a scene into the Yamamama, taking an optic line back from TV to AVR could give you the needed reliability.

ARC? Make sure you put your number into his phone for speed dial.

I had to use arc with a Yamaha Aventage because someone damaged the optical on the tv. The remote has almost a 30 second macro now to make sure the Yamaha stays on the right input. When the tv turns on, it will change the Yamaha to arc.

What he said: ARC is not fun.

ARC seems to have three modes of operation:

1) Doesn't work at all
2) Pretends it works but doesn't do so reliably
3) Works great.

In all honesty, you don't want to be staking your business on the chance that you might luck out with #3. At any rate, my one example of #3 was a Marantz receiver and Sony TV. Works exactly like you think ARC should, and has been doing so for 2 years.

Did an install last year for a fellow with a Samsung 1080p and a Marantz receiver. Turned off all of the CEC but we are using ARC to feed tuner audio back to the receiver. It's been fine all this time. It's not your TV and it's not your receiver, but it an ARC signal coming from a Samsung and with CEC off wouldn't think the receiver brand is relevant (big unqualified if there as this is the only time I've used ARC). Take from that what you will.

Craig

Edit: it was a Panasonic TV. Which makes what I said now totally irrelevant for you. Sorry. I'm going to bed.

Supposedly, and I have not had a chance to confirm this, with HDMI 2.0, the CEC protocol was rewritten and made a mandatory compliance. All products licensed for HDMI 2.0 have to conform to the standard, which is now actually an industry standard....so it should not be like before where every manufacturer could pick and choose what they wanted to implement, if any at all. and you ended up with a circus zoo.

I do not know how ARC fits under this umbrella.

I have used it successfully in the past as well. But the stars had to align properly for sure. I always run a toslink now because it is just easier to deal with. I have not had the guts to try the "new and improved" CEC.

Maybe Brent can chime in on the changes? There was an article on CePro a while back with the guy who wrote the new protocol. He is from UK and has a company that sells HDMI switchers, among other things, touting that you can control everything from the OEM TV remote....made it look super easy in the demo. :) YMMV.

One small example of CEC/ARC working without a hitch:

A Amazon Fire TV box to a Sony XBR-65X930C.

I know he wants to keep the same remote, but it seems that a result of using that remote is that this whole other area of crap technology becomes necessary. Maybe it's worth looking at that part of the system. Perhaps backing up one step and discussing the remote might provide an actually workable solution.

What is it about the fifteen dollar remote that is simplicity? Is it that he'll be using the remote he's used to? Are the buttons especially big? (No, that's not sarcasm.)

You haven't mentioned budget, so I'll bring this up: perhaps a touch screen where you can create largish buttons will solve the problems. It would allow the wiring and programming necessary to jettison ARC, and the large buttons you create would make it physically easier to use. (Still don't know if this is an issue.)

I even dare say this might be doable with an iPad controlling an RTI system. Then you could wire the system up to work!

Surely if you present him with the alternatives of an old technology (his present remote) that can be made to work unreliably with modern equipment, versus a different approach that will give him rock solid control, he might consider the second approach!