Photo by James Bareham / The Verge
Apple might have discontinued the original, full-size HomePod smart speaker, but the company is continuing to add new functionality to it. The latest one relies on you also buying the new, second-generation Apple TV 4K, however. If you own both products, there’s now built-in support for HDMI ARC and eARC, which lets the HomePod play audio from other devices plugged into your TV — not just an Apple TV streaming box. Gaming consoles should work; same goes for Blu-ray players or even another streaming gadget.
The feature can be enabled in the “video and audio” area of the Apple TV settings menu. There you’ll see a field labeled “Audio Return Channel (beta),” where you can tell the Apple TV to route all television audio through HomePod…
