Extract voice only from hdmi output

[John_523]

My wife has severe hearing loss and wears hearing aids. She uses a device to stream the tv audio to her hearing aids but she still has difficulty understanding what is said. Most tv shows have so much background noise music etc it's hard for me to follow what is said in a tv drama. Is there a way to extract voice channel only from hdmi output of our cable DVR?

 

[americanaudiophile]

You can use one of these
https/www.amazon.com/Panlong-Audio-Digital-Decoder-Converter/dp/B00AMC2J1Y
to derive the center channel from the TV audio. The center channel contains all the dialogue and little else. Connect that to the device that streams to her hearing aids. You will need a cable with a 3.5mm stereo plug at the converter end and 2 RCA plugs at the other. You will only use one of them (the other is for a subwoofer).
If you cable DVR has an optical audio output then use that. You may have to set the box to output in surround sound from the optical output.
If not then you will also need an HDMI audio extraction box like this one
http/www.monoprice.com/Product?p_id=5557&kpid=105557&gclid=CPPY2sLnwcYCFYIXHwodhY0FTw
to provide the optical audio out for the digital converter.

 

[John_523]

My Cable DVR had an optical audio output so I ordered a 6 foot cable with the decoder. The decoder came with a short optical cable but I needed it to go through a conduit to our TV over our fireplace.
I installed this hardware today and it's a great solution to our problem. Eliminates all of the embedded surround sound and provides primarily clear voice only output to my wife's hearing aid streamer!
11-17-16 update, The decoder using a feed from my DVR had a time delay with the sound and the speech did not sync with the lips. I have ordered the HDMI audio extractor now. This should sync the speech with the lips!

 

[John_523]

12-6-16 update - I have a significant sound lag with these two devices. I guess it's back to the drawing board for a better solution. Any ideas out there from the audio expert world?