Vieracast only using TV speakers

Hello,

I just hooked up my Onkyo HT-RC260 to my Panasonic P50ST30, and I'm trying to get sound through my receiver/speakers when using the Vieracast apps (hulu plus, etc).

My TV is plugged into the receiver via HDMI, no separate optical audio cable.

Last night I'd been watching Hulu on my Roku, but I switched to Vcast because the Hulu and Amazon apps work better there (think my Roku's dying). I was on the input for the Roku and just hit the Vcast button on my Panasonic remote, and it continued to output audio through my speakers.

Jump to this morning, after having turned off the TV and the receiver last night, and it no longer works - I can only get TV speaker sound through Vcast regardless of what input I'm on. Everything else still works fine - it just switches when I go into Vcast.

What am I missing here?

I checked the TV's output, it does specifically list ARC. I assume it would have to since I got sound fine last night. I'm just confused why it worked without any settings tinkering then, but isn't this morning.

I've thought about buying the optical cable but didn't think it was needed due to me getting that sound fine last night.

Well just to update, looks like I will have to get that optical cable anyways.

I found the setting for forcing HDMI On on the Onkyo, which sends the audio through it instead of the TV speakers on the Vcast menu. Unfortunately though it only appears to be 2-channel and not 5.1. So that kind of defeats the purpose :/

Anyways, thanks again!