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Volume normalisation on Sonos?

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I just noticed that my Sonos system adjusts the volume automatically between loud and quiet songs. I haven’t noticed this before. It is extremely annoying, and especially noticeable when I play an album where the songs run into each other. The system also inserts a little gap between the songs. ALSO extremely annoying. I tried playing the same music files on another player, and there is no difference in the volume and no gap between the songs on that player, so it’s not the files that are ripped that way, it is the Sonos system that plays around with the volume. Like I said, I’ve never noticed it before. What has happened? Where do I turn it off?

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Corry PAnswer

Sonos Staff

Hi @captainknut

Sorry for the delay.

Sonos does not apply volume normalisation to files from your Sonos Music Library, but Sonos does alter the playback level using the ITUNNORM or REPLAYGAIN_TRACKGAIN tags in the embedded metadata for the file.

I would say that normalisation was applied to the tracks by the CD ripping software (if you even ripped the tracks) on a track-by-track basis. This may be called “peak search" or similar in the options, if not "normalisation”. If this is the case, other (non-Sonos) players may read the recorded metadata (labelled ITUNNORM when ripped by iTunes) and apply it, thus rendering the tracks to the same volume and making it appear that Sonos is varying the volume when it isn’t. iTunes uses a different normalisation algorithm so the effect is different (not varied) when playing there.

I recommend re-ripping the albums affected (or just one, to test), making sure that normalisation is not activated in the ripping software. If you don’t see the option, it may be an idea to use different software - maybe the community can suggest some?

If you can find a program that will strip the ITUNNORM tag from your tracks, that will also suffice, and presumably be much quicker and easier - maybe someone here can suggest software?

Edited: technical clarification

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein

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ratty

Sonos does not apply volume normalisation when playing files from your Sonos Music Library.

You might want to check this out. I’ve had REPLAYGAIN_TRACKGAIN tags on my FLAC library for 12+ years, and Sonos still reacts to them. This was as originally designed, and documented at the time. (That article has now been pulled.)

It’s most discernable on gapless albums where there’s a marked transition in gain tag value between adjacent tracks. Mike Oldfield’s The Songs of Distant Earth is a good example, with swings of 6-7dB between certain tracks.

Corry P

Sonos Staff

Yes, you are correct - it is the Sonos app that reads and applies the ITUNNORM tag from iTunes. I tried deleting the tag from a sample album, and the normalisation disappeared. So I then proceeded to remove the tag from my entire music collection in one humongous batch job (~40,000 songs).

But I am reading straight from my local collection to Sonos, no other players are involved, so it is demonstrably so that it is the Sonos app that reads and applies the tag. And since that is the case - surely it should be possible to incorporate a setting in the Sonos app for the user to choose whether he/she wants the tag applied or not?

Sonos does not apply volume normalisation when playing files from your Sonos Music Library.

You might want to check this out. I’ve had REPLAYGAIN_TRACKGAIN tags on my FLAC library for 12+ years, and Sonos still reacts to them. This was as originally designed, and documented at the time. (That article has now been pulled.)

It’s most discernable on gapless albums where there’s a marked transition in gain tag value between adjacent tracks. Mike Oldfield’s The Songs of Distant Earth is a good example, with swings of 6-7dB between certain tracks.

Thanks @captainknut and @ratty, I am indeed checking that out. I will update my earlier post once I get some clarification.

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein

C

captainknutAuthor

Avid Contributor I

Sonos does not apply volume normalisation when playing files from your Sonos Music Library.

I think the confusion lies in the fact, on the one hand, that Sonos does not analyse the tracks by itself to apply its own normalisation - which is true - and the fact, on the other hand, that Sonos reads and applies normalisation that has been analysed by another application during ripping and then saved in the files, which is also true.

Or, in other words, the difference lies between analysing the files and calculating the normalisation, which Sonos does not do, and applying normalisation info that is already saved in the files, which Sonos does do.

Corry P

Sonos Staff

Thanks again @ratty and @captainknut. I spoke with an engineer and got clarification - it was a technical communication error. “Applying normalisation” refers to actually scanning files and setting the tag embedded in them (or adjusting the levels during encoding/ripping), which Sonos does not do.

Exactly as @captainknut said minutes before I posted this, and I didn’t notice. :grin:

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein

C

captainknutAuthor

Avid Contributor I

Which brings us back to the question - shouldn’t it be possible to add a setting in the Sonos app to let the user choose to read/not read the tag info? The effect would simply be the same as stripping/not stripping the actual tag from the file, which obviously works.

ratty

Which brings us back to the question - shouldn’t it be possible to add a setting in the Sonos app to let the user choose to read/not read the tag info? The effect would simply be the same as stripping/not stripping the actual tag from the file, which obviously works.

This is a question which has been asked for … oh … 12 years at least. Along with an option to select album gain instead of track gain.

Given the lack of attention to library playback these days, commensurate with its low usage across the installed base, I somehow doubt Sonos will ever attend to it.

C

Christian G.

Trending Lyricist I

Bonjour à tous, pour compléter et préciser ma question, j'ai des playlists qui viennent de Deezer. Sur certaines version de l'appli Deezer on trouve en effet une option "normalisation des volumes" mais cela ne fonctionne pas très bien et ça n'existe pas de toute manière sur Sonos.

C'est pourquoi je pense qu'il serait plus simple et plus efficaces d'ajouter une option à l'appli Sonos pour pouvoir ajuster manuellement à sa guise, selon son ressenti, chaque morceau de la playlist (volume ++.., volume --..), ajustement qui serait sauvegardé et modifiable par la suite si besoin.

Je ne sais pas si vous partagez cet avis ? Et je ne pense pas que Sonos aie envie de s'embêter avec cela…

Christian

Mod edit: Added English translation as this is an English-only forum:

Hello everyone, to complete and clarify my question, I have playlists that come from Deezer. On some versions of the Deezer app there is indeed a "volume normalization" option but it does not work very well and it does not exist anyway on Sonos.

This is why I think that it would be simpler and more efficient to add an option to the Sonos app to be able to manually adjust as desired, according to his feelings, each song of the playlist (volume ++ .., volume - ..), adjustment which would be saved and modified later if necessary.

I don't know if you share this opinion? And I don't think Sonos wants to bother with that…

Christian

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