Arc TV sound cuts in and out.

Shouldn’t there be a recall notice to go out to all the owners and retailers?  It seems like the problem is acknowledged by Sonos but not really posted anywhere.  Without this issue, this is a great product so it is quite unfortunate but I am hoping they come up with a solution - can’t be that difficult, can it?

@Bathdave The Sonos optical connector that is presented as a work around for this problem can  be bought from Sonos: https://www.sonos.com/en/shop/optical-audio-adapter.html

Thanks Rallye - in fact there was one in the box - I didn’t understand why it was there when I installed it 

I guess it means that Sonos have identified it as  an issue and solution 

I contacted my retailer this morning who was aware of the issue, said they had had a small number of similar problems and swapped out the Arc for a new one. The retailer thought it was an intermittent hardware issue on some units - I was told they had sold 20 and had swapped out 2 or 3 and the replacements were fine, they will refund me if this one had the same issue 

currently tearing my hair out getting the new one configured and running 

it’s too f***ing clever for its own good- whatever happened to plug and play?

I can confirm that the HDMI cable is plugged directly from my Sonos Arc into my Samsung Q95T into the eArc port. It’s detected by the TV and the remote volume controls are transferred as normal.

It works fine while watching that evening, then the next time I turn on the TV, like clock-work, it’s back to cutting in an out. I’ve tried enabling and disabling the external device within the tv settings but on turning it back on the sound cuts in and out ever few seconds remainins.

The only way to resolve it so far has been to power cycle the Sonos every time. The strange thing about this issue is it didn’t happen when it first released. I pre-ordered my Sonos and got it same day in Brisbane when it released to market. The issue never occured for the first few months… which makes me suspect that a firmware or software update that came down is the cause, either by the TV manufacturer OR Sonos.

I did not have the issue for several days and all of a sudden it is back again.  Absolutely not acceptable.  Seems like everyone’s issue is overall similar but all have different situations.  One thing is the same though, we really need Sonos to come up with a solution.  Just to remind everyone - I had a perfectly fine working Sonos Arc for close to 2 months and then one day it just happened.  I got sound for 5 seconds and then no sound, then sound for 5 seconds, then no sound.  Unplugging the arc fixes the issues and it has come back as early as next day and late as about a week later.

Hi,

I bought both a Samsung TV and a Sonos Arc (see below for details) about a month ago and they’ve never cooperated over eARC. Brand new, out of the box, I connected the Sonos Arc to the TV using the supplied HDMI cable - making sure to connect it to the eARC port. There were no other connections (except Ethernet) connected to the TV or the Arc.

The issue I experience is that sound keeps coming and going every 5-6 seconds and it won’t stop doing so, regardless of settings changes, restarts, resets, etc. After pulling my hair for a while I found threads related to the issue, both on the Samsung forums and here on the Sonos forums. It seemed at the time to be a well known issue on both sides and I also found out that both companies were working on fixes. So I, with a deep sigh, plugged the Arc into the TV using the optical connection - which worked fine - while waiting for new firmware.

Unfortunately the firmware released by Samsung yesterday (8 October) did not resolve the issue, to my great disappointment. So I reached out to Samsung support who offered to login to my TV and reset the HDMI ports, which I agreed to. That actually improved the situation, or at least changed it, the sound went away for much shorter periods of time. It almost made the Arc usable again. Almost. To my despair however, the more severe issue, with sound dropping for longer periods of time, came back after having turned the devices off and on again. The opposite of what you’d normally hope.

On the recommenedation of the Samsung support I also went out and bought a brand new HDMI 2.1 cable, to rule out a faulty connection cable between the TV and the Arc. That had no effect however. This leaves me quite unhappy and no closer to a resolution of the problem. I’m still hoping/looking forward to the Arc working and Atmos playing. But there doesn’t seem to be any solution or even hint of an upcoming fix, except dragging the Arc back to the store hoping to get it returned or replaced. That would be my absolute last resort however, because I really like the Arc and it works ‘fine’ over the optical connection. But it’s quite hard to justify buying the Arc and not having access to the fine features it comes with, like Atmos.

Appreciate any help, hints or suggestions. Best of all would be a date with an Arc firmware release that fixes the issue, but I suspect that’s hoping for too much. ;)

Thanks in advance!

Setup:

Sonos Arc – Latest Sonos firmware

Samsung QE65Q70T (2020 model) – firmware version 1402.6 (released 8 oct in the EU)

HDMI-eARC Mode: Auto

Dolby Atmos Compatibility: On

Hi

I see all these threads about audio dropping but most seem to be short sound drops, in my case I have complete audio dropping and not coming back.

Anyone with the same issue, perhaps report it in here.

I have the LG CX and I lose sound all together when changing between sources, this can be simply exiting the Netflix app back to live TV or turning on my xbox and not having an audio outputting, all very random when it occurs.

Various things can bring back the audio, simple on/off off tv, or switching back and forth between sources.

So if anyone else has the same issue, I would love to hear, because I worry that I’m alone with this and it may be a hardware issue.

I’m getting a bit fed up with this issue, had the ARC nearly 3 months and just want to be sure its something that others experience, I don't mind waiting for a fix if that’s the case.

I kept tinkering with the settings, using the newly bought HDMI cable and the stock one, it seems the problem is still there however it’s slightly less annoying. I disabled HDMI-eARC in the TV (changing from Auto to Off), to my understanding eARC is only necessary for uncompressed Atmos which seems to only come from BluRay-discs. Probably got that wrong, so please correct me if I am. If that’s actually the case however, it’s fine, since I only watch content from apps on the TV (Disney+, Netflix, etc.) anyway and those sources only requires (again to my understanding) an ARC connection (not eARC).

My Sonos app now shows that it’s playing Atmos sound both through logo in the now playing and ‘About my system’ says the Arc is playing Dolby Atmos (DD+). That’s an improvement at least.

So instead of having 5-6 seconds of sound and 5-6 seconds of complete silence from the Arc. I now have approximately 15-20 seconds of sound and 1-2 seconds of silence. Obviously way better, but still terribly annoying.

Probably doesn’t change anything, but maybe someone can relate or it helps narrow down the search space for potential solutions.

Also, I realized I posted this in the completely wrong forum - sorry for that. If someone can point me to where I can move this post or if someone could help me move it to the Troubleshooting forum I think that would make more sense.

Thanks again.

I have the same problem here. Sound on the Arc cuts in and out every 5 seconds. I have a Samsung Frame Television. The problem only occurs with the TV - otherwise the Arc works fine (on streaming services etc). 
I just spoke with Sonos support in Europe to log the fault  (I am in Ireland) and I was surprised that they were not aware of the problem. You would think that this would be well flagged and known at Sonos support. 
 

Anyhow the workaround for me - is to turn off everything and reboot the TV and the Arc every day. That seems to work but is quite frustrating and not ideal for a new soundbar  

Thanks for all of the feedback here and appreciate updates. 
if no progress in next month or two I’m giving this back

Yes, the Sonos support I spoke to twice was either not aware of the issue or basically refused to say there is an issue even though I mentioned that on the community boards, we were told to go log the issue.  They almost undermined this board by saying it is not official which was disappointing to see that kind of disconnect.  As I mentioned before, the only communication has been here which is very frustrating because this should be everywhere so the consumer is aware, at the very least their support team should be aware.