Question

Audio Out of Synch (Vizio M55-D0, Bell Atlantic 4k Receiver)

  • 15 September 2017
  • 4 replies
  • 1193 views

I have a very slight audio lag with my sound bar, but it is really driving me crazy.

I have had the Vizio M55-D0 for about 6 months, never thought about sound synch issues when I first got it; sound from he TV was lackluster, but okay. I got the Sonos Playbar last month. Something seemed a little off with the sound, but I would have been hard pressed to tell you which way at first. After a week I decided something was certainly off. Found the sound delay option on Sonos, but that made the problem worse. Turns out the sound is slightly behind the picture through the Playbar. Double checked the Sonos Playbar setting and the TV setting to turn sound lag down to zero.

When I turn the TV speakers on, there is definitely a noticeable echo between the Playbar and TV. Playing around, I switched the optical cable from (i) outputting from my TV to the Playbar to (ii) outputting from my 4k Receiver to the Playbar, and the audio lag seems to almost entirely drop away. Echo between the TV speakers and the Sonos also become pretty negligible. The problem is obviously if I switch to other sources, then I need to move the optical cable.

This might be just a little annoying in the future, but I am worried that it will lead to other problems in the future and I'll be stuck with a system that just isn't up to my needs.

Anyone have any other suggestions? I don't see a sound lag/video lag setting on my receiver, and am not sure the problem is really there anyway. TV seems like it might be the main culprit, but I am stuck with it for the foreseeable future. Anything else I should be trying here?

From one other post, I saw someone was happy when they removed the ethernet cord from the Playbar. I tried that and didn't see much improvement. Willing to try any other ideas people have, or if they know of a way to slow the video or speed the audio from any of the 4k receiver, Vizio or Sonos menus (last one is unlikely, I know), I'm all ears.

I have 8 other Sonos speakers around the house and really want this to work out, but am pretty uneasy about keeping the Playbar for a less than perfect setup going forward, and am coming up on the return by date pretty quickly.
-Noel-

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4 replies

Userlevel 4
Badge +2
If the TV speakers are OK, the optical output should be too.

Sonos does introduce a small delay, some are more sensitive to it than others. I'm fairly sensitive but managed to live with it for several years. Occasionally it got particularly bad and I found turning off the power to the PLAYBAR and giving it a full reboot fixed the problem.
Thanks, Mike. I've turned lip synch on my TV down to zero as well (well, it defaults at zero, and I've left it there). Turning it up makes it worse.

RO53BEN, the thing is that the TV speakers are fine, which makes the cable seem unlikely to be the issue. The problem appears when the Sonos is fed the audio through the optical output of my TV. That said, I can still take a look at the cable later on and see if there is any other information it provides. Thanks for the input...
Userlevel 7
Badge +21
Some TVs also have a delay/lip sync setting to allow the video to be delayed in case the video is coming before the audio. It might actually be under the Sound settings, since it relates to the audio being in sync with the video.
Userlevel 4
Badge +2
I lived with problems like this for many years and, in the end, chose to replace my Living Room set-up with a fully featured AV system. I wish I'd done this years before, but budget didn't permit at the time.

However, audio lag shouldn't be a major issue like this - your TV really does sound at fault.

Audio sync used to be a real problem over HDMI links as the video and audio came at the same time but, often, TV would add a post-processing delay to the video. End result you got lipsync errors.

With HDMI 1.3a, they introduced an electronic sync feature which allowed devices to communicate and agree on the total audio delay required. The blu-ray player would output sound with a delay that matched the video delay in the TV. All was good but it required:

- Devices to fully comply with HDMI 1.3a
- Cables to fully support HDMI 1.3a.

In this first instance, I would confirm you are using a compliant cable between your devices and your TV. If it's a cheap, generic cable this may not be the case.