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Audio Sync issues with Playbar / Xbox One / Sony 900a Television - Can Sonos support 5.1 from tv?

  • 22 August 2015
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Hi all, I'm a recent Sonos convert and have been extremely happy so far, adding a Play 5, Play 1, and now a Playbar + Sub. I've unfortunately had a horrific experience in trying to get the Playbar setup.

My setup is as follows - Sony KDL-55W900A television, TiVo Roamio that utilizes over the air digital signals, Xbox One.

The Roamio goes to the Xbox One, then the Xbox One to my television via HTML, then optical out to the Playbar.

This television is one that specifically has Dolby Digital 5.1 pass through.

I've spent 15+ hours on this and constantly scouring forums and looking for settings, but continue to have audio sync issues.

The audio delay setting in the software does not solve this, only makes it worse.

I've so far identified that it depends on the source - and sometimes different even in that source, and even do different variations of sync.

For example, I'm watching Seinfeld here on television and it's completely unwatchable - the audio clearly does not match mouth movement, 1-2 full seconds - the Roamio says the audio is Dolby Digital and so does the TV.

If I switch to ABS World News Tonight there are still issues, but it's about a second or a half out of sync. Switch to a commercial, it's better, but still not in sync.

Switch to Amazon Instant Video and an Episode of Mad Men and it's good, closest to 100% I've seen

Switch to Hannibal on Amazon Instant Video and it's decent, probably 85-90% in sync

Switch to Netflix, Californication, same as above. Same with Sens8, watchable but not 100%. Xbox Video is the same.

I was watching a Transformers Blu-ray, which uses Dolby True HD, and it is pretty much unwatchable. I put Transformers 2 which uses DTS-HD Master Audio and it's much better - which is strange because Sonos does not officially support DTS.

My Xbox is set to HDMI Bitstream out and Dolby Digital.

This is literally driving me insane and stressing me out, I'm half tempted to return every Sonos piece I have, has anyone else had this issue or can help me troubleshoot what component is causing the issue and/or how to fix? I've made sure my TV had the recommended settings for optical pass through.

Thanks all! Help!!
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Best answer by Chris 22 August 2015, 04:09

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13 replies

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So the audio delay option in the software seems to improve the Transformers Dolby True HD that was previously unmatchable, is it normal to have to use this setting?
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This issue came up recently. First make sure you have most recent Xbox 1 firmware. Secondly - I believe the last time this came up it may have been a Sony TV to and hooking the HDMI to HDMI 1 vs. 2 made a difference.
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This issue came up recently. First make sure you have most recent Xbox 1 firmware. Secondly - I believe the last time this came up it may have been a Sony TV to and hooking the HDMI to HDMI 1 vs. 2 made a difference.

Chris, thank you so much for the quick reply, I use HDMI 1 but I can try 2 - do you recall which one was best or the thread by chance? I have searched all over Google but not specifically this forum.
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I tried to find it. It must have been right at forum changeover and lost.
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I tried to find it. It must have been right at forum changeover and lost.

Ahh darn, well thanks for trying. I did change it from HDMI 1 to the HDMI MHL port and it seemed worse, so I'm hoping HDMI 1 is correct. Could it be my HDMI cables are having issues? They are only HDMI 1.3, I believe there are 1.4 now which supports ARC, but since the Playbar does not connect via HDMI I'm not sure how that could or would make a difference? What drives me the craziest is that sometimes it's fine, sometimes it's a split second off, and sometimes it's completely off - I'd like to be confident no matter what media I use it will be fine. The audio delay lip sync has helped but only in certain situations.

Thanks!
Userlevel 7
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Have you tried optical direct from
Xbox to playbar.
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Have you tried optical direct from
Xbox to playbar.


I did at first and did not see a difference, but I didn't run all the tests I am doing now, I can definitely give it another shot thanks!
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Hi, I have my Xbox One optical out going to an optical switch, into which my TV and satellite box are also plugged. The output from the switch goes to the playbar. I don't suffer any lag with this setup and can get 5.1 when apllicable. I just select the optical input depending on what I'm using. Actually, because I've the tv hdmi going through the Xbox, it generally stays on the Xbox.
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Have you tried optical direct from
Xbox to playbar.


Chris, I did some more thorough testing Optical directly from the Xbox One to Playbar, everything seemed pretty good, I'd say close to 100%. Appreciate the help! A little bummed I'll lose all the inputs to my tv, but I can pretty much run everything from my Xbox One and switch cables if needed. Now I just have to run the cable again through the walls which is a project itself!! 🙂 Thank you again.
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As lostlogik mentioned. An hdmi switch with optical output is a good choice.
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Hey Chris, so everything has been going pretty well and close to 100%. Haven't seen any issues with Xbox Video and 'most' television from my tivo - although I have noticed some Netflix shows have slight sync issues - for example, I was watching Mission Impossible via Netflix - I have had to adjust the lag in the Sonos tool, but for some reason some shows via Netflix, or some television shows which I think are broadcasted in Stereo, have issues no matter how I adjust the delay - any ideas what may be going on here? Is the Xbox unable to decode the source, e.g. is Netflix broadcasting in maybe DD Plus, or Stereo? I'm not too worried about the tv stuff since most of what I watch is broadcasted in 5.1, but for Netflix I'd like to get it consistent. Thoughts?

Thanks!
I experienced the same problem on my SoundBar. I had my TV on "game-mode". I changed it to a "normal" mode, and the audio-sync went all good.
I experienced the same problem on my SoundBar. I had my TV on "game-mode". I changed it to a "normal" mode, and the audio-sync went all good.

Cheers, this has just resolved issue with mine. There was less then a second delay but was killing me. TV was indeed in game mode. Switched out, problem sorted. Thanks!