Beam (Gen 2) disorted / metallic sound w/ TV (eARC) and Night Sound Mode



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@Shnakey : i can confirm I can reproduce the issue with the Superman YouTube video you posted.

I have to add though that while clearly noticeable, there is other material that exposes the issue more prominently. I hope I find some time myself to search for additional material.

 

@Ken : I posted a recording of the issue here in this forum. You can check what it sounds like there.

I posted the links, quoting myself (second recording of the issue):

I have captured it very clearly on the sidewards pointing speaker this time:

http://sndup.net/vnwz

Im that recoding the issue is less prominent in second 0..5, very obvious 5..10.


I think the issue could be described also a low pitch circular saw in the background -or- a swarm of metal cicadas -or- as others said, a robot army.

Can you hear it in the recording?

 

That said, if you cannot reproduce it in your setup - it will be interesting to identify any differences in setup.

Mine is: Beam directly connected to LG TV via eARC HDMI. Lg audio configured as pass-through.

 

 

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Update: in my LG i have a setting 

Sound / Advanced Settings / Digital Sound Output

 

If I set this to „pass through“ the issue is there.
The Sonos app is showing audio to be of format: „Dolbly Multichannel PCM 2.0“.

 

if I set this to „PCM“, the issue is not/hardly noticable. Sonos app is reporting audio to be „Stereo PCM“ on this case.

 

@Ken_Griffiths: what is the audio format being reported as in the Sonos app when you do your tests?

 

 

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I have again reproduced the issue today on a TV channel with Dobly Digital Plus 2.0.

Audio coming via HDMI. TV again the LG OLED. All firmware updated to the latest available (14.14, S2, Build 69132100). HW Version of the beam: 1.35.1.6-2.1.

 

NEW:

I can clearly locate the sound as coming primiarily from the leftmost and rightmost speakers (pointing outwards, on the both curved ends of the beam).

 

Diagnostics sent as 281087345.

I have captured it very clearly on the sidewards pointing speaker this time:

http://sndup.net/vnwz

 

This capture is:

0-5s, Night sound off → no/very little distortion

5-10s, Night sound on → Distortion clearly audible

10-15s, Nigh sound off → no or very little distortion

15-20s, Night sound on → Distortion clearly audible

20-35s, switching TV to other channels (non stereo) → no or very little distortion

35-30s, back to Dolby Digital Plus 2.0 channel → Distortion clearly audible

 

 

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P.S.: I think it is also audible with Night sound disabled, but much less prominent.
I would say the recording also features the distortion in e.g. seconds 0-5 of the uploaded snippet.

Yeah I tried the optical connector and it was the exact same too. 
 

I am getting the issue from all TV inputs via HDMI. Strangely if I put something on my phone and just airplay the audio to the beam it doesn’t have the same robotic reverb sound. 
 

Noticed it across all content from Atmos to stereo. It is really noticeable on the Elton John farewell show on Disney+ because of the crowd noise. Would be a good example to share with the sound engineers.

 

Hopefully they release a patch to fix it soon, but from seeing how long people have been mentioning it, maybe that’s a bit of wishful thinking. 

 

I’ll check the audio and let you know what audio format the Sonos App shows when playing the YT Superman video. My LG TV’s are both set to ‘pass-through’, just to confirm that.

In the uploaded audio recording I can hear what was described as a circular saw, but what might have helped would have been to post a link to the actual video and to then listen to that on other devices to see how it sounds, just in case it’s a noise recorded in the source audio itself.

if there is an issue just with the Beam, I would have thought the sound mentioned would be present on a good many audio sources such as movies/shows on Netflix, or Amazon etc; and it perhaps might help if it’s able to be shown that the audio issue is only present on the Beam and not present on other playback devices belonging to other device manufacturers. As I say the Spider-Man YT video sounds the same on an iPad and headphones as my Beam, particularly when playing it back at higher volume levels.

Anyhow if there are more examples please post those too as I will happily continue to try to test things here with my Home setup.

I will report back on the audio format the App shows when I return home. I’m out and about at the moment.

Ok the audio format I’m seeing is ‘stereo PCM’ when I play the TJATOMICA YT Supernan video with the YouTube App on my TV

The above post was referring to my living room TV with the Arc.

If I play it on the Beam in the Dining Room I get ‘Dolby Digital Plus 2.0’ but both sound similar/same, as far as I can tell.

I am facing this issue right now with the Beam Gen 2 without surrounds. Can anyone confirm that adding surrounds resolves this issue?

I’ve not used SndUp before, but I have uploaded a recording of what I hear from the Beam when playing the start of that YT TJATOMICA Superman video, which I just recorded using iPad Pro mic - here is the link (hope it works)…

http://sndup.net/p3fs

(extract from beginning until Superman takes off/launches).

I don’t hear a metallic sound but maybe it’s a frequency I’m not noticing. See if you hear it.

It’s probably not the best recording but at least shows what I’m listening/hearing here, which seems fine and ties in with what I hear when it’s played on the iPad too.

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Hi Ken,

i have also recorded what I hear on my Beam. Note that this recording was done in direct proximity to the sidewards pointing speakers in the beam, not in the middle of the room.

Thus the effect is very clearly audible.

find it here:

http://sndup.net/rvwz

First ten seconds - no night sound. Then after 10s, nightsound enabled - which in this case seems to not make that much of a difference.


It shows as „Dolby Multichannel PCM 2.0“ in the Sonos app.

Pretty akward that your beam reports a different audio format playing back the same video.

 

Looking at the original Video Stats, it seems audio is „Opus 251“ which translates into being stereo (2channel) VBR.

 

Also, can you confirm you directly connect the TV to Beam, 1:1 with the Beam HDMI cable?


 

Cheers,

Kai

Thanks for your response. I get metallic sound problem when playing games on a desktop PC.

I don’t get this metallic sound problem when I set the audio output to Stereo PCM mode - app shows “Stereo PCM”.

All other sound modes I tried (Dolby Digital 5.1, Dolby Atmos, Multipcm 5.1 / 7.1) will have this issue.

Do you get this metallic audio problem in Stereo PCM mode without surrounds?

Hi Ken,

i have also recorded what I hear on my Beam. Note that this recording was done in direct proximity to the sidewards pointing speakers in the beam, not in the middle of the room.

Thus the effect is very clearly audible.

find it here:

http://sndup.net/rvwz

First ten seconds - no night sound. Then after 10s, nightsound enabled - which in this case seems to not make that much of a difference.


It shows as „Dolby Multichannel PCM 2.0“ in the Sonos app.

Pretty akward that your beam reports a different audio format playing back the same video.

 

Looking at the original Video Stats, it seems audio is „Opus 251“ which translates into being stereo (2channel) VBR.

 

Also, can you confirm you directly connect the TV to Beam, 1:1 with the Beam HDMI cable?


 

Cheers,

Kai

 

The recording via  the iPad Pro was done directly in the middle of the beam about 6 inches away from the front of it.. but will listen out again to the side speakers.

  • PCM stereo format to the Arc was from the LG TV’s own built in YouTube App and that TV is directly connected to the Arc (eARC connection)
  • The Dolby Digital Plus 2.0 to the Beam was from a Nvidia Shield via Feintech VAX04101A extractor which I use with that TV but the Beam uses eARC connection to that extractor too - so maybe that’s the reason for the differences in codec. (Sorry it’s the best I can do with each of the HT setups I have here, without moving the devices about, which would be a lot of hassle for me).

Maybe others here will chime in and perhaps help test this on their HT setup too, but not hearing the metallic sound so far here.

Just as a thought - Maybe it’s the codec on the sending device that’s the cause of the issue here and not the Beam hardware, perhaps 🤔?

It might help to play the same audio, using the same codec, to a different speaker, if practicable, to see if it sounds the same. I assume this only happens with a few sources rather than it being a widespread issue. Something to do with some sounds and how they are being transcoded before being sent to the Beam?

Just wondering if maybe we’re looking in the wrong place as to the cause of the issue, just because the sound is coming from the Beam, it may not be the speaker, but something happening before it gets to the speaker in the transcoding stage of the audio itself?

Can anyone else here perhaps say if this only happens whilst listening to the audio in Dolby Multichannel PCM 2.0 format, as that might help narrow things down to that codec and/or the sending device… (that’s assuming the TV is set to pass-through the audio uninterrupted)?

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Nearly a year later and the issue is still there. Are there any Sonos staff members still active on the forum that could escalate this? There are more and more posts about this popping up on Reddit, AV Forums etc.

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I have the same distortion as you describe. It occurs when audio is passed through from Virgin V6 box via TV. From stereo pcm or Dolby digital 2.0. It disappears when audio is direct from TV (Freeview channels or apps) to the beam. Any suggestions anyone? Does using Sonos Ones as surrounds help? Cheers 

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Just as a thought - Maybe it’s the codec on the sending device that’s the cause of the issue here and not the Beam hardware, perhaps 🤔?

It might help to play the same audio, using the same codec, to a different speaker, if practicable, to see if it sounds the same. I assume this only happens with a few sources rather than it being a widespread issue. Something to do with some sounds and how they are being transcoded before being sent to the Beam?

Just wondering if maybe we’re looking in the wrong place as to the cause of the issue, just because the sound is coming from the Beam, it may not be the speaker, but something happening before it gets to the speaker in the transcoding stage of the audio itself?

 

@Ken_Griffiths 

“maybe its the codec on the device sending”:

yes, maybe. But on the other hand, we have peope reporting it on Sony TV / Virgin V6 Box [1] and myself I had it on a Pansonic TV (which unfortunately I have no access to anymore).

 

So I would like to second your thought, someone who can reproduce audio as “Dolby Multichannel PCM 2.0“ would be extremely helpful.

 

I understand that connecting the Beam to LG directly to reproduce is not currently possible for you, Ken, correct?

 

[1]

https://www.avforums.com/threads/beam-gen-2-disorted-metallic-sound-w-tv-earc.2429996/#post-30935186

 

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@Shnakey 

 

Can you help us out here:

  1. does the error on your end sounds similar to what I recorded (see above)?
  2. what is your TV model?
  3. What is the Sonos App showing as the audio format, at the time you reproduce the error?
  4. if you had an LG tv, is the error also going away if you disable pass-through and switch to PCM?

 

Cheers!

Just as a thought - Maybe it’s the codec on the sending device that’s the cause of the issue here and not the Beam hardware, perhaps 🤔?

It might help to play the same audio, using the same codec, to a different speaker, if practicable, to see if it sounds the same. I assume this only happens with a few sources rather than it being a widespread issue. Something to do with some sounds and how they are being transcoded before being sent to the Beam?

Just wondering if maybe we’re looking in the wrong place as to the cause of the issue, just because the sound is coming from the Beam, it may not be the speaker, but something happening before it gets to the speaker in the transcoding stage of the audio itself?

 

@Ken_Griffiths

“maybe its the codec on the device sending”:

yes, maybe. But on the other hand, we have peope reporting it on Sony TV / Virgin V6 Box [1] and myself I had it on a Pansonic TV (which unfortunately I have no access to anymore).

 

So I would like to second your thought, someone who can reproduce audio as “Dolby Multichannel PCM 2.0“ would be extremely helpful.

 

I understand that connecting the Beam to LG directly to reproduce is not currently possible for you, Ken, correct?

 

[1]

https://www.avforums.com/threads/beam-gen-2-disorted-metallic-sound-w-tv-earc.2429996/#post-30935186

 

Yes, I can connect the Beam direct to the TV, I guess, as the TV does have an HDMI-ARC port, but not eARC, that’s the reason I got the Feintech extractor to allow me to play Atmos and uncompressed Multichannel audio, as the built-in TV Apps sadly only support (upto) Dolby Digital 5.1.

My Sonos Arc is directly connected to my main TV (LG C9 OLED) over HDMI-eARC and I will keep trying to see if I can get the metallic sound to show up on there too.

I will test with the Beam directly connected to the older LG TV (2015), (but it won’t get uncompressed Multichannel PCM over HDMI-ARC, as the codec is eARC only) but will see what I can discover from that setup too.

So is the current thinking, that it ‘might’ be connected to the Multichannel PCM codec? … as I do also have an Apple TV 4HD that uses Multichannel PCM, albeit that’s connected via the C9 TV and the Sonos Arc?

Anyhow, I will keep trying and report back if I hear anything.

Some further audio sample/suggestions might perhaps help here too.