If you're experiencing audio delay issues, read this

I have sent in a ticket to LG Engineering and Sonos Engineering on the audio delay issue when gaming from an Xbox One X or PS4 Pro using Bistream Out (Dolby Digital 5.1).

PLEASE do the same and report these issues if you suffer from this issue!

The setup I have is simple:
1. Roku Ultra
2. PS4 Pro (bitstream out)
3. Xbox One X (bitstream out)
4. Nintendo Switch (uses Linear PCM 5.1 converted to Stereo)

These are all attached via HDMI 1,2,3,4 to my LG 65C7P OLED TV.

Then, using digital optical out from the LG TV, I am connected to the digital optical input on the Sonos Playbar (with two Play:1’s, and a sub).

The audio delay from the gaming systems (specifically PS4 and Xbox One) is horrendous.

Note: There is no audio delay on the ninentdo switch because it is using PCM, not Dolby Digital. The TV nor the Sonos can convert 5.1 PCM to Dolby Digital 5.1 on the fly. I don’t believe there is even a device that does this either. This means you will get emulated Stereo sound from the SONOS when playing the Switch. Darn.

Note2: There is no perceived audio delay using the Roku Ultra to watch Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, HBO etc.. (Picture Mode ISF Bright or other). This could be because gaming is higher speed video content than movie or TV playback, and the video processing and picture modes alleviate any perceived audio delay, but I’m not 100% sure.

Note3: There is no audio delay when using built in LG smart apps such as Netflix, Amazon, Hulu etc...)

LG software has the ability to adjust the audio sync (AV Sync Adjustment) between -5 and +15; however, my testing indicates that going to -5 does not alleviate the issue and has no perceptable difference in audio delay. LG software settings also have the ability to bypass (Bypass: On/Off) the TV but that setting also does not correct the gaming audio delay.

The problem is that the video is ahead of the audio and to make matters worse, when gaming, we obviously want to use the LG Picture Setting for GAME to reduce input lag. When doing this, the audio delay becomes even more noticeable and makes gaming almost unplayable. (especially online multiplayer shooters).

I have scoured the internet looking for solutions such as:
HDMI Switch with Audio Extractor*
Affordable AVR that has optical out and does not amplify the audio signal to use with Sonos system
LG Settings
Xbox Settings
Sonos Settings

*These products exist but they don’t seem to have the latest video standards yet (4:4:4, 4K, HDCP 2.2, HDMI2.0a or HDMI2.0b, 60hz etc...). Buying anything less would mitigate the value of the LG OLED TV and what it is capable of displaying.

Nothing I have done or tried fixes the issue.

I firmly believe this is a processing issue by the LG TV that is taking an audio signal (dolby digital 5.1) from an HDMI gaming device (ps4 or xbox one) and taking too long to process it before sending it out via Optical to the Sonos playbar/surround system.

I don’t believe this is a SONOS issue; however, I do believe that if Sonos does not have LG engineering fix the software in their TV, this audio delay issue is going to cause gamers to buy a different system.

I am also considering returning my brand new system in favor of a traditional wired speaker solution with a proper Audio/Video Receiver (AVR). This is how severe this issue is to me as a gamer.

P.S: This is unrelated but...Sonos, please update your products to handle DTS and other newer audio codecs. It’s 2018. We love your products but there are severe drawbacks and limitations currently.

Matthew,

Thanks for taking the time to write your suggestion. I think that’s probably a good product; however it fundamentally misses the point. The LG B and C OLED models have an issue with the audio delay and we need the community to call it in and report it.

I called LG for a followup on my service ticket today and the VIP customer service department at LG (you can get transferred to VIP if you prove you own an OLED model) told me that they have received so many calls on this issue recently that it has become a top priority for the LG engineering department in South Korea.

That’s progess.

They also told me that they are no longer capturing new tickets for this audio sync issue because they have all the information that they need and got a system wide email on Monday instructing them not to. They said there is no current ETA for this resolution but that they are working on it now and encouraged me to keep automatic updates turned on in the software settings of my TV.

Also progress.

Customers shouldn’t be relegated to buying a $300 HDMI Switch with Audio Extractor or a receiver. One of the alluring points of a soundbar setup (LIKE the Sonos system) is the simplicity of the setup and ease of use. Buying a receiver or a switcher fundamentally negates that idea. Plus, $300 is a lot of money for such a product. Budget receivers cost around the same amount. (Note: If you think you can buy a receiver to use with the Sonos system to solve this problem, my understanding and research indicates you cannot. Most receivers amplify the signal of the audio outputs (whther through hdmi or optical out), and the Sonos playbar already amplifies the signal. Double amplification will not work and could damage the system. If there is a receiver on the market that has passthrough audio and does not amplify the signal, then this could theoretically work with SONOS if you can find that product and want to spend the money to go that route.

So again, while the switch is probably a great product and fixes the issue for you and anyone else willing to buy it, I view it as a bandaid to the problem rather than a resolution to the actual underlying issue.

I also spoke with SONOS and they have escalated this issue to Tier 2 and told me their engineering department has been in contact with LG.

I hope this information finds its way to any customer who has spent good money and may be bashing their heads against a wall out of frustration.

Bottomline: Please continue calling in and reporting your audio delay or sync issues until this gets resolved.

Hello everyone. Quick update: The team is aware of an issue with LG OLED and Sony XBR TV's using Dolby Digital and lip sync. It'd take a firmware update to fix it on the TV's side of things, but we have no word on that. This can be further tested and verified by changing the audio from Dolby Digital to PCM (Stereo) or by testing the audio with another optical audio source such as your cable box. Thank you for your patience on this so far.

I’ve tested to unplug the beam, and by passing Bistream Dolby from the PS4, there is also a delay in the audio from the internal TV speaker. This means that the problem is the TV processing audio coming from HDMI sources causing the delay. So if there is a delay with the Beam, the Arc should also experience the same issue… I’ve read a lot about this and it seems that many TVs have trouble to pass audio from one HDMI source to another, inducing a delay. 

I just wanted to chime in and say thanks for posting this information. I’ve spent a lot of wasted time trying to get line out to work perfectly with 5.1 on my LG OLED C7. Currently use an optical audio splitter as a workaround, but obviously not ideal. I’ve been doing that for years with an older cheap Visio TV, but it was frustrating that finally getting a new TV didn’t solve my audio issues. It would be awesome if Sonos worked with LG and other TV companies to “certify” models that they work with 5.1 and Playbar/Playbase perfectly, rather than just holding out hope the manufacturer even passes 5.1, let alone does it right.

While I agree with your irritation, this isn’t something that Sonos can be involved in. As has been repeatedly shown by people who “spend extra money”, as you’ve accurately put it, the Sonos works properly. The issue is in the ability for LG (and Samsung) to not delay the signal as it goes through the TV.

I replaced a TV recently, and looked at both LG and Samsung as potentials. I ended up with another Vizio, because I was confident it could pass through a Dolby Digital signal without delaying it. And I was correct, my Sonos continues to work perfectly, as it had on my previous Vizio. 

For those of you who have the LG B6 or C6 and have been having the delay issue, there is new firmware available on the Korean LG site. They usually release first in Korea and it takes months if not longer for it to make it to North America. I've installed on my C6 and am seeing very positive results. Both PCM and DD 5.1 look in sync on multiple sources (Tivo, Apple TV, Xbox).

From the release notes, it specifically mentions an audio fix:: "Improved watch / play game's game subtitles and video / audio time mismatch (05.30.70)"

If you use Chrome and navigate to the Korea LG support site it will offer to translate which makes things easier to find. The firmware itself is not specific to Korea and works fine on a North American model.

Link: https://www.lgservice.co.kr/download/selectSearchView.do#none

For C6 filename is webOS3.0_M16_F16_75UH6850_93XX_96XX_05.30.70.zip
For B6 filename is webOS3.0_K2L_UH79_87_05.30.75.zip

I have tested this audio delay issue with other manufacturer's audio equipment and noted the exact same symptoms. Whilst this proves SONOS technically correct when placing the blame on the TV manufacturers, it doesn't account for a couple of ridiculous decisions which would have alleviated the problem, and are entirely SONOS's fault

Why did SONOS insist on making their equipment dependent on the TV? The Beam has HDMI, but only a single port, necessitating the use of ARC. Adding HDMI passthrough would have allowed us to use an HDMI switch in front of the Beam, preventing these ARC issues becoming apparent.

Why are SONOS insistent in providing the absolute bare minimum codec support?! This ARC issue only occurs when outputting Dolby Digital. I can change the output of my TV to PCM and my AV receiver will provide full 5.1, with no audio delay, over ARC, from the TV. SONOS, for some completely nonsensical reason, have insisted on only providing 2 channel support for PCM. It's not like this is a licensing issue, so I really don't understand the logic here. Simply adding PCM 5.1 support would work around this issue!

As it stands, there's literally no way to make this work with any SONOS AV equipment, if you want surround audio output from external devices. This has meant that I, and I'm sure huge amounts others, have had to return over £1000 worth of equipment. How much is this losing SONOS as a company?

And when was the PLAYBAR designed?

I haven't mentioned PLAYBAR or BASE anywhere above, except to mention that optical should work to them. I've made no comments to suggest that the hardware involved in these instances hold any kind of design limitation. That being said, clearly they do carry limitations, but only that derived from age. Clealy, common sense would dictate, when mentioning HDMI, or ARC, I'm referring to the BEAM.


I'd suggest that the Beam was one of the early users of the HDMI-ARC for speakers.

Nonsense, ARC has been around for an eternity. Hence my ability to test it using my ~7 year old AV receiver. Now relying on ARC exclusively however, perhaps was lead by SONOS. I would argue that considering this, it was perhaps SONOS' responsibilty to ensure this was properly tested before marketing it to paying customers. LG, Sony and (I believe) Panasonic are all affected by the ARC audio delay - not exactly small manufacturers. Now, SONOS either didn't realise this issue existed ahead of time, meaning their QA is not satisfactory, or they knew, but had sunk too much money into R&D, so just pushed ahead, letting the consumer reap the benefits. Either option is clearly not acceptable.


I consider the adherence to Dolby Digital and Stereo as the only options to be an aspect of the fact that the majority of devices that they've shipped are based on optical connections.

So you're defending SONOS releasing a brand new piece of equipment, limited in functionality in such a way that it actually causes compatibility problems in certain situations, purely because that's what the old equipment had?


I'll never expect a company that appears to be focused on ease of use and maximum market share to be a company that makes wild bets on tech that hasn't penetrated the marketplace to a certain extent

I'm not sure who you think suggested SONOS should be pushing cutting edge standards. The issues have come about, in part, because SONOS have tried to do things differently. Where every other AV equipment vendor bundles all the codecs they can manage on their equipment, SONOS seems to think it's better to include the bare minimum. As mentioned in the above post, simply adding PCM 5.1 would solve this issue, provided this is an output option for the TV in question.


And frankly, I'm not sure what you can expect Sonos to say here in this thread that would be beneficial to the marketing strategy of the company.

It's called public relations. When your customers have an issue, generally it's good practice to have the courtesy to keep them updated on the issue, otherwise people get a bitter taste in their mouths. At the very least, this could have an update post summarising that no progress has been made with the TV manufacturers. Clearly this wouldn't be the answer people want to hear, but this would at least show some level of respect towards the customer, and earn a certain amount of respect in return.


You're so heavily defending SONOS here, but do you not think that a large manufacturer should carry some level of responsibility for their equipment working correctly in the way it was designed to function? The fundamental failing here lies with the TV manufacturers, but their outlook can be understood to a point - ARC is simply one feature of many that their equipment supports and, up until recently, was fairly lightly utilised. SONOS, however, rely almost exclusively on ARC for the functionality of the BEAM, considering the fact that it doesn't work correctly with TVs from the largest manufactures makes the BEAM essentially not fit for purpose - You can bet SONOS aren't letting customers know about this ahead of purchase, despite proven knowledge of the issue. That's clearly unacceptable.

The bottom line here is that SONOS have a relatively simple action they can take to lessen this impact, by adding 5.1 PCM support to the BEAM and any future AV devices. Not only would this fix the issue for numerous customers who are stuck with the BEAM, but would gain them custom from people such as me, who returned the BEAM (and SUB), but would happily (and eagerly) buy again should this audio delay issue be resolved.

Just had my playbase and LG Oled TV installed. Experiencing lip sync delay. It is not consistent. Sometimes it appears synced and others times not especially when I first start watching. It seems to work well when playing Netflix.

This issue is all over the internet. It seems like people give up.

I’m using a playbase, LG C7 oled, and Xbox one S. There’s a delay when the Xbox is set to bitstream surround, but not uncompressed stereo.

The way I mitigated the audio delay was by running my optical directly to the playbase, from the Xbox one s. Not ideal because you give up the TVs switch capability. but it works.

The problems everyone seems to be having originates at the hdmi to tv/ tv optical out to playbar playbase pass through.

The sonos app has an audio delay, but it doesn't seem to have any effect. Super frustrating.

Either one of them, whether it be LG or Sonos should/ could step up. The common denominator is Sonos- difference is thier av sync function is not robust.. other sound bar manufacturers offer much more flexibility in regards to this feature.

I have seen on threads this problem with different brands of tvs and sound bars, but the combo most of the people posting here has a Sonos playbar/ playbase, and in turn seems to be one of the most common generally speaking.

It would be nice to have a combo of remedies to mitigate the problem.

I just set up LG C9 65” with the playbar and the audio synch was pretty bad (audio slower than video). I found a setting that seemed to help. On the LG optical out menu I changed it from “auto” to “pass through” and it seemed to be a big help. I also set my xfinity box to Dolby 5.1 and my Apple TV to Dolby 5.1. I am still testing it out a bit during the playbar return period. But it seems like pass through may have worked for now.

if not I will try the hdmi switch next although I would rather not deal with that if it can be avoided.

Would be interested to know if the audio pass through setting works for others.