I have been dealing with seemingly random static/crackling on my rear channel Play 3s in my 5.1 setup (which also consists of a Playbar and Sub).
My Sonos system is running on Wifi via my Orbi Mesh network, not Sonosnet (switched it over a while back in an effort to address this problem and what seemed like communication issues between other Sonos components in our house--we have a lot. Helped with the rest, but still get the random rear channel noise on the 5.1 setup.) Our network is very fast and we have no other issues with it.
Most of what we watch is through Apple TV, either Apple content directly, Netflix, Prime, HBO Max, etc. It happens randomly on all of these, but most consistently through Netflix. Apple TV is set to output Dolby 5.1; I’ve adjusted these settings and it seems to make no difference.
Sound is passed through our TV (Sony XBR65X950H) with all the sound processing settings in the TV turned off, at least to my knowledge.
The problem seems to occur mostly at random, but more predictably when the rear channel sound is loud. It is very annoying. My guess it is interference in the communication between the Playbar and the rear Play 3s. Not sure what to do about that, though.
Any ideas or potential fixes?
Thanks in advance.