Requesting an update on Multichannel PCM in ARC

You say that as if that should be the status quo. I don’t know of many other companies that aren’t willing to at least provide some boilerplate response to a highly requested update on a flagship product. None that are still in business anyway.

Customers don’t provide money to companies that don’t support their products. I’m hoping they’ll do the right thing.

I’m really just looking for an indication of whether it’s still a priority for them or not within a reasonable time-frame. I will be unable to use the ARC as a home theater sound bar without this feature and have to decide between returning it or buying more Sonos gear to complete the home theater setup. If a company can ask me to make an $1800 sound bar system purchase then I feel like it’s not unreasonable for me to be able to ask “Hey, is it going to work soon?”

 If not then I’ll gladly accept that and find a different product.

That’s a rather vague requirement, and honestly I think they already provided that when they stated it was coming later.   Would you be satisfied if they answered yes...but it turns out it was #10 on their list (not that you would ever know) and didn’t come out till next June...if they thought that was reasonable?

Sonos has been careful with releasing this sort of information as there is very little upside and plenty of downside.  If they give a date, they run the risk of missing the date and disappointed customers.  Even if they hit the date, some customers will fill it should have been done faster.  It makes sense to only give a date when there is little chance you won’t make that date.

If I were you, I never would have bought the Arc until it did what I needed it to.  But regardless, in your situation I would return the Arc, and decide to waint until it has the features I need, or go with another product.

Isn’t Multichannel PCM something you would automatically expect to be on a high end soundbar?

I’m no expert on all the sound formats but my last soundbar supported the lot apart from atmos which is why I purchased the ARC, I don’t think anyone wants a precise date but nothing stops Sonos keeping owners of the Arc updated with progress such as “it’s in the works”.

It is quite unfortunate, but recently Sonos has restructured their support staff. In the process they had let go long-time staff member Ryan S. Ryan went to great lengths to help us and indeed had worked with the engineers at Sonos to solve our problems.

The new support staff, I feel, has less contact with the engineering team. Moreover, I suspect they do not have a lot of freedom in the type of answers they can provide. Usually, they answer using very courteous canned responses, often based in a few keywords in the sender’s message. If that doesn’t work they ask for a diagnostic. They probably have some automated tool that will flag problems with that file. Then, if that doesn’t help they ask you to call the ever-busy support line. I do not think they have much access to what bug-reporting/development tracking tool. 

All the above is a very long way of saying that we are experiencing a decline in Sonos’ support offerings due to cost-cutting measures. Therefore, I am hardly surprised with the lack of updates (this does not mean to say that the support staff isn’t trying. It’s just that I think they are quite limited).

What do I suggest: email Patrick Spence, the CEO (his email is prominent on the support webpage), and let him know directly what you are feeling. I presume he does not peruse these forums so he may be unaware of the displeasure of some customers. Surely he must read some percentage of emails...

@Wolf it looks like it might be coming out next month, according to the CEO’s answer to your tweet 😃 Good news!