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arpatil1
Enthusiast II
June 17, 2020
Answered

Sonos Arc - Metallic Sound

Hi All.

It’s a relief that Sonos has identified the bug that’s causing the bass distortion in Sonos Arc. Thank you @Ryan S for working with the Sonos Communty to identify the problem quickly.

Having said this, I believe that Sonos still needs more work to make the Arc sound as it was advertised. Currently, multiple people on Reddit including myself are reporting the highs being too high which sort of feels “harsh”. This improve the speech clarity and brings out details in the movies, but the warmth in speech is lost because the voices sound thin and metallic (for eg. actors I know having heavy voices don’t sound heavy). I was expecting the mid-range to be a lot better considering the Arc has 8 woofers. 

I have tried TruPlaying twice without success (Turning TruPlay off produces muffled sound). Adjusting the treble also did not help much. Loudness turned on and off does not make a big difference either. May be, this is how the Arc is tuned?!

 Anyone else feels that Arc is over-emphasizing the highs with compromised mids?

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    Scott - SonosAnswer
    Sonos Product Management
    July 2, 2020

    Hello everyone. I’m a product manager at Sonos. Thank you for sharing your experiences with Arc. The development team is monitoring this community and listening to your feedback. 

    As we do with all Sonos products, we’ll continue to improve the experience for Arc through numerous software updates into the future. Last week we issued our first update (12.0.1) to fix a bug some customers were experiencing with low-frequency distortion at higher volumes. 

    If you have specific music tracks or timestamps for TV shows and movies that you want to bring to our attention, please use this form. It is helpful if you can submit a diagnostic when you’re listening to the content. Instructions for doing so can be found here.

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    jonmichael
    jonmichael
    Enthusiast II
    July 25, 2022

    So, I see the post on the home page about a “Clarity upgrade” for the Arc. After 40 pages of complaints about the sound quality, especially the rampant sibilants, I am starting to reconsider my planned October purchase of an Arc+sub+surrounds.

    Has this newly hatched upgrade helped anyone who has had this problem? Should I stay or should I go?

    Translate
    Old guy with toys.
      Ken_Griffiths
      Ken_Griffiths
      July 25, 2022

      So, I see the post on the home page about a “Clarity upgrade” for the Arc. After 40 pages of complaints about the sound quality, especially the rampant sibilants, I am starting to reconsider my planned October purchase of an Arc+sub+surrounds.

      Has this newly hatched upgrade helped anyone who has had this problem? Should I stay or should I go?

      Last post here in the thread (before yours) was a month ago, so maybe that helps to answer your question?… if not, just stick around anyway.😀

      You’ll always find those in support and those against, but the real answer here is to just try things for yourself, as there is a Sonos 100-day returns policy and money back guarantee in any case.

      Translate
        Keithmac
        Virtuoso
        July 25, 2022

        I have Playbar, Sub and Surrounds. Read too much bad press about the Arc to warranty upgrading at the moment.

        Even there newest update 14.12?, has multiple complaints about the Sub.

        At least they've nearly sorted the 14.06 Surround connectivity problems out.

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          jonmichael
          jonmichael
          Enthusiast II
          July 25, 2022

          So, I see the post on the home page about a “Clarity upgrade” for the Arc. After 40 pages of complaints about the sound quality, especially the rampant sibilants, I am starting to reconsider my planned October purchase of an Arc+sub+surrounds.

          Has this newly hatched upgrade helped anyone who has had this problem? Should I stay or should I go?

          Last post here in the thread (before yours) was a month ago, so maybe that helps to answer your question?… if not, just stick around anyway.😀

          You’ll always find those in support and those against, but the real answer here is to just try things for yourself, as there is a Sonos 100-day returns policy and money back guarantee in any case.

          Yep, last post here was a month ago alright, but I just got here! I expect to stick around!😊

          Translate
          Old guy with toys.
            ledzep1
            Headliner II
            July 26, 2022

            So, I see the post on the home page about a “Clarity upgrade” for the Arc. After 40 pages of complaints about the sound quality, especially the rampant sibilants, I am starting to reconsider my planned October purchase of an Arc+sub+surrounds.

            Has this newly hatched upgrade helped anyone who has had this problem? Should I stay or should I go?

             

            This metallic sound is an ancient topic now, I think it was improved over time, but also I think a lot were making rash statements about it sounding bright when the ARC, like any speaker needs time to “bed in”

            Thats my experience anyway, as when I first purchased, mine sounded bright “metallic” sounding but over time it improved and I no longer get that problem, (perhaps firmware improved it) but Im pretty certain “bed in” helped a lot.

            14.12 bought other issues. There is thread on here discussing it.

             

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            Toorg
            Trending Lyricist I
            October 22, 2022

            I own over 30 sonos speakers 7 tv's each one has a beam and my 135 inch screen projector screen has an Arc, I got to say it's the worst speaker sonos made. Regardless of the money factor the beam sounds way better in pretty much everything you throw at it. I'm happy I found this thread as I felt I'm loosing my mind, I tried to mount it over and under the screen , tried to tune it using ipad but nothing, the ARC sounds like a cheap speaker  specifically when dealing with voice from any source. Sonos please fix it or admit you have a shitty product and replace it for us . Side note I own it for enough time for it to bed in or whatever it needed to do and over the past year no improvement was made to my hears

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              Ken_Griffiths
              Ken_Griffiths
              October 22, 2022

              I own over 30 sonos speakers 7 tv's each one has a beam and my 135 inch screen projector screen has an Arc, I got to say it's the worst speaker sonos made. Regardless of the money factor the beam sounds way better in pretty much everything you throw at it. I'm happy I found this thread as I felt I'm loosing my mind, I tried to mount it over and under the screen , tried to tune it using ipad but nothing, the ARC sounds like a cheap speaker  specifically when dealing with voice from any source. Sonos please fix it or admit you have a shitty product and replace it for us . Side note I own it for enough time for it to bed in or whatever it needed to do and over the past year no improvement was made to my hears

              These online reviews can’t all be wrong. Perhaps it’s your ((h)ears🤔?), or your setup/environment...

              Translate
                Toorg
                Trending Lyricist I
                October 23, 2022

                I own over 30 sonos speakers 7 tv's each one has a beam and my 135 inch screen projector screen has an Arc, I got to say it's the worst speaker sonos made. Regardless of the money factor the beam sounds way better in pretty much everything you throw at it. I'm happy I found this thread as I felt I'm loosing my mind, I tried to mount it over and under the screen , tried to tune it using ipad but nothing, the ARC sounds like a cheap speaker  specifically when dealing with voice from any source. Sonos please fix it or admit you have a shitty product and replace it for us . Side note I own it for enough time for it to bed in or whatever it needed to do and over the past year no improvement was made to my hears

                These online reviews can’t all be wrong. Perhaps it’s your ((h)ears🤔?), or your setup/environment...

                Rting.com was the only source I trusted in your list and it was actually the review which triggered my sonos Arc purchase , apparently they also do paid reviews as my hears works just fine and environment that works for beam should work for the ARC, thank you for the educated reply. 

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                  Ken_Griffiths
                  Ken_Griffiths
                  October 23, 2022

                  Rting.com was the only source I trusted in your list and it was actually the review which triggered my sonos Arc purchase , apparently they also do paid reviews as my hears works just fine and environment that works for beam should work for the ARC, thank you for the educated reply. 

                  I have both the Beam (gen2) and Arc …and the Arc’s sound is superior when placed in the same Living Room here. If it’s not your environment …and/or Trueplay/EQ customisation hasn’t resolved the sound issues for you, then have you considered your Arc might be faulty, or whatever device is connected and sending the audio to it?

                  You can always go onto submit a Sonos diagnostic report from the ‘Settings/Support’ area of the Sonos App. Make a note of the reference generated and when practicable, contact/chat to Sonos Support Staff about the matter via this LINK and see what they can suggest to resolve your matter.

                  Paid or unpaid reviews - my earlier post was just pointing out a small random sample from a good ‘many’ reviews online that all speak very favourably when it comes to the Arc …and many Arc users have posted to say the same thing too. 

                  However we all hear things differently, I guess …and if the Arc is not faulty and the audio output is simply inot to your own liking, then you’re probably best to sell it on and replace it with something you are satisfied with.

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                  Airgetlam
                  Airgetlam
                  October 23, 2022

                  I’m sure the folks at rtings would be happy to be paid by the manufacturers for their review process. ;)

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                  Bruce
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