Enthusiast II

Answered

Sonos Arc Muddy/Bottoming out Bass

1406 replies
193224 views

Beyond thrilled to receive the new Sonos Arc. True played my room and I have loudness on as well connected to LG B8 using Tidal and Spotify. Most of the sound range is phenomenal, aside from the bass. At even half volume the woofers are extremely muddy and sound terrible. Not sure if this is because I have under two hours of use but I wasn’t expecting to have to break-in the speaker. I own set of speakers next to it in the same room (KEF LS50W) and the difference is night and day. There have also been posts on Reddit regarding this issue. It is interesting given no reviewers have mentioned this issue but more than a few recipients have. Has anyone else experienced similar issues? Turning loudness off helps but it is disappointing for such a highly anticipated product.

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Scott - SonosAnswer

Sonos Product Management

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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akawoj

Lyricist III

I’m very happy with current sound (after fixes) - but only below 30-40% of volume. When you try to make the ARC louder (not to maximum, but near 50-60%) you will get bass problems. I’m really hoping that Sonos team can fix it. For starter there should be setting to automatic switch bass boost off after reaching 30-40% of volume.

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mikecousins

Lyricist III

I got a video of it during the Friends theme song which is not even a bass heavy song.

Latest software, fresh tune, +0 treble, +0 bass, loudness on, 20% volume. Listen to the whomp, whomp, whomp...

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maurice.pothoven

Trending Lyricist II

I got a video of it during the Friends theme song which is not even a bass heavy song.

Latest software, fresh tune, +0 treble, +0 bass, loudness on, 20% volume. Listen to the whomp, whomp, whomp...

Damn that sounds just AWFUL! You should contact support for a replacement

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mikecousins

Lyricist III

Here’s the test song they asked me to play. Listen to the bass get messed up at the 0:12 mark.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQYL7DOoKho

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Yiannis74

Here’s the test song they asked me to play. Listen to the bass get messed up at the 0:12 mark.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQYL7DOoKho

I can definitely hear the bass problem there. Out of curiosity, what is the volume level?

Interestingly I can also hear the metallic sound in the upper midrange / treble. It is like the treble eq slider is way up. Have you changed the EQ settings when you recorded this or is everything at ‘neutral’?

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mikecousins

Lyricist III

Same settings as the other one but maybe 30% volume this time. Loudness on, bass and treble at 0.

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maurice.pothoven

Trending Lyricist II

Tested mine with eq bass +7 and volume on 40%. Bass is just fine

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HvdW

Lyricist I

This week I installed my Arc with my Samsung The Frame. I started searching on Google for “Sonos Arc no bass” and I ended up in this thread, because I have the same issue.

I own 3 playbars and a bunch of other Sonos equipment, but since we have moved to our new house I bought the Arc and 6 additional Ones for our new house. I must say the Arc was disappointing from the get go. I found it to be incomparable to the Playbars who have always blown me away with their performance.

The bass is terrible, distorted (even at low volumes) and for music it is not suitable. I did not watch a movie on a significant volume yet. For tv with a lot of dialogue it is ok, however sometimes the internal speakers of the frame even sound better.

When playing Solomun - The Way Back with Trueplay activated it sounds terrible. By skipping Trueplay it sounds slightly better especially when tweaking the surround speakers (making them more important).

Probably going to buy the sub this weekend because this is not what I expected it to be… Most dissapointing experience with Sonos after buying about 20 Sonos devices over the years. Especially looking at the premium price tag.

The Arc is situated about 40 cm below the Samsung 2020 The Frame (65”) on a wooden cabinet not attached to the wall. When sitting on the sofa the Arc is about at chest height.

Any help is appreciated… I have been a Sonos beta tester before, so I’d be happy to help if needed.

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Dysfunctional

Enthusiast II

Tested mine with eq bass +7 and volume on 40%. Bass is just fine

Do you have the sub?

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maurice.pothoven

Trending Lyricist II

Tested mine with eq bass +7 and volume on 40%. Bass is just fine

Do you have the sub?

Yes but I disabled both the sub and surrounds for the test ;)