As i mentioned on Reddit. I love RTINGS have been using their website for 4 years at least. But their soundbar reviews are non-sensical. I believe their measurements. But I don’t think that quite translates to the audio experience one gets with the product.

An example of this is the Beam and Playbar. I previously owned the playbar and have many friends and my brother with Beams in their living rooms. While I say the beam is a good product there is no way in hell they compare. Yet, RTINGS gives the Beam a higher score for mixed use, for MOVIES?? I just cant justify that. If you watch a movie with a playbar you feel so much more immersed in the content compared to a Beam.

Edit: They also compare SONOS soundbars be it the beam, the playbar or the Arc with other soundbars that come with Sub plus rears (even if those are more expensive) and say things like the $1000+ Q90R is better than the $600→ $700 playbar (obviously if you have a sub and surrounds youll get better surround, better low end, etc etc etc). They have yet to evaluate sonos soundbars with surrounds or with the sub. 

I do still find their measurements valuable but I wouldnt use it to compare or estimate which soundbar is better. That is just so subjective, and theres a lot that you just cant evaluate from frequency ranges, dymaic range etc. I am an engineer myself and while I understand those terms and measurements. They just dont quite encompass the whole picture on how much you will like a soubdbar.

Just received this email via Sonos…

Hi *********,

My name is Alex and I'm a supervisor here at Sonos. Our team is still looking into the issue you've reported and are working to address it in a future software update. For the community, we have recently made some changes to our internal teams, which may be why you're seeing longer times to a response there than usual.

We certainly understand that isn't ideal, and apologize for the inconvenience along the way.

If you do have any questions or need further assistance, please let me know.

Best,
Alex C. 
Supervisor | Sonos Customer Experience Team

The changes to the internal teams must mean the layoffs that were reported and the community people from Sonos are no longer active, which many have already noted here. 

At least it notes that they are still looking into the issue and will address it in a future update.  Details are vague but at least it’s something.

Everyone know that sonos will continue to improve Arc and tweak the sound for a long time. This is just the start I understand the frustration and that some people are not willing to risk it. But they just finished development on their new soundbar. Now it is all about improving and bringing new features to us. Thats what most of the team focuses on. This email makes sense to me. This is a weird time at sonos and in the whole world for sure

Thanks bbalz, it’s pretty annoying the service we were getting post arc. 

To be fair, we do NOT “know” that Sonos is going to tweak and/or improve the sound of the Arc for a long time.  At best, we can say “everyone HOPES” Sonos will continue to tweak and improve the Arc.  But there are no guarantees in life.  Laying off a large chunk of their support staff after prematurely releasing a half-baked “flagship” product is not a great way to inspire confidence in the consumer.

I mean they have an excellent track record with supporting their products. For years and years.

also laying off staff? Have you read the news? So many companies going through this.

yeah it’s clear they were pressured to release the arc before it was truly ready. But my comment is more about their track record and how they will continue to work on it. As I said there’s a risk this doesn’t happen and it won’t be enough for some. 

Yes, we are all hoping that’s the case.  But if I bought a new car, realized it was plagued with issues after I drove it home and then found out that the manufacturer closed most of their service centers, I wouldn’t exactly have a warm fuzzy feeling either.  That’s all I’m saying. Hopefully Sonos steps up and makes the Arc sound like a flagship product - and soon.  In the mean time, they deserve every return and bad review for rushing the product to market before it was ready.

+1 Sonos has a track record for adding features, new streaming services, tweaks to the app etc. But they are in uncharted territory with the ARC boondoggle. Don't accept a flawed, keeping it and hoping for the best seems like a terrible decision imo. 

@Jean C. Ive seen you’re active in the other thread for the tinny sound. Can you or someone else circle back with the community regarding this issue. Many users are still experiencing issues and return deadlines are approaching. Many are also dissapointed with Sonos radio silence . I think some response here would calm some anxieties people are getting about Sonos having moved on from this issue 

Just looked don’t know why I didn’t earlier at the build date of my arc- March 2020 - I can’t imagine the reviewers had earlier builds than 3 months prior? It hadn’t even been announced at that point

Mine was March 16th

Maybe the reviewers had later builds?

Where abouts is the build number written? I can’t see it anywhere on the bar just the serial number but no production date?

It was the Sonos support that told me. I was asking about the last date for which I can return my Arc. She told me that my Arc shipped only March 16. Which obviously makes no sense since it was only available for preorder in May. 
she later corrected herself and told me that March 16th was the manufacturing date. 

Chatted with support again and they are still insistent that a fix is coming and that it is software, not hardware. Even though I’ve already confirmed that I’ve run all the updates, we reset everything again. Still having the same issues with the low end most noticeably. I reinforced that communication has really been lacking - especially here on this forum. I also suggested that if they are really that confident that they can make Arc sound better for everyone that they offer an extended return window for anyone who has submitted a ticket. This would give us the reassurance that we’ll be happy with the product and for me, would make me more inclined to keep this while they figure this out. Not sure they’ll do that, but she said she’d pass that idea along.

It looks like mine was made in April. That was difficult to find

How can you tell the build date?

Look at the 4 digits before serial number YYMM

On the Arc itself or in the app?

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.

Thank you Scott, I have the utmost confidence that you guys will work out the kinks in the Sonos ARC and App.

@Scott - Sonos, @Jean C.: A number of people in multiple threads in this forum have proposed that Sonos allow greater manual control over EQ.  Probably finer-grained EQ control than just highs, mids, lows. I think that would go a long way towards addressing some of these issues since people’s listening experiences are so subjective. I have a pair of ear buds that come with a killer EQ app and it’s that app that really makes the difference. This of course assumes that the issues people are reporting are not hardware issues.  And even that might not be enough and Sonos may want to consider providing app control over the “effects” like surround and height.

I’m a software engineer and I realize that this is not something Sonos could pull off overnight.  Just wanted to add my vote to this request.

Maybe also being able to adjust the volume of the upper woofers, like the surround.

Do you guys really think Sonos is going to add a bunch of additional EQ settings and/or separate volume controls for the different drivers in the Arc?  I don’t see this as a likely scenario, but maybe I’m wrong.  Sonos tends to take the Apple style approach of “it just works” with less available configuration vs. the highly configurable and complicated approach.

I think it’s much more likely that Sonos tweaks the sound themselves with software updates vs. exposing a whole bunch of EQ controls which 99% of their customers don’t want to mess with.