Enthusiast II

Answered

Sonos Arc Muddy/Bottoming out Bass

1406 replies
193355 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.

Show previous replies

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Cherr1020

Lyricist III

This is pretty serious, and it shows the obvious issue in the ARC. I’m still keeping my ARC turned off, until their is software repair. I don’t want to take a chance in blowing my expensive speaker.

Drink

P

Pawl

Lyricist III

I wanted to post Peter’s comprehensive review on the ARC, I thought everyone should check it out.

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Clark2j2

Lyricist I

I’ve made this thread into a drinking game. Every time that same video appears you take a drink. Harsh midrange? Drink. S2? You know it. The only thing you can’t drink for is muddy bass, the thread topic.

You’re gonna blackout when Ryan posts that the update is released lol

On a more serious note, Ryan, do you have an update to the software fix prior to heading into the weekend?

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MikeBurrows92

Trending Lyricist I

This is pretty serious, and it shows the obvious issue in the ARC. I’m still keeping my ARC turned off, until their is software repair. I don’t want to take a chance in blowing my expensive speaker.

Grow up. The software is doing this to protect the speaker

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Jacobjacobi

Trending Lyricist I

This is pretty serious, and it shows the obvious issue in the ARC. I’m still keeping my ARC turned off, until their is software repair. I don’t want to take a chance in blowing my expensive speaker.

Drink

Cheers

Ryan S

Retired Sonos Staff

I’ve made this thread into a drinking game. Every time that same video appears you take a drink. Harsh midrange? Drink. S2? You know it. The only thing you can’t drink for is muddy bass, the thread topic.

You’re gonna blackout when Ryan posts that the update is released lol

On a more serious note, Ryan, do you have an update to the software fix prior to heading into the weekend?

Hi @Clark2j2, no major change since the last update. We expect the software release to be implemented as early as next week.

Mark good posts by pressing the like button, and select the best answer on questions you've asked to help others find solutions.

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And2

Lyricist II

Okay so I thought I didn't have this issue but it looks like I do I just played a 40hz test tone song by Bass Junkie through Spotify and once the volume gets louder the bass wobbles

Same here. Not happening with the Sub active, but without the Sub the test 40Hz sound wobbles on the Arc at over 50% volume and is completely cut (almost no sound) over 75% or so.

Didn’t notice a problem before as the setup has the Sub active all the time, but can see how it can be a deal-breaker for somebody using it without the Sub. I should probably wait for the fix rather than torment myself with additional tests, though. :-)

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Highfalutintodd

Prominent Collaborator I

Just added a Sub (gen 2) yesterday and haven’t heard the bass issue since. Now it just sounds as awesome as I was hoping it would in the first place. Obviously the underlying issue is still there and Sonos definitely needs to fix it, but with the Sub added I can’t hear the problem at all.

Arc + Sub 3 + One SLs = Awesome and Loving It!

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pyro225

Enthusiast II

Check your emails everyone..