Enthusiast II

Answered

Sonos Arc Muddy/Bottoming out Bass

1406 replies
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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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AndrewLC

Enthusiast I

Ftm that being the case is the Arc as amazing as you expected it to be? Did you happen to upgrade from another Sonos Soundbar?

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sebas1509

Enthusiast II

Got the sub today, easy set up as always. I can confirm that the sub takes care of the arcs bass issues. All the films I've watched which had the distorted bass all sound spot on now. That's with the sub set to -3

we really gotta stop saying “bass issues “ the bass issue was fixed already with yesterday’s firmware.

if you properly updated and have any issues you might have a defective unit but the widespread bass issue was fixed

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maurice.pothoven

Trending Lyricist II

I think the issue now shifts more towards the point of:

it doesn’t sound near as good as people claim in reviews. There hardly is any bass (without sub)

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arpatil1

Enthusiast II

I think the issue now shifts more to the point of:

it doesn’t sound near as good as people claim in reviews. There hardly is any bass (without sub)

LOL. This is never-ending.

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sebas1509

Enthusiast II

Ftm that being the case is the Arc as amazing as you expected it to be? Did you happen to upgrade from another Sonos Soundbar?

You’re going to have to try the arc for yourself! Many are happy with theirs others say it’s HORRIBLE. Honestly not sure why some people claim that.

but the bass issue was fixed no distortion or cracking anymore. Some say music sounded better in playbar. I think that will come to personal taste in how the soundbars are tuned and the speaker configurations etc. So if you can sample it in a store If not order and try it out and make your own mind

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Masterpopper

Lyricist III

Got the sub today, easy set up as always. I can confirm that the sub takes care of the arcs bass issues. All the films I've watched which had the distorted bass all sound spot on now. That's with the sub set to -3

we really gotta stop saying “bass issues “ the bass issue was fixed already with yesterday’s firmware.

if you properly updated and have any issues you might have a defective unit but the widespread bass issue was fixed

The bass issue most certainly is NOT fixed. My arc is updated and still sounding like crap on the low ends, especially in movie scenes. It’s not a lack of bass, it sounds like something is seriously wrong with the speaker. Maybe I have a lemon here, but it sounds like I’m not the only one!

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sebas1509

Enthusiast II

I think the issue now shifts more towards the point of:

it doesn’t sound near as good as people claim in reviews. There hardly is any bass (without sub)

I can assure you this is flat out a lie. Barely any bass? There’s plenty of bass sometimes too much. I had a playbar before and the bass here is more prominent.

ofncourse it wont compete with a subwoofer. I don’t see how you claim reviewers had it better many are happy with their arcs.

another thing might be your room if it’s huge and open space you might not hear as strong of a bass compared to a smaller space

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arpatil1

Enthusiast II

I think the issue now shifts more towards the point of:

it doesn’t sound near as good as people claim in reviews. There hardly is any bass (without sub)

I can assure you this is flat out a lie. Barely any bass? There’s plenty of bass sometimes too much. I had a playbar before and the bass here is more prominent.

ofncourse it wont compete with a subwoofer. I don’t see how you claim reviewers had it better many are happy with their arcs.

another thing might be your room if it’s huge and open space you might not hear as strong of a bass compared to a smaller space

Yeah. There is plenty of bass for sure. It just needs to be much tighter and composed.

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Masterpopper

Lyricist III

I think the issue now shifts more towards the point of:

it doesn’t sound near as good as people claim in reviews. There hardly is any bass (without sub)

I can assure you this is flat out a lie. Barely any bass? There’s plenty of bass sometimes too much. I had a playbar before and the bass here is more prominent.

ofncourse it wont compete with a subwoofer. I don’t see how you claim reviewers had it better many are happy with their arcs.

another thing might be your room if it’s huge and open space you might not hear as strong of a bass compared to a smaller space

This is a thread to talk about the issues going on with the arc. I’m glad yours is fixed but many people are still having issues. Maybe different hardware?

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craigski

Local Superstar

Anyone with RTINGS early access can see some prelim graphs on THD, Frequency Response etc.

https://www.rtings.com/soundbar/reviews/sonos/arc

Will be updated in a few days.

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