Sonos Arc Muddy/Bottoming out Bass

@armando.spataro 

Did Sonos outline a possible update/fix or what was the next step to resolve the issue please.

Great info, thanks

Unfortunately the only fix to resolve the issue was to turn Trueplay off.

I'm in a similar situation as you preferring the sound of Trueplay but it's a sacrifice I had to choose. I eventually purchased the sub, which resolved the issue entirely. However, this should not have to be a key selling point of having to force other products in order to make your "flagship" product to work properly.

I hope they this sorted out on the next firmware update as it continues to be an issue for others. Best of luck!

Hey Sonos Community,

I have some updates: It seems that the bass on my ARC has improved...not totally fixed but it's way better.

Apparently, the way the ARC was sitting on my entertainment center was causing more of a reverb for the bass during Trueplay?! I also noticed that the firmware was updated to 12.2.5, so not sure if the combination of the two was the solution.

So if any of you are still having issues, try the following:

- Retune your system under the new firmware.

- If your ARC sits on a large Entertainment Center, try shifting the ARC towards the front edge when tuning for Trueplay.

I hope this helps.

My replacement Arc arrived today. Original was a June 2020 build, with the replacement being a December 2020 model. Setup is standalone bar with no sub or surrounds. 
 

After having enough of constantly adjusting volume and bass EQ during movies, I’d finally gotten to a point where I contacted Sonos support and sent them a video. They agreed to swap it out but alas, no change. Trueplay on or off makes little difference to the booming bass. One would think that this level of distortion can’t be good for the drivers long term.

Only hope is that firmware can correct this now.  
 

Do you happen to have a photo of how the ARC is placed? I moved mine towards the front of the media cabinet and that helped big time.

Also, what kind of TV do you have? Curious if it could be an issue with the ARC (Audio Return Channel) HDMI port or inconsistency with apps?

I can't believe after all this time people think a firmware update is going to fix this issue! If only Sonos had released this soundbar stating that the sub was essential to produce room filling bass then no one would have ever complained. Instead it was sold as a standalone and those without 'extra' speakers were mostly left disappointed. Clever marketing to make people buy more products or make people leave the Sonos eco system and look elsewhere with ridiculous claims of what the Arc can achieve as a standalone unit?

I did the latter and glad I did... Wake up complaining Arc owners it'll never get any better with software, people have been saying that for 9 months now and it's rather boring. 

Did this problem ever get solved?

ive just purchased the arc but I do also have the sub 

but strangely I’m having the turn the bass up to around 10 to feel happy with the bass

i haven’t yet tried without the sub 

If you have the sub whatever you do, don't try without it!! 

Making me feel I should switch back to the beam

I’ve got 2 IKEA Symfonisk lamps, which are apparently based on the Sonos One. These relatively low-end speakers (in terms of price point) sound significantly better when playing music vs the Arc and Sub. With the Arc and Sub, when there’s a low amount of bass in a track, the audio sounds incredibly thin and lacking. It’s like you have the fullness of bass from the sub which fills the room perfectly, but then the Arc seems very “directional”, like a laptop speaker at the front of the room that is easily picked out.

I’m no audiophile and I’m not sure exactly what is missing, it just doesn’t sound right, especially given how fantastic the Symfonisk lamps and sub sound together.

I’ve added the Symfonisk lamps to the the Arc and Sub which has transformed the sound completely. Before this I tolerated the sound whilst watching TV or listening to music, now I’m listening to music just to enjoy the sound from the system. It’s quite a contrast.

Same problem - did everyone here upgrade from the beam? No reviews had this issue 

Sonos did in fact sort out the muddy bass, at least I am not experiencing anything since months back. Peter Pee has an excellent video on the best settings to use https://youtu.be/icKD2LRfzK4

I just got my ARC out of the box this afternoon and have been trying to set it up for about 2 hours.

It still sounds thinner than the actual internal speakers in my Bravia TV, and they sound really dreadful.

I'm going to try it for the weekend and if no good send it back.  I am so incredibly disappointed at the way the arc sounds in the balance of low mids to hf.

One scene, on a show I mixed for Netflix myself (so I know exactly how it's supposed to sound) the dialogue was so thin that there was virtually no difference cutting between an actor on the phone and present in the scene.

In fact the low bass is fine, about right I would say, even without the sub.  But the overall sound quality in the octaves above that is terrible.

How can this possibly still be so bad in a speaker that has been in production for over a year?

How did it ever get to market?

Have you performed Trueplay tuning and adjusted the EQ settings in the Sonos app? Have you turned off Night Sound and Speech Enhancement? Are you getting Dolby Digital Plus audio from Netflix or just stereo PCM?

Hi and thanks.

Yes I have run Trueplay several times on multiple IOS devices.  I have tried with the doors open / closed / halfway.

I'm getting Dolby Digital Plus via ARC and a good 5.1 signal.  I have tried night mode and that dialogue boost setting both on and off.

Are you saying the your system has a nice warm, natural sound? Because if yours does then I wonder if my system is actually faulty.

I am very pleased with the way my Arc setup sounds. When I watch Blu-ray discs with a Dolby TrueHD/Dolby Atmos soundtrack, it always blows me away.

It may just be that you don’t personally like the sound profile of the Arc.

Well here's a strange thing. I hooked up some rear surrounds and then did Trueplay again, with an iPad Air this time.  And I got a completely different, and much better result.

I'm having to dial in quite a lot of bass and wind down some treble to get the mid band to sound like normal speech. And of course this means that the actual low bass is a bit over emphasised.  It's a shame there aren't a few more bands in the EQ section. Just a 7 band EQ would make a  huge difference.

But overall its sounding much better now.

Are you running the sub in your set-up?

@Layback Glad you were able to improve the sound with the iPad.

Yes, I am using the Sub and two Play:1s as surrounds. The Sub makes a pretty big difference. I believe it allows the Arc to focus more on the mid range and higher frequencies while allowing the Sub to take care of the bass.

You'll love your system a lot if you add the SUB, or even dual subs.😊

I'm going to delete my original post, if I can.

One of my surrounds had a momentary 'seizure' and had to be reset to factory, so I lost my Truplay settings.

Now I've done them again the difference is extraordinary 👌

I don't know if the drivers in the bar maybe needed a bit of a run-in to loosen up, or perhaps the microphones provide some sort of ongoing feedback to the system to allow the DSP to continue to adjust the profile over time.

Either way the subjective sound quality now is a huge improvement over my initial experience.

I guess the life-lesson is, don't launch into print immediately.

I just bought my Arc a few days ago thinking that the bass issue has been resolved but I’m surprised to hear a similar issue. The bass is just bad and I’ve dialed down the bass level to just 2. True Play on or off doesn’t make a difference. The sound from my One SL is so much better than the Arc now. What else can i do?

Alvin Kyen

Don't give up. Keep at it.  Keep on doing Trueplay in the way shown in the YouTube demo.

I had different results each time  but incrementally better.  If you've got a One SL you can use then maybe try attaching it as a surround. I get the impression that Trueplay works better if the are more point sources in the room.  You could remove it again afterwards.

I'm on day 4 now and the differences from my first attempt is quite dramatic.

That sounds like lots of work for something so expensive 😅 I only have 1 unit of the One SL so i cant use it as a surround. How come i have this feeling that the Arc isn’t meant to be a standalone device?  

All I can say is, scroll up and look at how disappointed I was on day 1. I was going to send the Arc back to the store.  In fact I was really angry.

But it really is worth persevering with the Truplay thing.  I wasn't suggesting that it you use your other speaker as a permanent surround speaker.  Just hook it up to see if you get a better result when calibrating your room.  After that disconnect it if you need it elsewhere.

I got a pair of those Ikea Sonos speakers £100 each, and they work very nicely.

But I completely agree with you that a sound bar at this price point should sound better straight out of the box.