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Audio delay for TV to wireless speakers

  • August 24, 2024
  • 11 replies
  • 2663 views

I have a TV with an Arc connected by HDMI, then two wireless speakers, an Era 100 and a Roam. They’re distributed around an open space, so my goal is to hear TV on all three speakers.

This works great with non TV, such as Spotify. But for TV audio, the wireless speakers are slightly delayed. It creates a bad sound similar to a school assembly in an echoy gym.

I’ve found audio sync features to make it worse, but none to make it better. For example in the Sonos app in settings there’s a Group Audio Delay, which _adds_ delay to the Era and Roam speakers (though doesn't add delay to the wired Arc).

I think what this really needs is a TV feature to delay the video, and then for the Sonos speakers to coordinate with each other and stay in sync.

I’d like to add a Sub to my system, but since that’s wireless too, I’m worried that it won’t work.

What confuses me is that I see you can use wireless speakers like the Era for surround sound. Is the delay in that case somehow solved? Or maybe the delay isn’t noticeable since the surround isn’t generally used for audio (so you can’t see lips out of sync)?

 

Best answer by Airgetlam

If speakers are ‘bonded’ as either surround speakers or the Sub to the Arc, there are no ‘sync issues’, as they are all part of the same Sonos ‘room’. 

Any ‘room’ that you group with a Sonos Home Theater input (TV via HDMI) will have a 75ms delay between the Home Theater room and any/all grouped rooms…for the TV only. Any streamed data / music will have already paid that buffering tax, and play in sync across all rooms.

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11 replies

Airgetlam
  • Answer
  • August 25, 2024

If speakers are ‘bonded’ as either surround speakers or the Sub to the Arc, there are no ‘sync issues’, as they are all part of the same Sonos ‘room’. 

Any ‘room’ that you group with a Sonos Home Theater input (TV via HDMI) will have a 75ms delay between the Home Theater room and any/all grouped rooms…for the TV only. Any streamed data / music will have already paid that buffering tax, and play in sync across all rooms.


  • Author
  • Contributor I
  • August 27, 2024

Thanks for the info. So that’s good for the Sub; it will be bonded and won’t have the delay.

Do you know if there’s any way to remove the delay for the other speakers that aren’t surround or sub? My use case for those is to get the TV sound closer. My family room & kitchen are connected, no wall between them, so from the kitchen you can see the TV, but with kitchen noises it’s difficult to hear it.

 


Stanley_4
  • Lead Maestro
  • August 27, 2024

At that distance the delay may not be an issue, there would be a few ms delay just from the distance plus masking due to volume levels.


  • Author
  • Contributor I
  • August 27, 2024

The delay’s an issue unfortunately. The minimum delay you can set in the app is 75ms, which is enough to make it sound like you’re hearing an echo from noise reflecting off a concrete wall.

 


Forum|alt.badge.img+19
  • Senior Virtuoso
  • August 27, 2024

The delay’s an issue unfortunately. The minimum delay you can set in the app is 75ms, which is enough to make it sound like you’re hearing an echo from noise reflecting off a concrete wall.

 

The delay is how Sonos can achieve synchronised sound. When they first began, they had no tv speakers, so there was no reference point to show the delay, and that’s why the speaker combination you have works fine for music streaming. When they developed the Playbar they realised a shorter delay was needed to avoid lip-sync issues, so the soundbars have about a 30msec delay - but only to the speaker connected to the tv. So, when you group other speakers, they have the longer delay and the “echo” is the inevitable and unavoidable consequence. 


  • Author
  • Contributor I
  • August 27, 2024

Yeah, that is what I expected. I just don’t understand how the surround/sub can stay in sync with the sound bar. I thought the delay was because of going through my wifi network. But if the sub/surround can stay in sync, that seems not to be the case.

 


press250
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  • Prodigy III
  • August 27, 2024

Yeah, that is what I expected. I just don’t understand how the surround/sub can stay in sync with the sound bar. I thought the delay was because of going through my wifi network. But if the sub/surround can stay in sync, that seems not to be the case.

 

Hi @Mochi1976, speakers bonded to the soundbar (surround, sub) do not use your Wi-Fi; they connect directly with the soundbar via a dedicated wireless link.


  • Author
  • Contributor I
  • August 28, 2024

Ah, thank you, that’s the piece I was missing. This all makes sense now. I just wish the audio shop that I bought these from had understood that this setup wouldn’t work.

 


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  • Prodigy II
  • August 28, 2024

Ah, thank you, that’s the piece I was missing. This all makes sense now. I just wish the audio shop that I bought these from had understood that this setup wouldn’t work.

 

Best thing to do is simply buy another Era 100 and set them both up as surrounds. Then all will be in sync. (For music playback, in the Surround settings, you would select Full so the music plays in stereo across the soundbar and surrounds, as long as you have the left and right surround on the correct sides of the room).

And use the Roam elsewhere.


  • Author
  • Contributor I
  • August 30, 2024

We’ve wondered about that. Right now I have too many speakers, since the Era in the kitchen doesn’t do what it was intended for. I’m nervous about the solution to too many speakers being to buy more speakers :)

And I’m not sure if I’d be able to make that work. With the Arc/Sub plus two Eras it will want to give me 5.1 sound. I’m skeptical that I would be able to get the system to give me 3.1 on Arc/Sub, and then downmix to mono on the Eras.

 


buzz
  • August 30, 2024

Maybe you can improve the situation by adjusting voice sync. It will be a trade off.

In addition to SONOS introduced latencies and voice sync fumbles by video sources, you have the physics of pokey sound propagation. Sound travels at about one foot per millisecond. If you have speaker and listener ‘A’ separated from ‘B’ by 30 feet, ‘A’ and ‘B’ will each claim the other is 30ms late, while listener ‘C’ standing at the midpoint will claim “equal’. All three listeners are correct. Reflections from walls, floors, and windows will arrive later — creating the “echoy gym” effect.