Enthusiast II

Era 300 rear driver is silent (with Arc Ultra)

393 replies
24998 views

First things first. This is not a rant. This is an expalation of a problem, which reduces the experience in 3D audio a lot. For background: I'm a sound engineer and music producer and I don't wanna sound arrogant, but I know what I'm talking about. (I'm a really nice and funny guy :D)

So lets get to the problem then :D

NO I'M NOT TALKING ABOUT THE FRONT FACING DRIVER

for better understanding watch this VIDEO

This bug appeared the moment I switched the Arc with the Arc Ultra. Before I made the switch I was on the 16.1 app and firmware. So I don't know if the Ultra causes the problem or the app/firmware. Before the switch everything was running as it should.

So, since there is not much of a topic around this, I'm curious if I am still one of a few who have this bug or one of a few who noticed it.

I made this post in Reddit, but not everyone is on Reddit and the more people know, the faster Sonos can work on it. Reddit discussion

I didn't saw any review which mentioned it.
As you can see in the video, the rear driver is completly silenent when the Era 300's are paired with the Arc Ultra. Also Truplay isn't "sweeping" the driver either. (Timestamp 0:44)
So the mesurement isn't right.
First I thought it could be a feature instead of a bug, but it doens't fit the Dolby Atmos recommendations like this. You won't get sound from "behind" your seating position.
And I remember Sonos self promoted it how it should work, where the rear driver is playing.

DOLBY ATMOS LAYOUT

Sound from side driver/channel should boucing off your side walls, rear driver/channel bouncing off the back wall of your seating position and height channel obviosly bouncing off your ceiling. Thats why you should position them facing forward. At the moment you don't get the immersion that sound is coming from behind you, since the driver is silent.

I tested every setting, played the Dolby Atmos testfile (MKV [TrueHD Atmos] and MP4 [EAC3 + joc Atmos]) from different sources (TV Plex app, Nvidia Shield, from a USB through TV) Same result everytime.

If someone could test this behavior and can confirm this, it would be very nice. Sonos can't fix something they don't know and if most people doens't recognize doens't mean something isn't wrong.

Currently I'm running app version 80.12.04 (Android) and 80.12.03 (iPhone) and firmware version 81.1-58210.
If you don't have this problem, what version are you running?

And last but not least: IF this ever getting fixed, the experience with Arc Ultra and Era 300 will be much better! I love my Sonos products soundwise and Arc Ultra is sounding really good, but it could be much better.

Have a nice day

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Pinned Reply By Jamie A

Hi all, thank you all for your patience.

I was going to post at the same time as Keith on Reddit, however I wasn’t able to. I see that the link to the reddit post has already been copied here, but just to confirm what you've already discovered, this is expected behaviour as explained by our audio team.

I’m happy to forward any questions and feedback you have, as well as forward this as a feature request.

The side tweeters on the Arc Ultra are “overpowering” the bonded rear surrounds.
Side channels are virtualized by both the Arc Ultra and Era 300’s. While you can use “Surround Audio” features to dial in the sound level of your preference there are a few important things to keep in mind:

Surround TV Level and Music Level Slider Behavior: The surround level sliders adjust the sound level for both the Arc Ultra and the surround channels equally. This is the intended behavior.

Using Surround Distance Setting to Adjust Rear Sound Levels: The surround distance setting can be modified to influence the output level from the rear speakers relative to the sound bar:

Setting it to “Less than 2 feet (0.6m)” reduces the volume from the rear speakers.
Setting it to “More than 10 feet (3m)” increases the volume from the rear speakers.

Perceptible Differences: While the surround distance slider adjusts the levels equally for both the Arc Ultra and the surround speakers, testing has indicated that listeners may perceive differences in the sound from the listening position, as described above.

Impact of Trueplay: The surround distance setting is disabled when Trueplay is active, as Trueplay automatically corrects for this. To adjust the surround distance, Trueplay must first be disabled.

There is no audible output from inner woofers when Era 300 is bonded as rear surrounds.
This is by design. The rear speakers are designed to disperse sound throughout the room, rather than directing it to the listener exclusively.

The Era 300 plays rear channel audio through its height array.
This, too, is by design. The Era 300’s DSP (Digital Signal Processing) leverages either the rear height tweeter OR the outward-facing tweeter/woofer to create the intended sound experience. Because of this, when you play the Dolby test track, you might notice that rear height channel as being active during rear-channel playback. This is expected.

Edit: Modified the wording on the 2nd and 3rd bolded points to closer match the wording in the app.

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da3wilson

Lyricist III

Sonos, you really expect us to believe you made a speaker with 6 drivers and you willfully deactivate 3 of them in a way that also does not support the speaker placement/arrangement for 9.1.4 surround. I am calling your BS. Otherwise all we needed was a height channel on the era 100s.

Not to mention, I did extensive testing with individual channels and had each speaker (outside the actual intended center driver) working in surround tests. Now there is a noticeable hole behind the listener. IF YOU WANT TO KEEP THIS COMPANY RUNNING, OWN YOUR MISTAKES, FIX THEM AND LEARN FROM THEM.

Sonos really s*** the bed on this. It’s weirdest feeling when nothing comes from behind and only shoots off to the sides.

as I me ruined before this system now acts like a 5.1.4 system.

Moderator Note: Modified in accordance with the Community Code of Conduct.

Suggest you test Star Wars Andor S1E5 after 19:25. I don't understand why certain sounds come out of the inner woofers but many that should don't. I haven't gotten around to testing other recommended Atmos scenes yet but this one performs differently than expected.

S

Snoomuffin

Enthusiast II

Yeah I notice the woofer is operational at times but it’s the tweeter that permanently off.

I don’t understand what Sonos did and won’t fix the damn thing. It’s not like the system sounded like pure garbage before or that anyone complained about the era 300’s…

P

ProfessorFrag

Enthusiast II

Chris Welch of The Verge posted over on Reddit. Sonos told him that the inner tweeter is working and always was working.

LOL!!!!

S

superlollo

Enthusiast II

This joke keeps getting less and less funny.

Now they’re saying that the inner driver is indeed emitting sound, which is a complete lie. They do say that it’s supposed to be lower than the outwards driver, which has always been the case. Except now it’s either silent or is like 5% of the volume of the outwards/upwards drivers, so at that point it might just be totally silent since nobody’s gonna hear it anyways.

I have my 300s about 1.2m on each side from my listening position and I absolutely cannot hear any sound coming from the inner drivers.

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da3wilson

Lyricist III

This joke keeps getting less and less funny.

Now they’re saying that the inner driver is indeed emitting sound, which is a complete lie. They do say that it’s supposed to be lower than the outwards driver, which has always been the case. Except now it’s either silent or is like 5% of the volume of the outwards/upwards drivers, so at that point it might just be totally silent since nobody’s gonna hear it anyways.

I have my 300s about 1.2m on each side from my listening position and I absolutely cannot hear any sound coming from the inner drivers.

The inner driver and/or woofer is emitting sounds with certain signals. From the test videos that I suggested it is definitely firing inside.

G

GuitarSuperstar

Lead Maestro

So is this statement by Sonos still accurate?

The Era 300 plays rear channel audio through its height array.
This, too, is by design. The Era 300’s DSP (Digital Signal Processing) leverages either the rear height tweeter OR the outward-facing tweeter/woofer to create the intended sound experience. Because of this, when you play the Dolby test track, you might notice that rear height channel as being active during rear-channel playback. This is expected.

"Receive with simplicity everything that happens to you." - Rashi

K

krion

Trending Lyricist I

Contradicting statements one after another. They could have just avoided this mess by acknowledging that it’s a bug that needs fixing.

K

krion

Trending Lyricist I

The statement from last week (which blew up this Era 300 issue backlash against Sonos)

"The Era 300 plays rear channel audio through its height array."
This, too, is by design. The Era 300’s DSP (Digital Signal Processing) leverages ***either the rear height tweeter OR the outward-facing tweeter/woofer*** to create the intended sound experience.

VS the statement now:

The rear surround audio channel is emitted from both the inner speaker and the up-firing tweeter.

So which one is it? Two statements, just one week apart.

Rear audio channel = up-firing tweeter OR outer tweeter? Or
Rear audio channel = up-firing tweeter AND inner tweeter? Or
Rear audio channel = primarily just the inner tweeter (understanding since Era 300 launch)

Can they make up their mind?