Enthusiast II

Era 300 rear driver is silent (with Arc Ultra)

393 replies
25030 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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superlollo

Enthusiast II

Hi @Lewdog129

I don’t have information on that either, but the Arc Ultra was released on 29th Oct 2024.

Well i really hope they didn’t release it knowing it was actually broken….

[…]

@Corry P would you be able to tell us when the Sonos team were first made aware of this issue? Understand that you can’t tell us when a fix for this will be implemented and I don’t expect it to be fixed soon, but would be interesting to know when Sonos was made aware of this issue as it drastically impacts the immersion and effectiveness of the surround sound. Can’t wait to get my system firing in all cylinders (drivers) again. Thanks for the support!

I would definitely expect this to be fixed soon. We’re talking about sonos’s flagship surround Product, a very expensive one, not correctly reproducing surround sounds. This is major and if Sonos is a serious company they should have this fixed in no time

S

Spaxx24

Trending Lyricist II

Hi @Lewdog129

I don’t have information on that either, but the Arc Ultra was released on 29th Oct 2024.

Well i really hope they didn’t release it knowing it was actually broken….

[…]

@Corry P would you be able to tell us when the Sonos team were first made aware of this issue? Understand that you can’t tell us when a fix for this will be implemented and I don’t expect it to be fixed soon, but would be interesting to know when Sonos was made aware of this issue as it drastically impacts the immersion and effectiveness of the surround sound. Can’t wait to get my system firing in all cylinders (drivers) again. Thanks for the support!

I would definitely expect this to be fixed soon. We’re talking about sonos’s flagship surround Product, a very expensive one, not correctly reproducing surround sounds. This is major and if Sonos is a serious company they should have this fixed in no time

It is not the Ultra that is broken, people with regular Arc has this too.

L

Lewdog129

Lyricist III

Hi @Lewdog129

I don’t have information on that either, but the Arc Ultra was released on 29th Oct 2024.

Well i really hope they didn’t release it knowing it was actually broken….

[…]

@Corry P would you be able to tell us when the Sonos team were first made aware of this issue? Understand that you can’t tell us when a fix for this will be implemented and I don’t expect it to be fixed soon, but would be interesting to know when Sonos was made aware of this issue as it drastically impacts the immersion and effectiveness of the surround sound. Can’t wait to get my system firing in all cylinders (drivers) again. Thanks for the support!

I would definitely expect this to be fixed soon. We’re talking about sonos’s flagship surround Product, a very expensive one, not correctly reproducing surround sounds. This is major and if Sonos is a serious company they should have this fixed in no time

I am with you here. Paying £449 per rear speaker and only to get less than 50% of it working due to the issue is not acceptable at all. Completely unacceptable given they are advertising it as an ultimate surround experience and you don’t get that in its current state, far from it. Made me think I had two defective Era 300 units at first. I said I don’t expect it to be fixed soon, more as a statement of the current state Sonos is in with the app and software quality assurance issues. In hardware terms, the products are solid and the capabilities are there, it’s just the software for both the app and hardware that drastically lets an otherwise stellar product down.

I would like to see updates on this issue from the Sonos team as they progress through working out a fix. However, I’m not holding my breath on this.

G

GuitarSuperstar

Lead Maestro

I can confirm this issue affects the original Arc too. I just tested my Arc + Dual Subs + Era 300s setup using the 5.1.4 and 7.1.4 Dolby Atmos Test Tones videos on Blu-ray disc. The inside-firing drivers don’t play any audio during both tests.

@Corry P Another problem I noticed is both REAR height channels are playing through the Arc instead of the Era 300s. So the only driver currently being utilized on the Era 300 (when used as surrounds) is the outside-firing driver.

An interesting note about the rear surround issue is the rear surround channel now sounds louder playing through the outside-firing driver. For some reason Sonos has always had the inside-firing driver play at a much lower level compared to the outside and upward-firing drivers. Maybe this is intentional because so many users sit so close to the surround speakers.

EDIT: I unplugged the Arc from power for 15 seconds and re-ran the tests. The rear height channels are playing correctly now.

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

S

Spaxx24

Trending Lyricist II

@Corry P Another problem I noticed is both REAR height channels are playing through the Arc instead of the Era 300s. So the only driver currently being utilized on the Era 300 (when used as surrounds) is the outside-firing driver.

Thats interesting, for me the rear-height is definately firing.

G

GuitarSuperstar

Lead Maestro

@Corry P Another problem I noticed is both REAR height channels are playing through the Arc instead of the Era 300s. So the only driver currently being utilized on the Era 300 (when used as surrounds) is the outside-firing driver.

Thats interesting, for me the rear-height is definately firing.

Does it fire when playing the rear height test tones on these videos?

https://download.dolby.com/us/en/test-tones/dolby-test-tones_7_1_4.mp4

https://download.dolby.com/us/en/test-tones/dolby-test-tones_5_1_4.mp4

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

S

Spaxx24

Trending Lyricist II

@Corry P Another problem I noticed is both REAR height channels are playing through the Arc instead of the Era 300s. So the only driver currently being utilized on the Era 300 (when used as surrounds) is the outside-firing driver.

Thats interesting, for me the rear-height is definately firing.

Does it fire when playing the rear height test tones on these videos?

https://download.dolby.com/us/en/test-tones/dolby-test-tones_7_1_4.mp4

https://download.dolby.com/us/en/test-tones/dolby-test-tones_5_1_4.mp4

Yep!

J

JHVandegriff

Lyricist I

Same problem with my setup. Very disappointed, and am considering returning. My friends also purchased this setup on my recommendation and now I look dumb as they ask me what’s wrong with there speakers and I have to say “the company I recommended over Sony actually does not have your speakers working properly”.

S

Snoomuffin

Enthusiast II

Yes this is a problem. I have been sharing dominiklei’s finding for the past week on Reddit and on the sonos community here.

i watched LOTR last night and sounds were just misplaced and it sounds really strange. This problem is affecting everyone I’m sure of it, but it is so subtle to notice that many just don’t even know they have a problem with their system.

Also wanted to mention the waveguide tweeters disable when era 300’s are connected so only the end tweeters of the bar fire. Disconnecting the era 300’s made the waveguide tweeters fire again but then turned off the end tweeters. Why the hell would this be a thing? All drivers should be firing to have ultra immersiveness - not ‘select immersiveness’

I own ultra, 2 sub 4’s, and era 300’s. The amount cash dropped on this system to only not work right out of the box is so glaringly bad.

S

superlollo

Enthusiast II

Yes this is a problem. I have been sharing dominiklei’s finding for the past week on Reddit and on the sonos community here.

i watched LOTR last night and sounds were just misplaced and it sounds really strange. This problem is affecting everyone I’m sure of it, but it is so subtle to notice that many just don’t even know they have a problem with their system.

Also wanted to mention the waveguide tweeters disable when era 300’s are connected so only the end tweeters of the bar fire. Disconnecting the era 300’s made the waveguide tweeters fire again but then turned off the end tweeters. Why the hell would this be a thing? All drivers should be firing to have ultra immersiveness - not ‘select immersiveness’

I own ultra, 2 sub 4’s, and era 300’s. The amount cash dropped on this system to only not work right out of the box is so glaringly bad.

they screwed this up so badly, and I’m starting to think they knew about this before release but chose to go to market anyways in order not to miss the holiday season. Really scummy if you ask me and it’s embarassing that after 5-6 weeks this still hasn’t been fixed

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