Enthusiast II

Era 300 rear driver is silent (with Arc Ultra)

393 replies
24997 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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M

MarkJnf

Lyricist III

A speaker for $350 with only 20% of the drivers working is just ridiculous. Especially the wait(not even for a fix), but just for a response! This is not normal.

D

da3wilson

Lyricist III

The fact that only Corry can reply and his response needed to be approved is really telling in itself. I wonder if they fired the PR and customer service teams in the latest round.

M

MarkJnf

Lyricist III

I have no complaints about Corry. He did a great job! This is not his responsibility! If it werenв't for him, Sonos wouldn't have had any idea about what was happening!

D

da3wilson

Lyricist III

Me either. It sounds like his hands are tied and from his last reply he was getting a bit pissed that we would even ask for an update after another two weeks of silence.

S

Snoomuffin

Enthusiast II

I have no complaints about Corry. He did a great job! This is not his responsibility! If it werenв't for him, Sonos wouldn't have had any idea about what was happening!

While true, it’s really hard to say if this will even reach the right people (let alone just make it through this approval process to get corrys message read) and a correction will take place.

its pushing a month and a half now.

S

superlollo

Enthusiast II

At this point i honestly feel like i wasted my money going with sonos. The only piece which i feel is great is the sub4, arc ultra is pretty good and era 300s are absolute trash right now. I only use them for movies, have a separate hi-fi for Music so i cannot comment on that.

really disappointed by how this was handled

S

Snoomuffin

Enthusiast II

At this point i honestly feel like i wasted my money going with sonos. The only piece which i feel is great is the sub4, arc ultra is pretty good and era 300s are absolute trash right now. I only use them for movies, have a separate hi-fi for Music so i cannot comment on that.

really disappointed by how this was handled

the upside is when you sell your gear you’ll nearly get all of your money back.

im still debating as we speak. I may go with Bravia quad as a new subwoofer is supposed to release this year. At least I know all the drivers work accordingly on the quads lmao.

S

superlollo

Enthusiast II

At this point i honestly feel like i wasted my money going with sonos. The only piece which i feel is great is the sub4, arc ultra is pretty good and era 300s are absolute trash right now. I only use them for movies, have a separate hi-fi for Music so i cannot comment on that.

really disappointed by how this was handled

the upside is when you sell your gear you’ll nearly get all of your money back.

im still debating as we speak. I may go with Bravia quad as a new subwoofer is supposed to release this year. At least I know all the drivers work accordingly on the quads lmao.

that’s why i kept all the boxes, if they don’t fix the mess they Made i’ll also look into orge options. Bravia quad is already much better as a home theather, just not a fan of the looks

L

Lozbass

Lyricist II

At this point i honestly feel like i wasted my money going with sonos. The only piece which i feel is great is the sub4, arc ultra is pretty good and era 300s are absolute trash right now. I only use them for movies, have a separate hi-fi for Music so i cannot comment on that.

really disappointed by how this was handled

the upside is when you sell your gear you’ll nearly get all of your money back.

im still debating as we speak. I may go with Bravia quad as a new subwoofer is supposed to release this year. At least I know all the drivers work accordingly on the quads lmao.

that’s why i kept all the boxes, if they don’t fix the mess they Made i’ll also look into orge options. Bravia quad is already much better as a home theather, just not a fan of the looks

I share these sentiments entirely. The boxes were destined for the loft, but I’m keeping them handy. This situation is heading downhill fast.

S

Snoomuffin

Enthusiast II

At this point i honestly feel like i wasted my money going with sonos. The only piece which i feel is great is the sub4, arc ultra is pretty good and era 300s are absolute trash right now. I only use them for movies, have a separate hi-fi for Music so i cannot comment on that.

really disappointed by how this was handled

the upside is when you sell your gear you’ll nearly get all of your money back.

im still debating as we speak. I may go with Bravia quad as a new subwoofer is supposed to release this year. At least I know all the drivers work accordingly on the quads lmao.

that’s why i kept all the boxes, if they don’t fix the mess they Made i’ll also look into orge options. Bravia quad is already much better as a home theather, just not a fan of the looks

I share these sentiments entirely. The boxes were destined for the loft, but I’m keeping them handy. This situation is heading downhill fast.

Being its getting much closer to the 60day mark now since Corry’s response about approval - I feel it’s safer to assume this “issue” will not get resolved any time soon (if at all).

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