We have a brand new Era 300 and Arc Ultra. The Arc is tied to the new LG C4 TV by HDMI. The Era is paired to the Arc via wifi. While the sound is good, the Era sound keeps skipping. We had this issue with a Move as well. We started with an Arc and Move, were told to replace the Arc with the Arc Ultra as it has better connectivity. That has not solved our sound glitches. Replaced the Move with the Era. We have moved the Era around, and it doesn’t seem to matter. If we play straight to the Era thru the iPhone, no issues at all. For some reason, the communication from Arc Ultra to Era is bad. Open room, no issues with any other wifi device, have tried all the plugging in and unplugging scenarios. Not my first rodeo there. Wifi router, Era and arc are all within 20 feet oof each other. Very frustrated as we want this to work. Help!
Era 300 sounds skips
Best answer by MoPac
If two are “Bonded” as surrounds it will work without skipping. If one is in a “Group” with the Arc Ultra and TV sound is being played the single speaker will likely skip. with music they will play nicely together.
Anything through the TV, regular movies, etc and including any music app through the TV. Connecting directly from the iPhone 15 -- no issues.
Try increasing the Group Audio Delay setting under the Arc’s settings in the Sonos app. This will create more of a delay from the grouped speakers but give your system more time to buffer the TV audio.
Will the delay mean we are hearing the audio at different times? That is just not going to work since the speakers are in the same room.
I am pretty sure (I don't use it) that the Group delay keeps the sound in sync.
It is different than Grouping to a TV source that does add a delay in the Grouped speakers.
OK, I will check that out. It is pretty ridiculous that we have to go through this for as much money as you spend for Sonos.
Group delay does not keep the speakers in sync. Elevating the delay MIGHT help in the higher app range but it was too disconcerting to listen to two speakers out of sync with each other. The Audio Delay isn’t accessible in the Era since it is not hooked up with a line in as the Era is to the TV. I did try all of the other options in the app for sound but nothing seems to clear up the issue. I think if the two speakers communicated via Bluetooth vs wifi the issue might go away. I have them on Bluetooth but I don’t think that is the way the two are communicating.
Sounds like you are looking at the wrong setting, the one you want is on the Arc, not the Era.
Bluetooth would give you much more delay, the Arc to Era link is a dedicated low-latency 5 gHz (close but not quite Wi-Fi) link.
I tried the Arc Ultra settings. I only checked the Era to see what options it gave me but yes, the Era is slaved to the Ultra. I understand that. Also checked TV output settings, PCM, Pass Through and auto. Same issue.
A Sonos chat rep says that the product is not meant to work with a TV to Arc to Era 300 -- even though I pointed out the website says that is exactly how it can work and so do in store reps. Sonos chat rep says issue is because I do not have 2 Era speakers and the skipping is due to the left-right channel missing in a true home theater set up. If I buy another Era he says that skipping will go away. I have my doubts….
I don't think I'm helping, anyone else have an idea?
If you only have a single Era 300, the Sonos rep is correct. You do not have a surround setup, you have one speaker grouped with the Arc, which will cause a delay with TV sources and can cause skipping in less than optimum environments.
jgatie -- funny that it isn’t being sold that way. I know others who have the set up we do, and with older TVs, and it works fine. I guess that is one thing left to try and see what in store reps are saying. Thanks Stanley_4 for your input as well.
jgatie -- funny that it isn’t being sold that way. I know others who have the set up we do, and with older TVs, and it works fine. I guess that is one thing left to try and see what in store reps are saying. Thanks Stanley_4 for your input as well.
Anybody who is selling an Arc Ultra and a single Era 300 as “surround sound” is completely ignorant of what surround sound is. After all, Sonos only sells a surround package that include 2 Era 300’s, not one.
They are not selling it as surround sound. We just decided that given our space, one Era 300 was sufficient. It was never sold as “must buy 2 of any speaker” to work with a single sound bar or it will skip when listening through your TV. Even a Sonos factory rep visiting the store never said that. He was as baffled as anyone.
+18If two are “Bonded” as surrounds it will work without skipping. If one is in a “Group” with the Arc Ultra and TV sound is being played the single speaker will likely skip. with music they will play nicely together.
+18You would need two 300s to be able to Bond as surrounds.
Yeah, that is what I am getting the picture on - the need for an additional speaker and not just one. Weirdly, the skipping issue is a frequent source of ire in chatrooms all over and no one at the retail level has even hinted at that being a challenge.
Well, I owe Raul A from Sonos an apology. Getting two 300s and bonding them solved the issue. When we went back to Best Buy “experts” (not Geek Squad mind you, the floor guys) it was still met with a quizzical look and they tried t push us to a different sound system. But we stuck to our guns, got our 2nd 300 and voila. Now, when you group the speakers instead of bonding them, we still heard some skipping, but not as bad as before. I still think that for the $$ spend, there still shouldn’t be ANY skipping but we do have true surround sound now and learned a lot about how Sonos is meant to work together vs how it is sold at retail. Although the retail issue is probably the same for any speaker system. Thanks for playing along folks, all the help was appreciated.
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