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samro1094
Contributor I
December 8, 2020

Sonos Arc loud pop then audio loss

  • December 8, 2020
  • 1202 replies
  • 90685 views

I was playing on my Xbox when the arc suddenly made an extremely loud pop sound and then lost audio completely. The app wouldn’t let me adjust the volume and Alexa wake up didn’t emit its usual tone. I had to remove the power from the arc and reapply which resumed the audio. I’m concerned that one of the speakers in the arc may have been damaged when this happened. Has anyone had this issue?

We have had no issues with the arc since purchasing it earlier this year.

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    Pinned Reply By Corry P

    Hi Everyone!

    Good news! We are pleased to share that our team has identified a fix for the popping sound on Arc and it will be shipped to all customers as part of a software release today, Thursday Nov 16 at 09:30 ET, 14:30 GMT, 15:30 CET. Please note that some app stores may take an extra hour or two for it to become available.

    During our investigation we uncovered a rare bug that impacts how Sonos Arc and Beam (Gen 2) in certain home theater configurations process Dolby MAT, a streaming technology which is used to deliver Dolby Atmos audio over HDMI. Occasionally a Sonos product will receive a corrupted audio segment from an external source and needs to filter out unwanted audio data. The bug we identified was allowing our Dolby decoder to play audible errors on certain home theater setups rather than concealing them. The solution we’ve built and tested improves our Dolby decoder so it better filters out corrupt audio data that can manifest as a popping sound. We’ll continue to monitor customer feedback closely after the fix has been released and ship additional updates if necessary.

    We strive to deliver the best listening experience possible and work to address major issues that impact our customers. We apologize for the disruption this bug has caused and want to thank you for your patience while our team developed a fix.

    We would also like to thank our community users for their detailed setup information and steps to reproduce the issue, which were helpful to us in uncovering the cause of the bug.

     

    1202 replies

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    Corry P
    Corry P
    Sonos Staff
    May 20, 2021

    Hi @fok_1 

    I just find it odd that troubleshooting for TVs is done but for Arcana it’s denied as I’m pretty sure that HDFury devices are much better engineered, standards compliant and updated then many or most TVs. But okay…

    In the case of the Arcana, I personally agree with you. Perhaps, in time, it won’t be grouped-in with other HDMI switches/adaptors.

    This sounds possible to me, however I believe that both the source stream and the Arc could be at fault here about the integrity of the stream, given how many people have the same issue?

    We have no reason to do anything to the audio stream. As this is happening before the Arc gets a chance to decode it (one of the first things the Arc will do), it’s seems more likely to do with the transport.

    Regardless of which device’s fault it is there is one thing I think Sonos should do something about: The popping sound is so loud that I fear it could damage my hearing or the Arc speaker itself. It’s actually like a shot fired right next to you or a little explosion in you living room.

    I agree with @Airgetlam here. How’s the Arc to know what is “real” audio and what is not? 

    However I have configured my Arc to a 50 % volume limit and usually only use 25 % of the Sonos volume bar, so I’m roughly at 12.5 % volume of what the Arc could do (in addition to this my PC is set to about 50 - 70 % volume itself which would further lowe that to 6 to 9 %, but let’s drop that assuming it produces a broken stream with higher volume...).

    I find it hard to believe that this is the max. volume of the 12.5 % the Arc is set to. I think if those peaks are possible through a presumably broken stream at least the Arc should limit the volume of such a pop to something more healthy.

    Well, that certainly sounds suspicious - I was not aware. Your PC volume probably isn’t taken into account with Atmos passthrough, but that’s immaterial. I highly recommend you get in touch with our technical support team, along with anyone else experiencing this issue. Please be sure to mention your volume levels and how loud the pop sounded.

    "Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein
      Keithmac
      Virtuoso
      May 21, 2021

      For what it's worth I use a Playbar with the Series X and never heard a similar noise, never had loss of audio etc.

        Haydenx360a
        Lyricist I
        May 28, 2021

        I have had this happened twice in the last week, both whilst using my Xbo Series X, loud pop and then no sounds, switching TV to another source such as Sky brings sound back.

        My diagn number is 292236251

        DuranDoranMartell
        Avid Contributor III
        May 28, 2021

        It sounds like a fuse popping (very loudly). I think its electrical, probably a power surge.

        Not sure where the issue originates but the commonality of people using Xbox consoles is hard to ignore. My TV, Xbox, Arc and and a few other components are all on the same powerbar.  I would be interested to know if other people are also using the same powerbar / circuit? 

        Surely somebody at Sonos HQ has replicated this issue by now? 

        fok_1
        Enthusiast I
        May 29, 2021

        Something I noticed yesterday when it happened again: At first the Arc switches to “Dolby Multichannel PCM 1.0” (silent) and after that to “Dolby Multichannel PCM 6.1” (sometimes some sound fragments). Do these formats even exist?

        jmkorn21
        Lyricist I
        June 22, 2021

        I have had this Pop happen probably a dozen times in the past 6 months. I have the arc connected directly to my LG OLED65 CXAUA. The sound completely drops. I then have to unplug from TV and just use thebuilt in speaker. This occurs when streaming movies or shows through Netflix and Apple TV. I have to disconnect my Arc speaker from the TV and now.

        I am disappointed to see this as a recurring issue for people. I have sent diagnostics. This does not seem to happen when streaming music over Wi-Fi.

        Airgetlam
        Airgetlam
        June 22, 2021

        What did Sonos say when you contacted them with your diagnostics number after submitting it?

        Bruce
        dastly75
        Lyricist II
        July 18, 2021

        Just had this happen with my Xbox series x and LG Oled C1 via eARC. 
        diagnostic: 707320152

        D3R3K
        Lyricist I
        September 15, 2021

        I got my first scary pop last night at about 12:30 am. Scared the heck out of me. Thought something exploded. I was using my Xbox Series X connected to my LG C9 with EARC HDMI connection to Sonos Arc.

        I recently switched the HDMI input on my C9 that the Xbox Series X is using to PC Mode to unlock 4:4:4 full bandwidth signal. Not entirely sure it was related, but was an interesting coincidence. 

        TheFlamesFan
        Enthusiast II
        September 17, 2021

        Also had my first reoccurrence of this issue last night with a Series X and Sonos Arc with a Sony x900h TV

         

        I was watching videos from the Dolby App and as soon as I prematurely closed a video by pressing the back key I got the pop sound, Arc stopped working at that point until reset 

         

        Worth noting that the surrounds were still working fine afterwards only the ARC wasn’t.  
         

        Obviously I don’t want to do damage to the Arc, so if it is in fact just garbage playing at highest volume I feel a little more at ease, would be nice to see a true diagnosis and a fix though

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