Contributor I

Sonos Arc loud pop then audio loss

1202 replies
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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.

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blunderdome

Enthusiast I

https://www.reddit.com/r/sonos/comments/14pupmm/extremely_well_done_post_on_the_nature_and_causes/jrevwxe/

Sonos rep replied to the Reddit thread covering @rc12 ‘s post.

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TheFlamesFan

Enthusiast II

I appreciate the post but still does not give the warm and fuzzies that this issue will ever be fixed.

Probably in the line of expectation of a $200 soundbar kit but certainly not in line of a $2500 setup.

Sonos needs to do better and offer assurances to its loyal customer base that they will fix the problem or take back their problem hardware

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Skunky333

Lyricist I

Long time Sonos user here. I recently upgraded my living room tv and surround sound to this combo:

LG G2, Arc, Sub Mini and Era 300’s. I have the most recent Apple TV4k that does all of the streaming for me, with the exception of Netflix (I use the LG’s webOS because Apple TV won’t do Dolby Vision or Atmos with Netflix). Anyway, I have been getting popping, creaking noises from the Arc since I upgraded. At first I thought it was the TV getting warmed up, my last TV would do that until it was at full operating temperature. I get the popping noise even when no Atmos content is playing. The Apple TV screen saver is active with no music playing and I still get cracks, pops and a creaking noise. About 30 minutes ago I turned Dolby Atmos off in the ATV settings and I’m still getting cracks, pops and a creaking noise. Even with the ATV completely powered off, while watching cable tv, the popping noises are still happening.

This is unacceptable. I have spent a lot of my hard earned money with Sonos. Does anybody have any recommendations for an Atmos capable sound bar, sub and rears that plays nicely with Apple TV?

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blunderdome

Enthusiast I

Long time Sonos user here. I recently upgraded my living room tv and surround sound to this combo:

LG G2, Arc, Sub Mini and Era 300’s. I have the most recent Apple TV4k that does all of the streaming for me, with the exception of Netflix (I use the LG’s webOS because Apple TV won’t do Dolby Vision or Atmos with Netflix). Anyway, I have been getting popping, creaking noises from the Arc since I upgraded. At first I thought it was the TV getting warmed up, my last TV would do that until it was at full operating temperature. I get the popping noise even when no Atmos content is playing. The Apple TV screen saver is active with no music playing and I still get cracks, pops and a creaking noise. About 30 minutes ago I turned Dolby Atmos off in the ATV settings and I’m still getting cracks, pops and a creaking noise. Even with the ATV completely powered off, while watching cable tv, the popping noises are still happening.

This is unacceptable. I have spent a lot of my hard earned money with Sonos. Does anybody have any recommendations for an Atmos capable sound bar, sub and rears that plays nicely with Apple TV?

You shouldn’t be getting pops or creaks with the ATV powered completely off. This sounds like a defective unit rather than the specific “popping” issue that’s being discussed in this thread.

Honestly, I would do some more troubleshooting and pursue a warranty replacement before ditching the entire system.

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Skunky333

Lyricist I

I’ll look into getting a warranty replacement after I get video evidence of the noise with the ATV unplugged.

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blunderdome

Enthusiast I

I’ll look into getting a warranty replacement after I get video evidence of the noise with the ATV unplugged.

You said you just upgraded it? If it’s still under the retailer’s return period I wouldn’t even mess around with a warranty replacement. Arc would go back in the box for a quick exchange at the retailer. As you said, we spent a lot of money on this gear and it’s not unreasonable to expect it to work straight out of the box.

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Cleary

Lyricist III

Adding my identical experience to this thread.

Sonos Arc. Xbox Series X with Dolby Atmos selected. CEC disabled. LGC1 utilizing eArc.

Loud pop (like a gunshot) whenever I leave a game running Dolby Atmos and return to the Xbox dashboard. Horrifying every time.

Grateful for RC12’s advocacy on this thread.

C’mon Sonos.

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TheFlamesFan

Enthusiast II

Adding my identical experience to this thread.

Sonos Arc. Xbox Series X with Dolby Atmos selected. CEC disabled. LGC1 utilizing eArc.

Loud pop (like a gunshot) whenever I leave a game running Dolby Atmos and return to the Xbox dashboard. Horrifying every time.

Grateful for RC12’s advocacy on this thread.

C’mon Sonos.

Cleary, you have identical hardware and setup to me. If you disable “Dolby Vision” and “Dolby Vision for gaming” on your Series X. Do you get the pop?

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Cleary

Lyricist III

Adding my identical experience to this thread.

Sonos Arc. Xbox Series X with Dolby Atmos selected. CEC disabled. LGC1 utilizing eArc.

Loud pop (like a gunshot) whenever I leave a game running Dolby Atmos and return to the Xbox dashboard. Horrifying every time.

Grateful for RC12’s advocacy on this thread.

C’mon Sonos.

Cleary, you have identical hardware and setup to me. If you disable “Dolby Vision” and “Dolby Vision for gaming” on your Series X. Do you get the pop?

Will try it out tonight and report back. Am hopeful after seeing your post. Thanks for the message.

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KrylonBlue

Enthusiast II

Adding my identical experience to this thread.

Sonos Arc. Xbox Series X with Dolby Atmos selected. CEC disabled. LGC1 utilizing eArc.

Loud pop (like a gunshot) whenever I leave a game running Dolby Atmos and return to the Xbox dashboard. Horrifying every time.

Grateful for RC12’s advocacy on this thread.

C’mon Sonos.

Cleary, you have identical hardware and setup to me. If you disable “Dolby Vision” and “Dolby Vision for gaming” on your Series X. Do you get the pop?

I have never had Dolby Vision enabled on my TV side for Xbox and I get the nasty pops on my Sony OLED.

This has been ruled out as a fix a while ago. Sadly, there is no real fix on our end as it has to come from Sonos.

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