Apple Music Atmos on ARC but not Era 300

  • 30 March 2023
  • 6 replies
  • 383 views
A
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So I think I’ve encountered a bug, and wanted to share in case anyone else sees this (or hopefully someone from Sonos engineering sees it).

If I play Apple Music in Atmos on my Home Theater (ARC+Amp+Sub) I get a nice little Atmos icon in the app showing me I’m listening to spatial music. 

If I try to play the same Apple Music track on my Era 300’s (Era 300 Stereo Pair + Sub Mini) I don’t get the same icon. 

To troubleshoot I tried to drop the sub, and also unpair the stereo pair, and I still don't get the little icon. 

So the next thing I tried was comparing the same track played from another music service (Pandora in this case) to see if there is a noticeable difference. There seemingly was.

So I believe this is a UI bug where the Atmos icon isn’t showing up for the Era 300s versus it being an issue of Atmos not working. 

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6 replies

T

I think this is more than a UI bug, playing the same track on era 300 via Amazon Music it is clear the one coming from Apple is not Atmos

A
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Man, now I’m even more confused - just signed dup for the Amazon music free trial to give it a shot. 

I tried Ocean Eyes buy Billie Eilish as the song and to me the Amazon version which was Atmos sounded more like that Pandora version which wasn’t, except for the drum line which sounded better on the Amazon version.

The Apple version sounded more open than the other two, but it didn’t have the same separation in the drum line as the Amazon version. 

Do you have any other tracks you’d recommend trying this with?

T

There are a few versions of Riders on the Storm in Atmos, but this one (link below) with 45 secs of “chatter” at the start is a straight forward way to tell the difference. Especially with the thunder and “whisper” roughy 1m15s into the track - you should “hear” these elements almost directly above your head. 
 

https://music.amazon.com/albums/B082Y86WDM?ref=dm_sh_8dAE0qK3GQ2llYFp5cZLVeY9u

A
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So on that track they sounded very similar to me and the thunder never sounded directly above me. I'm starting to wonder if I’m not getting spatial at all now with the Era 300 Pair + Sub

A
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So scratch that - uninstalled and re-installed the app and I’m getting the logo now.

It also fixed a bug I was having with toggling the spatial audio setting, and I definitely can hear the difference in both the Apple tracks and the Atmos tracks with it toggled on and off. 

There is definitely differences in the mastering of the songs between Amazon and Apple though.

T

I don’t have any noticeable difference when turning on and off on iOS. Have tried reinstalling app. 2 x ERA 300 in a stereo pair. 

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