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Volume levels too high after 15.2 update

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170 replies

C
Userlevel 2

Small update from Sonos support:

“Devices that do not support the Atmos format have received "boosted volume" to be more consistent with Apple Music volume.”

Can anyone confirm that this problem is only with speakers without Atmos?

They also said that they are working on it (and that many users already reported this problem)

-- 
Bohdan

In my experience, Atmos tracks have lower volume than non-Atmos so it wouldn’t make any sense for Sonos to boost volume for non-Atmos speakers. I don’t listen to Atmos except on Apple TV occasionally with Beam/Surrounds/Sub.
 

Playing Apple Music throughout my system on the Sonos App, the volume of every song is inconsistent but notably files that I have pinpointed to being .mp3 vs the apple standard. However, I never had ANY volume issues until 15.3. 
 

Airplay is also a pain because it takes FOREVER for music to start playing everywhere for me. When it works, it’s great. But when it doesn’t, it’s a headache. Sonos needs to fix all of these issues ASAP. 

O
Userlevel 2

How ironic, I just got 3 months free of Apple Music from Sonos when I bought two new Era 100 speakers… and now it does not work properly. Even at volume = 1, getting complaints from the family :(

Do you mean the voice-control volume-1 level, or actual volume-1 in the Sonos App, as the two are entirely different volume levels - I struggle to hear volume-1 in the Sonos App at say a distance of 5-6 feet in a quiet room. Anyone in another room would never hear it in our Home.

The Alexa voice assistant (just as an example) works in integer numbers, each representing a volume increase/decrease of 10%.

I mean the normal volume in the App. Even at 1, it is too loud.

T
Userlevel 2

I just updated the iOS app (it had to be done manually) and also had a firmware update and I’m experiencing the opposite. I now have to crank it to 100% to not even get the volume I had at 50% before the update watching TV. It’s pathetic.

To be clear, I’m just watching TV on a soundbar with Sonos 1 surrounds and the woofer. No Apple Music even connected to the account


​​​​​

That’s correct. The issue only applies to streaming services. Maybe only to Apple Music ( i do not use other services). In my case, the online radio station i sometimes listen to, has not this issue  

L

I have the same problem - removing and re-adding Apple Music hasn’t helped, nor has changing the maximum volume limit. When I contacted a Sonos rep on chat, they said no issues at their end and to contact Apple customer support, but that they would look into it if it reoccurs.

Corry P
Userlevel 7
Badge +18

Hi @thkl 

Thank you - this is just the kind of feedback we’re looking for!

We are, of course, unable to normalise if the normalisation levels are not supplied, and typically with online sources, they are not. This is why I have already put forth the idea of having a togglable option in the app.

the goal for the customer should be an equal volume between all music services the customer uses

While this would be a nice-to-have, I feel I should set some expectations - this is unlikely. There are literally hundreds of online sources available, and an order of magnitude (or two) more when you start including radio stations too. They would all need to supply normalisation data for each and every track, and I think that would be beyond the resources of most of them to achieve, especially the radio stations.

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein
Corry P
Userlevel 7
Badge +18

@Tom_69 - thank you too for your feedback.

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein
S

After a half hour of chat support, we have a fix! Remove your Apple Music account from your system. Reset the Sonos Controller App, then re-add your Apple Music to the services and the volumes seem fixed…….for now.

Hope this helps everyone else that lands on this thread!

Sounds promising I’ll give it a go! How do I reset my app?

 

thanks!

T
Userlevel 7
Badge +4

Right. Sonos surely controls Apple’s engineering efforts, or has access to making code changes on Apple’s servers. Got it. 

I didn’t say any of those things. Sonos is our service provider so as a consumer it’s irrelevant whether it’s an apple fix or a sonos fix, sonos need to fix it ASAP as their service to their consumers is broken.

 

It’s not a valid excuse to say ‘but it’s apples problem’. 

T
Userlevel 7
Badge +4

I had a response after emailing the CEO, still not holding out much hope of anything resulting from it but at least it has been acknowledged. 
 

“Thank you so much for reaching out to Sonos Customer Experience. Your initial e-mail and feedback have been shared with our CEO. Patrick, after having read through the description of the situation you have been facing, decided it best to have your case sent over to one of his senior advisors within the the project, for further handling, such that action could be taken immediately.”

 

However they did then go on to say to disable loudness to help fix it, so the fundemental understanding and impact of the issue is still not hitting home! 

T
Userlevel 7
Badge +4

so @Tom_69 how do you propose that Sonos fix Apple’s bug.

If a bus provider cannot run a service to its scheduled timetables because the bridge over the local river is broken would you expect the bus company (my service provider) to mend the bridge?

 

Not fix the bridge no. They’d liaise with the party responsible for the route as a matter of priority though and divert buses until it was fixed. However, it’s a bad analogy as we’re talking about software. 
 

The bug is in Sonos’ music service addin for Apple Music, so it’s Sonos’ responsibility to fix it in conjunction with Apple. 
 

The point I’m making is that we can’t shrug this off and say it’s apple’s fault. As consumers we need to hold Sonos to account for screwing up a key part of their solution. 

P

This may help some people…..

Apples music is loud in my Sonos system.

Set the max volume to about 35% is Sonos app settings.

Start playing Apple Music via the Sonos app to an Airplay compatible speaker, 5 gen 2, One SL etc, and the volume stays pretty consistent.

Add a speaker that isn’t Airplay compatible, Play1 Play 3, Sound bar, and there's suddenly a huge volume increase…

 

Ken_Griffiths

Hi @Corry P ,

it has been a while since this issue came up. And the volume thing for Apple Music is still completely broken. Is there a slight chance that Sonos will fix this ? I cannot use Apple Music later on the day cause even at level 1 !! volume the speakers are still blasting the music out. 
 

best

thomas 

Is this just a glitch for some users? - if I set Apple Music to play at 1% volume on a stereo pair of One’s in our Kitchen, then at their centre position approx. 4feet away from each speaker my dB meter App gives a reading of 41dB - I would have no issue playing music at that level at any time of the day.

So just curious, what reading do you get with such an App?

I get an average of 38 in the room when no music is playing from a ticking clock and fridge hum noise.

So it seems I’m certainly not seeing/hearing the reported Apple issue here. 

2 Attachments
Corry P
Userlevel 7
Badge +18

Hi @maynard 

As you are using Apple Music, I assume you have an iPhone? If so, you can AirPlay to your compatible Sonos devices (in your case, your Amp or Ones) and group in which ever other speakers you want to hear from. There are reports here that this results in quieter playback.

Alternatively, a different source may play at a more acceptable level for you. Personally, I get your point and agree - but I haven’t experienced it; as I have never used Apple Music, I have never encountered this issue myself.

I hope this helps.

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein
N
Userlevel 2

Still no resolution for this.

I ended up chatting in with Sonos support who ran diagnostics and their advice was for me to go through my Apple Music library of thousands upon thousands of songs and delete the files that I've added manually over the years (I began curating a library in 2003) that are .mp3 files and were uploaded (some were not matched) to AM upon subscribing and delete them and redownload/add the Apple Music (AAC) files – not to mention risking losing those songs if I ever chose to unsubscribe to AM. 

I LITERALLY played the same song (my .mp3 variant that was uploaded and not matched AND the Apple Music version) and there is an extreme difference in the volume levels. Yes, I will obviously replace my .mp3 variant of this song with the AM variant, but this should not be the fix that users must audit their libraries for songs with volume inconsistencies. There was NO issue with 15.2 and prior. 

If they can’t pinpoint this, they need to introduce a “sound check” feature or similar for the system. 

I am SO tired of having to use AirPlay (which sucks) to listen to my AM library. 



What about uploaded mp3 files without an AAC version? Do they propose any solution? I had bought albums from an old Google Play Music and they had only mp3 for download.. (and for some there are NO Apple Music Album at all - for example soundtrack for Transformers - Age of Extinction: GM had a single and an album, AM have only a single)

There are a LOT of albums which don’t have an Apple Music version/match at all..

Ken_Griffiths

This may help some people…..

Apples music is loud in my Sonos system.

Set the max volume to about 35% is Sonos app settings.

Start playing Apple Music via the Sonos app to an Airplay compatible speaker, 5 gen 2, One SL etc, and the volume stays pretty consistent.

Add a speaker that isn’t Airplay compatible, Play1 Play 3, Sound bar, and there's suddenly a huge volume increase…

Sadly I can’t test this myself, as I don’t have a non-AirPlay device in the setup here, but is the Play:1/3 soeaker you’re adding to the mix set at the 35% volume level in the App too (or less), before you group them? - I did check the steps with all Airplay compatible speakers and everything works fine with those. That’s setting their volume levels in the Sonos App in conjunction with the Airplay sending device too (an iPad in my case).

T
Userlevel 2

I also had a response in a german support chat session. They told me their developers are aware of this problem. But no eta for a fix or a workaround. 
 

He suggested to use an other streaming service until the problem is solved. 🧐

M
Userlevel 1

For anyone having this issue with Amazon music (noticeable when audio changes from HD, Ultra HD & Dolby Atmos), Sonos are aware but no fix or ETA available. 

 

Workarounds provided were very disappointing - stream to another speaker instead, use another music service, create playlist with affected songs. 

 

Wish they would just revert this update.  

Ken_Griffiths

Update 15.11 has still not fixed the Apple Music playback volume issue. I also haven’t received any further response from the CEO correspondence. 

It’s now 9 months since Sonos introduced this issue and still no sign that they want to fix it. 

Maybe see this earlier post in the thread from Sonos Staff…

It’s gone forward as a ‘feature request’, but there’s no saying anything might change here. Sonos never announce their development updates either, looking at other feature requests that have been put forward in the past.

Airgetlam

It’s odd that this seems to be an Apple Music only issue. Since Sonos uses the same connection/player for all services, I’d think the issue would be impacting all of them equally. 

Bruce
O

Same issue for me for at least a couple of months now. 

M
Userlevel 1

After a half hour of chat support, we have a fix! Remove your Apple Music account from your system. Reset the Sonos Controller App, then re-add your Apple Music to the services and the volumes seem fixed…….for now.

Hope this helps everyone else that lands on this thread!

  • GrandpaTrike Thank you for this!! This has fix the same issue I was having with Amazon Music (after updating to 15.2) - issue was occurring from the changing audio quality for each song, that you can’t control/set. HD & Ultra HD fine but soon as Dolby track came on... BAM!! Getting shouted at by speakers and the partner 😑.  

N
Userlevel 2

How ironic, I just got 3 months free of Apple Music from Sonos when I bought two new Era 100 speakers… and now it does not work properly. Even at volume = 1, getting complaints from the family :(

Do you mean the voice-control volume-1 level, or actual volume-1 in the Sonos App, as the two are entirely different volume levels - I struggle to hear volume-1 in the Sonos App at say a distance of 5-6 feet in a quiet room. Anyone in another room would never hear it in our Home.

The Alexa voice assistant (just as an example) works in integer numbers, each representing a volume increase/decrease of 10%.



My tests from post before (Sonos and Echo are siting on the same shelf)

“Did some tests yesterday - the same track and my very unprofessional dB meter:
Sonos (Apple Music API mode) at the LOWEST possible volume 1/100 is roughly equivalent of Alexa at volume 16/100.”


P.S.  It is possible to use voice to fine tune Alexa Echo volume by 1% (not default 10%) - not easy and a require some work but then works fine (EACH volume level require separate routine)

T
Userlevel 2


 

I’ve took some measurements.. quite room is about 25db with music on volume level 1 is about 45db … 

No music …

Music on lvl 1

 

Maybe it depends on the speaker configuration. I am using a Playbase with 2 Play1 as rear speakers and a sub connected. The equalizer is set to 0. 

 

best Thomas

 

Airgetlam

Well, it’s a stretch, since I’m not sure I can understand why it’s changed volume….doesn’t make much sense to me, but hey, I’m not there on the ground. But that’s why I included the whole “call Sonos” thing. It’s certainly foreign to my update experience. As I type this, I’m listening to a pair of PLAY:1s that flank my computer screen (but are not connected to the computer, I just use the controller on the computer to play music).

Oh...it might be helpful to know the source of music, too. Pretty much most of what I play is from my NAS, but if you’re streaming from a particular service provider, that might be a key part of the whole possibility too. But again, guessing at this point :)

Bruce
O
Userlevel 2

My Sonos system was perfect before 15.2 At the very least, let us revert back to a prior firmware. I do not have any Era speakers, nor do I play Atmos through the app, thus being able to go back to 15.2 would work for me.

AirPlay has allowed for volume normalization for me for Apple Music (through Apple’s settings), but AirPlay is buggy and consistently knocks speakers off. Playing Apple Music through the app, like others have stated, the 1% volume of AM is STILL too loud (especially at night), and there needs to be a normalization option for when streaming Spotify and/or Apple Music within the app so we don’t have to rely on shoddy AirPlay. 

I do have 2 Era speakers, but still being bothered by the same issue …

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