Personal a Sonos soundbar? I made 3 straightforward changes to immediately enhance the audio high quality

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ZDNET’s key takeaways

• Your listening room’s format has a big impact in your soundbar’s Dolby Atmos efficiency.
• There are a number of audio options that may assist enhance dialogue readability.
• Constructing out your Sonos residence theater might help with audio readability and robustness.

Sonos’ webpages and standard opinions are filled with specs, however a number of real-life elements have an effect on your soundbar’s efficiency greater than you’d assume. Components corresponding to placement, your content material’s audio format, and your room’s dimension and furnishings all have an effect on your soundbar’s output. 

I take advantage of my Sonos Arc and Arc Extremely soundbars, Period 300 audio system, Sub 4 subwoofer, and Ace headphones each day, however reaching full satisfaction required some changes. I am lastly able to share the secrets and techniques.

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Begin along with your soundbar’s placement. No matter whether or not you could have a flagship Arc or Arc Extremely, or a smaller Beam or Ray, location issues. Guarantee your soundbar is as near eye degree as potential and centered in your TV. When you might help it, preserve your soundbar out of a cupboard; you need sound to disperse all through the room slightly than be confined inside an area.

1. Drawback: Dolby Atmos would not sound immersive

The rationale: An absence of peak

Dolby Atmos is an object-based spatial audio format. Nonetheless, film theaters get it proper as a result of they’ve audio system embedded within the ceiling, including peak and reaching an immersive expertise that mimics sounds coming from above you. You do not have ceiling audio system, however your Arc or Arc Extremely has upfiring audio system to create this phantasm at residence.

The repair: Enhance the peak channel quantity

This one is probably the most troublesome. When you have vaulted ceilings or your soundbar setup would not enable for a lot house between the soundbar and your TV, your upfiring audio system will battle. Nonetheless, you’ll be able to enhance the quantity of your Arc or Arc Extremely’s peak channels to attempt to make them louder and extra noticeable. 

A set of rear audio system might help considerably increase the horizontal airplane of your Dolby Atmos expertise, and the Period 300 has an upfiring tweeter for added peak impact, in case your house can accommodate it. 

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Neither the Sonos Ray nor Beam (Gen 2) has devoted upfiring audio system, however their ahead and side-facing channels assist with increasing your content material’s soundstage. Both compact soundbar is an improve out of your TV’s skinny audio system, however the Beam (Gen 2) is the perfect compact possibility from Sonos (when it is on sale).

2. Drawback: Dialogue is not clear

The rationale: Toggle Speech Enhancement, Night time Mode, or Loudness

There are a number of methods to deal with this downside by enjoying with a number of audio options. Beginning small, you’ll be able to activate Speech Enhancement, which decreases bass and will increase mids, which is usually the place dialogue resides. You can too activate Night time Sound alongside Speech Enhancement to additional cut back bass. 

Guarantee your soundbar’s Loudness characteristic is off, as it may well additionally amplify non-dialogue sounds. When you’re nonetheless not listening to as clearly as you want, you’ll be able to cut back the soundbar’s bass response in its EQ settings. You’ll find all these options within the Sonos app.

From my expertise, rear audio system and a sub, particularly a subwoofer, mitigate this downside completely, for the reason that extra audio channels enable the soundbar to deal with mids and the sub to deal with bass. 

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When you’re this deep into the Sonos ecosystem and need to watch TV with out bothering your housemates or neighbors, contemplate shopping for the Sonos Ace headphones. They’re appropriate with the Sonos Arc, Arc Extremely, Beam, and Ray, and play the identical audio format because the soundbar’s output. 

3. Drawback: One thing simply sounds ‘off’

The repair: Re-calibrate TruePlay

TruePlay is Sonos’ acoustic tuning characteristic that helps your audio system carry out to their greatest by accounting in your room’s dimension, furnishings, and format. When you’re like me, your rooms aren’t the proper sq. with minimal furnishings just like the mannequin rooms on the Sonos web site. 

You will need to tune your speaker with TruePlay to account for the partitions close to your soundbar and the sectional-sized barrier in your listening space. When you ever rearrange your listening space, whether or not that be the audio system or the furnishings, run a brand new TruePlay calibration.