Sound "turning off" after 2 seconds on Soundbar 700

[Kiryuu]

Hi everyone,

My problem is that when an audio signal isn't transmitted for a period of say 2 seconds from a device to the soundbar, when it transmits again it has a .5 sec delay to come back on. Let me make an example:

I'm playing a game which has a dialog without music, a character says "Let's go" and there's a pause of 2 seconds, after which another character says "Yeah, let's go". I can only hear "s go" from the second phrase. Of course if there's music in the background this doesn't happen, as the audio is not interrupted.

There's a setting on the NVIDIA shield to circumvent this which is called "Play comfort noise on HDMI" which plays all the time a silent track so this won't happen, but it's not present on every device, in my example it would be a PS4.

So, is there a way to configure the soundbar to actually stay on? The 20 min standby is off, not that it should be related, but just mentioning it.

Thanks in advance!

[Andy_B]

Hi Kiryuu,

Welcome to the Bose Community Forums. I'm sorry to hear that you're experiencing issues with your Soundbar 700. 

To confirm, does this issue occur on all sources that you're playing to your TV such as the PS4, cable/satellite box, etc? Do you experience any difference in audio playback with the "Play comfort noise on HDMI" feature enabled/disabled and is this function found directly on your TV? 

What TV make/model do you have? HDMI connections utilize a feature called CEC, whereby additional commands can be sent. Have you tried adjusting the CEC functions on your TV to "On"/"Off", or similar to compare for results? Similarly, the Soundbar 700 has adjustable CEC settings. To change this, within the Bose Music app select your Soundbar 700. Tap the icon for the Soundbar 700 in the bottom-right of the screen, and press "Settings". Scroll to "Advanced CEC" and test using between "On", "Alternate" and "Off" to compare for your own results.

Have you tested using an Optical cable to connect your TV to the Soundbar 700 in place of the HDMI cable? This may also help to resolve the issues that you're currently experiencing.

Kindest,

Andy B - Community Support

[SandwichEconomist]

Hi there! Sorry to resurrect a dead thread, but I’m having the same issue. After a few seconds of silence, the next sound that plays will have the first 0.5 - 1.5 seconds cut off. Effectively this means that sudden noises are completely filtered out if they’re short enough.

I’ve tried a full reset of my sound bar. I’ve also connected my PS4 directly to it with an optical cable, and got the same behavior. The problem does not occur when using my TV’s speakers, so it seems to me that the soundbar is the culprit. Please help!

[Keith_L]

Hey SandwichEconomist,

It sounds like you have done some great troubleshooting with this already, so thank you for doing that and letting us know! Resetting the soundbar and testing with other devices are both great starting points.

When you say you have done a full reset of the soundbar, was that the factory reset process or a standard reset?

As this happens with the PS4 through the soundbar using the optical cable, are you also using an optical connection with the TV? Does it do the same if you use the HDMI-ARC connection

Also, does your TV have access to a "Play comfort noise on HDMI" that the previous user mentioned fixing this?

Does this happen with all sources through your TV as well? Or only when you are using the PS4?

I look forward to getting to the bottom of this with you!

[SandwichEconomist]

Hi! I have a new Bose Soundbar 700. I’ve noticed an issue and I’m hoping there’s a way around it that I don’t know about.

Basically, if everything is silent for around 2 seconds or more and then a sound happens, the first 0.5 to 1.5 seconds of that audio will be dropped completely. It kind of fades in. Once it goes quiet again, this will happen again. This kind of ruins quiet moments in movies and makes menus in games feel broken if there’s no background music.

I have tried both optical and HDMI connections, both from my TV and my PS4. Same problem for all. If I go through my TV speakers, I have no issues, so I’m pretty confident it’s the soundbar.

For what it’s worth, I have an Ethernet connection, and I’m not using WiFi if that’s related somehow. My TV is a Sony X900e. The soundbar is on firmware 7.0.11-7872+c14c25a. I have tried a full power cycle, as well as changing the CEC settings.

Thank you!

[SandwichEconomist]

Hi!

I only did a power cycle, so I just did a full factory reset. That prompted a firmware upgrade from 7.0.11-7872+c14c25a to 8.0.13-8133+552c64a. 

Unfortunately, the problem persists. I’ve uploaded a video here to show the problem more clearly.

I have tried:

- Connecting the soundbar directly to my PS4 with an optical cable

- Connecting the soundbar to the TV with an optical cable

- Connecting the soundbar to the TV with an HDMI cable

All of these exhibit the same (undesired) behavior. In the video I linked, I have an optical connection from the soundbar to the TV. When the sound is set to play through the TV speakers, there are no problems, but when it goes through the soundbar, there are. When the PS4 is connected to the soundbar directly with an optical cable, same problem. I can conclude from that that it’s the soundbar itself causing the issue. 

I do not have a “comfort noise” setting, but the fact that it helped someone else corroborates my theory that the soundbar is either filtering too aggressively or it has too short of a threshold for entering standby. When there is continuous audio coming through the soundbar, like music or ambient sound, the problem doesn’t happen. It makes sense that a feature that generates noise would keep the soundbar from “sleeping”, as it seems to be doing. 

Thanks for your time. I hope we can get to the bottom of this, because I really like how this soundbar sounds otherwise!

[Kiryuu]

Still here, still have the same problem. NVIDIA Shield has the comfort noise setting, so it doesn't bother me much. Except when I'm playing on my PS4, same as you, and there's some spoken scene without music. It ruins the immersion, tbh. Hope there's some workaround...

[SandwichEconomist]

Any news @Keith_L ? Would it be possible to get in touch with a firmware engineer? I'm hoping to find out if this is a deliberate design decision or unintended behavior. Is there any other way I can help? Thank you!

[CDonovan]

Has this been fixed yet? I have the exact same issue with my Soundbar. I replaced a Bose Cinemate Series II system with the Soundbar 700. I had no similar problems with the Cinemate Series II, and still don't. I've isolated it to being the Soundbar in particular and have tried every combination of setup and configuration as possible (using optical, using ARC, using eARC, all types of timeout and audio passthrough settings).

I also tried using two separate receivers, one from Onkyo and another from Yahama and both do not show the same problem. I've reset my device to factory settings and even borrowed my friends 700 Soundbar and it has the exact same problem on my same hardware. I have another friend who always just thought his PC was the cause. It happens to me using all sources (Tivo, Xbox One X, PS4 and PC), but it is particularly annoying when using my work computer with Skype for Business and Outlook. The notification sounds are so quick, and they usually fire off during a silence period that the sound is mostly muted is missed.

You clearly have a problem in the firmware of the Soundbar here. Please get a firmware tech on it as soon as possible. I'm sure the problem is easily reproducible on your end as I haven't see a single 700 Soundbar that does show the issue (I've seen 4 so far). The issue is also reproduceable with Bluetooth playback from a phone as well. Try it for yourself like this...

1. Pair the phone via bluetooth.

2. Play a youtube video, it will quickly cut off the beginning 1-1.5 seconds of the audio

3.rewind the video to the beginning without pausing, you'll notice you get all the audio, including the first 1-1.5 seconds

4. Pause the video, wait 3 seconds, rewind to the beginning and then hit play, you'll lose the first 1-1.5 seconds of audio again, showing that the soundbar is somehow going into some standby mode after 2-3 seconds of inactivity.

[abuchanan]

I’m seeing the same behavior with my soundbar 700 with lg tv and Apple TV. I had always thought it was the Apple TV, but apparently not. Good thing I learned this now, as I was about to order a 500 to use as a computer speaker, but this won’t work for me on zoom calls alas.