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Playing the bombing run scene from Unbroken and we’re immediately transported to within the fuselage of the B-24 Liberator. Our listening room is filled with wind noise and the whirr of the plane’s engines, and the incidental creaks and rattles are placed in specific spots, including right in the top corners of the wall we’re sitting against. For personalised sound, use the Sonos app to adjust bass, treble and loudness. Speech Enhancement mode optimises vocal clarity – ideal for documentaries and sports commentary. Night Sound reduces the intensity of sound, making it less intrusive for others around your home. Bass and treble can also be adjusted in the Sonos app, although you're unlikely to feel the need, and the Loudness function can be disabled here, too. There's also a Night Sound feature that flattens dynamics and reduces bass, ideal for when you don't want to wake the rest of the household, while Speech Enhancement aims to project dialogue more clearly. Prices valid in stores (all including VAT) until close of business on 29th November 2023. (Some of these web prices are cheaper than in-store, so please mention that you've seen these offers online.) This product does not have any user-serviceable parts. Do not open or disassemble or attempt to repair it or replace any components. Refer all servicing to Sonos qualified service personnel. Servicing is required when the apparatus has been damaged in any way, such as power-supply cable or plug is damaged, liquid has been spilled or objects have fallen into the apparatus, the apparatus has been exposed to rain or moisture, does not operate normally, or has been dropped.
The Arc's own status light consists of LEDs that shine through four holes above the subtle Sonos logo (fun fact: there are 76,000 holes in all the grilles combined). By default, these LEDs remain off most of the time and their brightness is tailored to the ambient light in the room even when they are lit (when adjusting volume, for example), so as not to appear too bright. There’s two rear reinforced holes to wall mount the 13.78 lb (6.25 kg) unit for a forward facing mounting setup, but naturally the bass response is a little more concentrated when it can reflect off a tabletop surface. Find the right music for every moment on Spotify. Search any artist or song, create and share playlists, and get personalized recommendations. Listen on Sonos and control the music with your voice, the Spotify app or the Sonos app. With four, far-field microphones on board, Arc can hear you – even from the other side of the room. (Spotify Premium account required for full features).Using the Arc is just as simple. Watch your TV as you normally would and the Arc will switch on and play sound. You can control the volume with your TV’s remote, using a voice assistant or the Sonos app. General stereo TV sound was great. Everything from old reruns of Midsomer Murders and NCIS to Match of the Day sounded exactly as it should: clear, crisp and full. The Arc’s dialogue clarity was truly top notch coming across sounding natural and clear at all times. Not once did I have to turn up the sound to hear what was going on, and that was without the Arc’s dedicated Speech Enhancement mode. Improved stereo. Again, why? For being a sound bar and limited by it's physical shape and dimensions, it's already excellent. Buy separate speakers if you want true stereo separation.
Most soundbars do a good job of reproducing TV and movie audio, but fall down on music. The Arc is simply fantastic as a music speaker, sounding far better than any other soundbar I have tested, including the Beam, and many dedicated music systems. Clean only with dry soft cloth. Household cleaners or solvents can damage the finish on your Sonos products. So while we were able to experience excellent height and left/right soundscape movement, we definitely didn’t get the same surround sound experience as a multi-speaker array.
Obviously the Arc is in no position to offer any meaningful impression of surround sound, but it does quite well in its efforts to bring effects that would be in the rear channels of a five-speaker set-up as close to alongside your seated position as possible. The ‘Trueplay’ feature (iOS only), heard to such good effect on products like the Sonos Move portable speaker, helps no end here: understanding the room where the Arc is positioned allows sounds to be reflected off side walls with a fair bit more purpose than they otherwise would. The setup process is designed to be as simple as possible, all done through the Sonos S2 smartphone app. (Image credit: Future) Once in position, most of what you can see of the Arc is a 273-degree grille that hides the array of front-mounted and up-firing speakers. Each end also features a grille-covered driver. A woofer in each end of the soundbar provides a wide soundstage. Photograph: Samuel Gibbs/The Guardian With HDMI eARC and full-fat Dolby Atmos onboard, the Arc already supports a combination of features that no other Sonos product offers. So what might we expect the company to add to this already class-leading soundbar?
Pros: sounds fantastic with music, great Dolby Atmos reproduction, super-clear vocals, Night Sound, wide soundstage, looks good, Alexa or Google Assistant, extensive music service support, simple set-up, surprisingly good bass without a subSonos gets better when you add more speakers. Play a movie in your living room, a podcast in the kitchen or the same music across all your Sonos speakers – flexibility is key. The latest Sonos components link via your home Wi-Fi but for very best results, linking one component to an Ethernet connection gives the most stable solution.
You can perform True Play tuning, waving an iPhone or iPad about your room listening to what sounds like loud alien blasters. The Sonos app listens to the sound to optimise the Arc for your particular room. Sadly the feature isn’t available for Android devices because of the variances in microphone quality. This precision is matched by the three silk dome tweeters that deliver particularly crisp highs with an impressive level of control. We were particularly taken by the unit's ability to deliver soundscapes that distinguished sound from individual instruments during particular arrangements without feeling disjointed. Dynamics, detail and clarity are all outstanding in the current Arc, though there is a lot to be said for how much weight and bass a home cinema product can produce too. A weightier presentation that's capable of a greater volume of bass– perhaps due to those reflex bass port improvements – would be most welcome in a sequel. The Arc has top-notch vocal clarity and excellent separation of tones, instruments and vocals. Play The Who’s Baba O’Riley and you’ll be able to make out every overlapping note or hear fingers on drum skins and guitar strings in the live version Hotel California by the Eagles.
Verdict
If your TV remote is set to control the sound via HDMI control rather than infrared it won’t work when playing music on the Arc.
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