Soundbar issues? talking too quiet, explosions too loud (1 Viewer)

[Necros]

I've always had this problem where sometimes i can barely hear what people are saying on a TV show or movie, so I have to crank up the volume, but then explosions and sound effects are super loud, even background music is too loud. Is this a calibration issue? I thought maybe it was my fairly cheap Onkyo atmos sound bar, but I remember this happening even way back when I had separate speakers. I tried increasing the volume for the center channel in the soundbar settings, but it doesn't seem to do much for the dialog, it just raises the overall volume. There's also a way to shorten the distance settings for how far away the spear is supposed to be, but that also does nothing as far as I can tell.

I'm thinking of upgrading to the Samsung q990 soundbar, but was waiting to see if it goes on sale for black friday. Trying to decide on if I want to do that or switch back to separate speakers. The reason we got rid of them was puppies liked to go after the cables, I can't really stuff them inside the wall or anything, just run them along the baseboards. That and we just like the less cluttery look you get with a soundbar.

 

[JohnRice]

It sounds like it's a problem with the incoming audio signal. The fact that turning up the center makes everything go up makes me suspect it's actually receiving a mono signal. How is it connected? It could be a configuration problem with your source.

 

[Todd Erwin]

Does the soundbar have a Night mode? Enabling that compresses the dynamic range of the signal, lowering the high volume sounds and raising the low volume ones.

 

[Necros]

I don't think there is a night mode. I have the sound bar connected to my TV with earc. I mosrly just watch streaming shows and movies on this TV and I also do Xbox gaming. My TV is a LG Nano 65", last year's model. My Xbox is connected to the TV so I use the TV to switch things around. I can see when I'm playing games or watching an Atmos movie, the atmos light on the little receiver comes on, so I don't think it's mono? This is the sound bar I have

See on Amazon

 

[JohnRice]

Have you tried lowering the surround levels? That and raising the center really should fix it.

 

[BobO'Link]

It's caused by extremely poor mixing at the studio. And producers/directors are generally the fault of such horrid mixes. You *might* be able to mitigate it somewhat with a 5.1 audio system but with just a soundbar and zero control over the mix you're stuck with those mixes. Resign yourself to keeping volume at a level to not blow out the windows and turn on SDH/subtitles.

 

[JohnRice]

I’ve never had problems with soundtracks, not accounting for Nolan, but I’ve never used a soundbar, so I don‘t know what calibration is actually possible . With a regular speaker based system I’ve always been able to get good calibration. So, at least it is possible with a conventional system.

 

[John Dirk]

I have the sound bar connected to my TV with earc. I mosrly just watch streaming shows and movies on this TV and I also do Xbox gaming. My TV is a LG Nano 65", last year's model. My Xbox is connected to the TV so I use the TV to switch things around.

Best I can tell, this product only supports ARC, not eARC, which would explain why it's unable to process Hii Res audio from your TV.

The XBox should be connected to the receiver unit, not the TV. I'd try this arrangement and see if a Blu Ray disc [XBox can play those, right?] sounds better.

 

[JohnRice]

I think what everyone is illustrating is that there are too many things that could be going wrong. In a strange way, the more idiot proof components are, the more likely something will go wrong, and the less likely there is a way to fix it.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Can anyone suggest a solution?

Rather than turning the volume up and down for the entire system, go into the setup menu and turn up the volume specifically for the center channel/speaker. That is where the majority of dialogue comes from and giving that a slight boost should help.

 

[JohnRice]

...while you're at it, also lower the levels for the surround channels. It usually takes a combination of both.