The latest advance in HDMI connectivity, called enhanced audio return channel (eARC) is designed to both carry higher-quality sound formats and to solve lip-sync issues. That is the reason why I still use a separate home theatre system with a dedicated receiver, rather than one of the significantly sleeker, cheaper – and just as good-sounding – soundbars. In the last decade of testing various combinations of TVs, set-top boxes and soundbars, I have had some sort of lip-sync issue at least half the time. People often ask how they can avoid such problems, but it’s very hard to know in advance whether you’ll be hit with incurable lip-sync malfunctions. These third-party companies make and sell small gadgets to solve what is essentially a software failing. There’s even a cottage industry of – often high-priced – devices that attempt to solve the issue. It is such a common and irritating problem that various online forums are filled with people trying to work out homemade fixes, often with bizarre sets of configuration steps that might as well include some sort of prayer and a dance. That leaves those unlucky TV watchers contacting call centres for each of their various bits of kit, ending up in a merry-go-round of agents blaming each other. The culprit is more likely to be the set-top box or the TV further up the chain. People often point the finger of blame straight at the soundbar, but the anger is often misplaced. And worse, the delay can be variable depending on the content you’re watching, and the sound format it was shown in. If the audio arrives at your soundbar after the picture is displayed on TV, delaying the audio does nothing. And it is this issue that plagues all brands, costs and sizes of device. These tools work fine when the picture is behind the sound, but if the sound is delayed and arrives after the picture you’re often out of luck. But the culprit is often more likely to be the set-top box or the TV People often point the finger straight at the soundbar. But getting it right is a tedious process, which may leave someone questioning why they have to tweak a piece of technology that they have spent so much money on. If the automatic systems designed to correct timing issues fail, most set-top boxes, TVs and soundbars have ways to manually add a delay to the audio so you can synchronise it with the picture. When the audio arrives at the soundbar before the picture is displayed on the TV, it creates the dreaded lip-sync problem. The TV then splits the picture and sound, and feeds the audio to the soundbar via ARC down another HDMI cable. When watching this way, the picture and sound are passed from the box to TV via the HDMI cable. The problem comes when you attempt to watch some other video source connected to your TV, and is particularly prevalent with broadcast TV boxes such as Sky’s Q or Virgin’s V6. When simply watching Freeview, Freesat or one of the various apps directly on your TV, ARC usually handles the synchronisation without issue. Once you notice it, you won’t be able to unsee it. When things go wrong it can be infuriating – sometimes the picture can appear after the sound, which is most obvious when someone is speaking on screen and their speech doesn’t match up with the movement of their lips. The problems can affect soundbars of all types, and the audio may either run ahead of or lag behind the video.
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