Kd-65af9 kd-55af9 centre speaker latency.

[csschofi]

I have new af9 running with str-dn1080. I’m using the tv speaker as center front speaker using input terminals on af9. I’m seeing lipsynch problems with delayed audio. Running auto calibrate on dn1080 confirms that it thinks my centre speaker is 5 meters further away than it actually is. This corresponds to a 15 milliseconds audio delay. This shows up as poor lipsynch on live tv using the af9 native tv receiver. I believe the problem is inherent in all new af9 TVs. 

This needs to be addressed in a future upgrade please. If the processing delay for his speaker cannot be reduced then a way of delaying the video needs to be found to restore lipsync.

If there are any other af9 users using the centre speaker mode, can you please check your delay times or speaker distances and report this anomaly here?  Any advice on a workaround gratefully recieved. 

Carlos

[Mick_D]

Hi Carlos

Have you tried adjusting the audio settings on the TV? 

Cheers

mick

[csschofi]

Sony support is looking into my lipsync issues. After a number of resets to both the picture and sound configuration, the lipsync now seems very good and no longer an issue for me. However, the latency on the centre speaker still remains and is most apparent after auto calibration as the distance to the centre speaker shows as 5 meters further away than it actually physically is. The tv may now be adequately compensating for that latency so this is no longer an issue for me but it may cause confusion when looking at the distances to each speaker for other users.

If you experience this problem. update software to latest version on Dm1080 and AF9. Then try resetting the picture and sound configurations to their factory state. if you are experiencing very small differences then putting a bit of motion smoothing on may delay the picture enough to better sync with the audio. (sorry this is based on totally subjective assessment). Note that the "custom" picture setting defaults to no smoothing. Set your Earc output to Auto2 pcm and compressed for multichannel. Let sony know if you have had a similar problem by posting something here.

[sidechained]

I saw a demo of this a couple of months ago and everyone in the room picked up on the same issue. Saw Sony a month later and they had fixed the issue. I'm not sure if this was in a test environment (the fix) but I imagine an update must be coming to fix it.

[csschofi]

Thanks for this interesting feedback. 

[pvandamcom]

I recognize the problem and are working with Sony in the Netherlands on the same.

The lipsync associated with this is not my biggest problem (it seems to auto correct somehow anyway).

My biggest issue is that most TV content and even TV shows on Netflix are recorded in a way that voices don't come 100% only from the Center speaker. The result of this is a nasty echo.

With content that is pure 5.1 (voices coming from Center) the sound is fine.

To me this problem is to be explained by the audio going through some extra electronics, causing a slight delay.

The OP, mentions receiver speaker calibration identifying the speaker as further away, that is interesting, as it would imply that receivers can set individual timings on analog speakers. I can't find that on Yamaha.

If the speaker calibration process provides a way to do that, it might be a solution.

But if that process results in the speaker still being off, then indeed it would need to come from Sony to do something about that delay.

I'm glad I found this thread, I'm not the only one (as it seemed...)

[pvandamcom]

I've tried most of the audio alignment settings suggested here, none of the make the audio echo problem go away.

The only thing that solves it for me is to reconnect an old Center Speaker and that defeats the whole purpose of this nice and niew solution from Sony to use the TV as center channel.

[pvandamcom]

I have managed to work around the problem by doing the Manual Speaker setup (calibration) through the reveiver.

As suggested before, in an automated setup the Sony Center Speaker is "seen" as further away than in reality, because of the latency and this then gets compensated by the receiver.

My Left/Right main speakers as 3.5 meters, and the Sony Center is now set at 9 meters, where in reality it is 3 meters, so an approximate correction of 6 meters, makes the sound arrive early enough for the speaker to sound in sync.

Sony in the Netherlands says it is still investigating, the least thing they could do is document this "feature" and publish a manual on how to approach this latency, that is if they can't fix it due to the electronics.

[Daz-JJ]

I had similar problems with my AF9 connected to Denon X3500H.  V6(Cable) box connected to TV (loss of picture quality through AVR), all HDMI.  I turned off Auto Lip Sync on the AVR, all now working perfect.

[csschofi]

This latency lip sync issue is still a problem for me. I have given up waiting for solution and manually dialed down the distance to centre speaker on the Dn 1080. Result is better lip sync but potential for smeared sound where centre channel carries same audio sources as left and right.

My conclusion is centre speaker requires dsp treatement to be any good and this requires a considerable latency which is difficult to avoid with current implantation and technology.