I've been using a Majority Audio soundbar via optical on my TV for a while now. It clips out sound when a scene has low level audio - traffic hum, room ambience and the like. It's an absolute nightmare with old movies that have hiss, creating a staccato effect where, every time someone stops talking, the sound completely drops out. It's as if there's some sort of built-in audio noise reduction algorithm running, which is driving me mad. It's a problem on both Bluetooth and Optical. The soundbar works fine on may parents' 12-year-old LCD Samsung TV playing the same films. I tried my next door neighbour's HDMI-Arc soundbar on my TV and, if anything, the clipping problem was even worse, so this is clearly an issue with the TV's output.
I've looked online and, judging by the number of comments I've found this seems to be a widespread problem with a number of Samsung TVs. I've also found references to it on this website and the person was simply told to contact the soundbar manufacturer. However, this appears to be an issue with how the TV outputs its audio, because I've used two different brands of soundbar on three inputs that have this problem on my TV and tested my own soundbar on a different TV that didn't give me a problem.
Additionally, the TV won't run an audio delay for Bluetooth, so I can't watch movies on my Bluetooth headphones, as the delay is too jarring.
I'm not happy, as this wasn't a cheap TV. My previous HD LCD Samsung lasted me 12 years and was great, which is why I came back to Samsung for its replacement. This problem literally ruined watching The Godfather and Carlito's Way for me last week and has rendered old films such as Ministry of Fear and The Lady from Shanghai unwatchable.
I'm sure both of these problems could be solved with a firmware update.
