10 common problems of home theater system and solutions

1. No sound emits.

In this case, firstly, we unplug the power cord of the amplifier from the socket. Secondly, check the connection of amplifier’ power cord and speakers’ wires. If you're using bare speaker wires, you need to make sure the wires are held down by the studs so that no excess wire is exposed.

Take Tonewinner AT-2300 AV receiver as an example. First, enter the menu and go to SET UP section. Select “speaker setup” and enter “level test level adjust”. Test each channel one by one to see whether the speakers are connected correctly and whether gain of each channel are the same.

In some cases, we need to manually arrange speakers to some channels, and in some cases, the original audio content may not be played by speakers.

2. Surround speakers do not work.

If all connections are correct, let’s adjust the volume first, because some times the volume is just too low to be heard. If it doesn’t work, then check your audio content whether it is 5.1 or 7.1 stereo sound. Many sound played by amplifiers are two channels mixing and normally sound from films has no surround sound. In this case, you can choose multichannel or Dolby Atmos sound output. If you are using a Blu-ray player, you may need to set the output to source output or a multichannel bitstream.

3. The sound of the main speaker is not good enough.

If the function of main speakers goes well, then the problem may be the incompatibility between power amplifier and main speakers. If the output power of the power amplifier is too low, and the main speaker is a large-size floor standing speaker, there will be a situation of "a small horse drives a big cart". At this time, the power amplifier cannot drive the main speaker to achieve best sound. As a result, the sound of the main speaker is always weak.

So in a home theater system, the power amplifier is crucial. First choose the amplifier and then choose the matched speakers, so that there will be more appropriate speaker to be chosen.

Another way is to adjust the crossover of your subwoofer. You might have put on too much low frequency load on your front main speakers, which could distort or muddy the sound.

4. The height channel sound doesn’t sound good.

The adjustment of the top speaker is more complicated, because it is not like other speakers that can be adjusted and placed at will. In addition to adjusting the wiring, we can open the menu of the amplifier to see if the current speaker layout includes the height channel.

If that doesn't work, you may need to think more about how to re-arrange your speakers’ placement. With reflex height channels, the problem is much less. The reflex overhead channel reflects the sound towards the ceiling and then transmit it to the listeners to create a sound with a sense of 3D.

5. There is static electricity in the speakers.

The presence of static electricity generally comes from improper speaker connections. A wire may have been shaken and looses from the jack, and you just need to reconnect it.

If it does not work, try to switch the input signals. If you're currently using a Blu-ray player, and if you have other devices, try watching something on a streaming platform to see if the static is still there. Elimination method should help you figure out which part of your system is causing the problem. If you are using a preamplifier to connect with an amplifier, you may find that the problem lies in the connection between them.

Generally speaking, static electricity is almost always a problem with loose connections. Unless it's the worst situation: your speakers might blow up because they don't match your amplifier.

6. The whole system doesn't sound good.

This problem is a bit difficult to diagnose. All the connections are correct, the amps are precisely tuned, and your room is well done to handle the sound well...but the sound is still thin or stuffy with less low frequency than you might expect. It could be an issue with the whole setup, or it could just be one or two speakers.

There are two connection terminals on the back of each speaker: one for positive and one for negative, usually white and red (the binding posts are mostly red and black), and the connections on the back of your multi channels amp will line up the same way. If they are reversed, the phase is wrong and the sound will be worse. If your system’s sound is thin or muffled, the main thing you need to do is to check whether you're connecting your speakers in the right way.

7. There is some buzzing sound.

Generally, two equipment on the same circuit interfere with each other and create an annoying hum. Let's start with the amplifier and adjust the volume. If the hum is getting louder or quieter, that means the noise is caused by amplifier.

If you choose another input source, and the buzzing still exist. Then just remove all the wires connecting the amp and other machines, but keep the speakers and the amp's power cord. Move away and further test the machine which brings the buzzing noise. 

But if you can't find it, either by switching the input signal or adjusting the volume, then you need a ground loop, that is, you need a piece or two of little equipment to fix it. If the the noise is caused by your wired TV, you will need an isolation transformer. If the the noise is caused by something else, try a earthing grounding isolate device.

8. The universal remote control does not work.

There may be three or four remote controls in a home theater system. At this time, some people will choose to buy a universal remote control to operate all machines. But every once in a while, they have a little problem. First check if the battery runs out of electricity. Also, this can happen if you've crammed an amp into a cabinet, which it's a more common mistake than you might think.

Check online to see if your remote and amplifiers are designed with infrared (IR) or radio frequency (RF). Amplifiers that use RF will not be able to compatible with remotes that use IR. Fortunately, in most cases, you can change this setting on the amp itself. Even if they can't, there are many small devices that can convert IR to RF, and RF to IR.

9. No sound emits from the subwoofer.

If there is no sound from the 10/12 inch subwoofer, the reason is that you haven’t used the amplifier to set up for the subwoofer.

Taking Tonewinner AT-2300 amplifier as an example. Let’s enter the menu and the level test to check whether the speaker wiring is correct. Then select the subwoofer selection. If you want to turn off/on the subwoofer, then select “Frequency Response” and “Left and Right Low Frequency”, and set the left and right channels to "full frequency". At this time, the “Subwoofer Selection” option becomes bright, and you can select the switch of the subwoofer. This setting is to avoid accidentally turning off the subwoofer when the main speaker is not set to "full frequency", resulting in the loss of the subwoofer signal.

10. The sound is out of sync with the image.

Sound and image lag is one of the most common problems in the 5.1 home theater bluetooth system world. This is because the video processing time is a bit long, but the sound is prepared before the image, so the actors on the screen will “speak” before their mouths move, which does affect the audience experience.

The solution is very simple. Again take AT-2300 amplifier as an example. Open the menu and enter “Speaker distance”, input the distance between each speaker to the best listening position, and the system will automatically convert it into milliseconds (delay time), to achieve better lip-sync effect and listening experience.