Solved! Vizio Surround Sound speakers not working SB3581

[HoomanSacrifice]

My friend gave me his Vizio surround Sound setup to place in my room and for some reason. the surround sound speakers on the podium aren't working. They're plugged into the subwoofer that has Left and right channels for the surround sound and all I hear coming through them is static while the music is playing. I mostly use the speakers for bluetooth so I don't know if that's affecting it in anyway shape or form. The Model number is: SB3851-CO.

 

[americanaudiophile]

When you set up and balanced the rear speakers you got sound out of them?
You are sending a stereo to the soundbar and will have to select a surround mode for a stereo music input. Try each surround mode which you can change on the remote. The result will depend on both the content and the surround mode. There may not be any or much rear output.
It will not be the same as when you use video which may be encoded for digital surround sound which is almost never the case with music (and never with bluetooth).

 

[HoomanSacrifice]

I never got sound out of the rear speakers, just static. How do I change the surround mode on the remote? Is it menu?

 

[HoomanSacrifice]

I never got sound out of the rear speakers, just static. How do I change the surround mode on the remote? Is it menu?

Only the subwoofer and the sound bar are outputing music

 

[americanaudiophile]

Does never got sound mean that you ran the setup and got nothing?
If you didn't do the set up download the owners manual and do that. How to change the surround mode will be in the manual too.
If you can't get any sound during set up then changing the surround mode won't help. Could be in the surround speakers or in the transmitter of the soundbar.

 

[HoomanSacrifice]

So there's no way that I can get the back speakers working if im using it over Bluetooth? Because im just using the speakers just as speakers connected to Bluetooth.

 

[HoomanSacrifice]

Just did a speaker test and the back speakers work, but IDK how I get them to work for music. Surround and Surnd are on.

 

[hang-the-9]

Music is stereo, there is no rear audio to send to the rear speakers. Look in the manual for the sound bar to see if there is some other setting to run rears all the time, although that won't sound too good unless you play things in mono since you will be getting audio that should be on left/right coming in from all sides. There is a difference between surround sound and using all speakers for stereo sources. A while ago "quadrophonic" sound was a thing, not so much now https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quadraphonic_sound

Just having more speakers working does not mean you will get better sound from the system.

 

[HoomanSacrifice]

I'll see if I can find something after work.

 

[HoomanSacrifice]

Ok so just got back home. Quadratic sound is in the 4 corners of the room, that's not the setup that I have. I'm pretty sure the only way I can get the back speakers outputting audio is if I get a Digital Coaxial Cable to 3.5mm adapter and plug it into my PC. I don't know if it'll work but I can say, "at least I tried."

 

[hang-the-9]

Ok so just got back home. Quadratic sound is in the 4 corners of the room, that's not the setup that I have. I'm pretty sure the only way I can get the back speakers outputting audio is if I get a Digital Coaxial Cable to 3.5mm adapter and plug it into my PC. I don't know if it'll work but I can say, "at least I tried."

If you are trying to play stereo inputs through 4 speakers, you are not using 5.1 audio, you are using the 4 speakers running stereo. 2 front, two rears = 4 speakers, but playing stereo, that is the setup you have. To play rear speakers from a stereo source you need to look for a setting on the soundbar to enable that.

 

[HoomanSacrifice]

What setting would that be because on the manual I never saw anything like that. I'll look and see after work.

 

[hang-the-9]

What setting would that be because on the manual I never saw anything like that. I'll look and see after work.

There may not be one. Stereo is left/right. So soundbar plays left/right. Rear speakers are rear left and right. Stereo signal does not have that, so soundbar does not use the rear speakers.

Let's say you force them to play, which rear speaker would be playing the left audio, is it left based on the speaker as you are facing it, or as you are facing the front speakers? So you can have left audio on left front, then left audio coming from behind you from the right as a possibility. Then you have a mess with imaging. Leave music playback to the front speakers and the sub.

More speakers does not equal better sound. The only really good way a bunch of speakers may sound OK is if you play audio in mono, so all the speakers play the exact same thing, but then you want speakers that are similar so the audio is balanced.