uKER

You probably have selected some audio mode that's trying to generate audio for the rear channels and getting a poor signal as the input. Try Standard or Direct mode.

Thanks for the suggestion, but yeah, my original post mentions I exhaustively tried flashing using a flash drive. Apparently there's no way to initiate flashing unless the bar is alive.

Wi-Fi update how? Can you get me a link to read about it? I asked support about that possiblity, since my bar is still visible on the network, but got nothing from them. Yeah, I also asked that they only shipped a new bar (no subwoofer) to me, but that also seems to be impossible apparently.

Well, congratulate me. I woke up to my bar being stuck on "UPDATING..." and long story short, it ended up completely dead. Full story here.

Well, all in my life was well until I woke up today and unexpectedly found my Cinema 800 with "UPDATING..." in its display. I found it quite weird that it had decided to update itself during the night with no intervention from me, but well. I let it sit there for over an hour and a half, and nothing ever happened, so I tried and the bar was responding to remote control commands. Probably a glich, I thought. Turned the bar off, but when it came back on, the "UPDATING..." notice came back. Left it there for a good while and it never went away. I then decided to do some research and ended up here. https://support.klipsch.com/hc/en-us/articles/4406163207316-Cinema-800-Firmware-Update There I saw my bar actually did not have the latest firmware, so I set out to update it. Followed the instructions there, and the update appeared to have gone well, coming back to a screen that showed the volume level. The world came crashing down when I turned the bar off and it never powered back on. I've tried everything. Followed the procedure for the BAR-48 seen here, nothing happened. Tried multiple flash drives, no cigar. The flashing procedure for the Cinema 800 begins with the bar turned on, so it's kinda expected. I've tried the factory reset sequence too, but that one too assumes the bar to be initially on, so that too is a no go. I contacted Klipsch and they seemed not to have any contingency for a failed firmware update whatsoever, going straight to offering a replacement, which is kinda worrying. Unfortunately, I live in South America and now I cannot get the bar into my country without paying a fortune in customs taxes and duties. Not happy at all. So there. Congratulations to me for being the first one I guess. Suggestions and condolences are welcome.

Try party mode.

I'm on a similar boat as you, waiting for the Cinema 800. Crutchfield lists the 800 as releasing on May 28 and the 1200 on June 1, but then Amazon has the 800 listed as releasing on August 30 and the 1200 on July 1. I just came to know about this ongoing postponement trend and I was really hyped for the 800 but now I'm having second thoughts.