Need Advice on Set up: Sonos, Ceiling Speakers, TV

  • 20 July 2018
  • 6 replies
  • 3675 views

Hi,

Our home has wired ceiling speakers in separate rooms on the main floor. Each rooms speaker can be turned on or off individually via a wall control dial. There are also two speakers (no ceiling, but actual mounted speakers) on our screened porch - they are part of this same system. When we moved, I brought three Play:1 speakers with me.

A friend's genius son connected everything through a Sonos Connect - the result being I can stream Sonos through both the hardwired speakers, and the three Play:One speakers - or choose one or the other. I don't know much about the wired setup - there's a bunch of wires and a receiver (?) in a utility closet under the stairs. Again, the genius kid set it up.

What I want to do now is somehow add in a soundbar for our TV. I'd like the soundbar to work with our ceiling speakers. The TV is nowhere near the utility closet with all of the wires and receiver.

How do I set this up? Is it possible to control all via Sonos? Have the TV sound somehow come out of the ceiling speakers and/or the Play:1 speakers?

Thanks for any advice you can offer.

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6 replies

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Should be easy to do..., set up the sound bar as a stand alone and then group the sound bar with the other speakers.
Thank you for the quick response! It sounds so easy.

So once I set up the sound bar, and “group” with wired and ceiling speakers via app, all sound (TV, music,etc.) will be heard in all sources?

Do I need a Sonos sound bar for this, or would another brand work?

Best,
Marlee
Oh, and one last thing, the Sound Bar does not have to be physically connected to the Sonos Connect. Is that right?
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Right. The Sonos Connect is a music player that outputs to an amplifier that drives your wired speakers. The Sonos soundbars have a built-in player and amplifier and appropriate speakers. All (both) can be grouped as you wish.
You would need to get a sonos soundbar, either the Playbar, Playbase, or Beam. Best to select the product that best fits your room size and whether or not you're tv is mounted on the wall or not.

With a sonos soundbar, you would then be able to play music in sync with your play:1s and your ceiling speakers (through the Connect), but TV sound would play slightly out of sync. Everything else slightly behind the soundbar creating a slight echo effect. This wouldn't be noticeable for the speakers located in different rooms, but for your speakers in the same room, it would be an issue.

You're easiest work around would be to just turn down the volume on the ceiling speakers if you want tv audio and have that tv audio play on your other ceiling speakers around the house. Again, for music sources, it wouldn't be an issue.

The other solution would be to setup the ceiling speakers as surround speakers 'bonded' with your Sonos soundbar. You would need to get a Connect:amp for that, and it's going to take a bit more tech knowledge to setup and both the soundbar and Connect:amp would need to be wired to the network, no wifi. If your ceiling speakers aren't located in a good place for surround sound, probably not a good solution.

This article goes into more detail on the setup:
https://support.sonos.com/s/article/2237?language=en_US

I think for you, I'd just start off with a sonos soundbar. If you want to use the ceiling speakers as surround, or add other sonos speakers, you can always do that later on.
Thank you everyone for the valuable advice. I think I’ve got it now!