Beam vs. play 5

  • 17 November 2019
  • 3 replies
  • 1484 views

Userlevel 3
Badge +6

What are peoples thought of replacing a play 5 gen one with either s beam or play 5 gen 2.

A bit of background. Had the gen 5 for a few years, acquired used mainly  for the headphone jack to allow for night time use. That has since been replaced with a bose headset.

It now lives in the bedroom next to the tv but not connected to it. And used for casual listening,.

 

While I have no issue's with the 5, I worry Sonos are about to make some changes that will impact my 5 negatively, no evidence on my part just a gut feeling and ii'm looking nto a replacement for it.

A 5 gen 2 gets me the best sound quality but the beam allows me to connect to the tv, a voice assistant  and airplay 2, wife is an iPhone user, my question really is if these others features are enough to justify the lower sound quality of the beam, and it's also cheaper. I think it is but curious on what people think. 

How does a beam stack up against the 5 gen 2.

O, the beam also allows for a 5.0 expansion in the future, though I am not optimistic on getting a sign off :( 

 

Thanks all 


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3 replies

Just a couple of factual points:

  1. You seem to imply that Airplay 2 is a feature of the Beam but not the P5 gen 2.  In fact, the P5 is also Airplay 2 compatible.
  2. You can add voice control to a P:5 for the price of an Echo Dot (currently £35 from Amazon).  I personally prefer this to built-in Alexa, mainly for the freedom to place the Alexa device away from the speaker, and because you get full Alexa features.  I am sure some other users will have different views on that. 
Userlevel 7
Badge +22

We replaced a Gen 1 Play 5 with a Beam, less aggravation to get it to work with our TV, smaller and easier to place in front of the TV and 13 years newer. The 30% Trade-Up discount made the choice even easier.

Point out to the spouse that a 5.1 Beam counts as one trade-up and the 30% comes to about $450 making it a great time to grab the bundle discount and get the big trade-up credit too.

Userlevel 1
Badge +1

I agree with Stanley_4. First I had the play 5 1ste gen connected to my TV, next the play 5 2nd gen, and finally the Beam.

Both Play 5 speakers have a great sound, and especially the 2nd gen is for music the better speaker for me.

However if linked to a TV, the beam has a real added value. Main reason for me to prefer the beami s  the sound being perfect in sync with the TV. With both play 5, it was almost correct but never completely in sync.