So over a couple years I have collected several Sonos products. My current setup is a Sonos beam (my first Sonos purchase) in front, two play 5s as rears and a gen 3 sub. I want to upgrade my system again but I’m not sure if it would be better to replace the beam with the arc or just get 2 play 5s up in front with the beam. What do you guys think? What will sound better?
Best answer by Airgetlam
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What purpose would the two PLAY:5s up front serve? Neither the Beam nor the Arc can be used as only a center channel, so unless the PLAY:5s were a separate ‘room’ for just music, it wouldn’t make much sense.
Oh really?? That’s pretty lame lol I guess I’ll just upgrade to the arc then!
Do you know why you can’t use the beam as a center channel? Does Sonos just not let you?
The Beam alone is already configured as a 3.0 sound bar that includes the center, front left, and front right channels. If you added two more Sonos speakers in front, it would be redundant. So, yeah, it is a limitation on Sonos home theater setups.
I imagine it also has something to do with Sonos wanting to keep their home theater setups simple and clean without bulky speakers placed everywhere in the room which is one of the main benefits of using a sound bar rather than individual speakers for each channel.
It is an intersting thing, as it reduces the opportunity to sell more hardware, which is where they make the preponderance of their money, at this point. There has been a long standing desire expressed across the years for something like you want. So far, nothing, which is curious.
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