Hello @jamaxt,
Welcome to the Sonos Community and thank you for reaching out with your set up questions.
You could certainly “Group” the Sonos Fives to your Arc based surround set-yo, but you might want to road test the Arc on its own (with the Sonos One rear surrounds) first before deciding if you need more power.
The Arc is designed to deliver incredible stereo sound when it is not in use as a home theater speaker and you may even prefer to use the Fives as your rear surrounds instead, depending on the square footage of your home theater area.
I say this with the understanding that speaker placement is highly individual and subjective so your ears may lead you in a different direction.
Perhaps some of our other community members can chime in with their opinion the options that you are considering.
Against this background, the following questions:
- you could group the Fives or AMP with the Arc set-up, but there would be a minor delay with TV input that will be enough to irritate you. Since you will hear two audio streams together out of sync (echo effect) this is worse than lip sync issues that e.g. may occur when streaming TV audio via line in.
- you could of course use the Fives or AMP as surrounds for Arc. Whether that would be overkill is a matter of preference. However, as listening to music seems very important to you (same here), a word of caution. You might expect upgraded surrounds to be an improvement to your overall listening experience. Indeed, many have reported that using surrounds in ‘full music’ mode takes the sound to the next level when e.g. used with a Beam. The surrounds enhance the immersive stereo experience of the Beam alone. Logic then dictates that better surrounds improve this even further. However, I don’t think this is true fall all situations and this is depending heavily of what you have as front speakers. The Arc we don’t know yet - it could be that the Arc on its own already is at a level that ‘too heavy’ surrounds will mess the sound stage. What I know from experience is that AMP driving high quality speakers as fronts (B&W 705S2) is better of with Play:1s than Play:5s as surrounds. I did try the Play:5s first because I had these as front L+R (paired with a Sub) fed with TV through line in before I purchased the B&Ws. It worked really well for 5.1 movies, but not so much for music - the Play:5s messed with the sound stage, whereas the Play:1s used in ambient mode and volume at minus 5 for music just brings a fantastic yet subtle broadening of the sound stage of the B&Ws and Sub.
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Obviously, the Sub would definitely work with the Fives and I would assume that Sonos uses some secret sauce to make the Fives work well with the Sub. Would the Sub also be a good addition to the KEFs connected to an AMP? Or would the better harmony between the Fives and the Sub outweigh other advantages of the KEFs?
Don’t know about the KEFs, but my B&Ws are definitely benefiting from the Sonos Sub, maybe even more so than my Play:5s did when those were my main listening speakers. Of course, this is while using AMP as fronts and being ‘master’ over the Sub.
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When using the Fives OR the KEFs connected to an AMP for music listing, would it still make sense to also have the ARC, the Sub and the two Ones play at the same time or would that somehow mess with a good music listening experience? How would it even work having e.g. the Fives play together with the rest of the setup if the 5.1 option isn’t available?
It will work for music if you group all. You would need to try it out, but I doubt it will have the best effect. Maybe fun for a total immersive experience once in a while, but probably less suited for general listening sessions,
Can’t comment on the KEFs. As I wrote, I have used Play:5 pair (gen 2, so basically the same as Fives) with Sub and it was really great for music, and also for TV. Far better than the Beams I have in other rooms, which are also good for what they are. However, there is no comparison really - my AMP, Sub and B&Ws is so much better for listening. I still very much enjoy the Play:5s, however, now each as an individual room in other physical rooms.
Im not sure if my advice will help but:
The Amp should be processing the audo when using 3rd party speakers with or without a (Sonos) Sub. But personally i would go for Sonos speakers if u like good music instead of an audiophile. Its less cables and more freedom of positioning the speakers.
Also u might like speakers to fire inside the room from the best position more then from halfway the room (like behind the couch). This is what i notice alot when using Ones firing into the room compare to surround setup behind the couch.
For now i think u should try the arc, sub and ones first and see if u like it. I think its enough power to fill your room, for tv and music. Maybe u can place the ones further behind the couch ?
I've had the Kef LS50W’s and tried the passive LS50 on the new Amp and I have stereo paired 5’s.
I would say stereo paired 5’s all day long.
I found the passive LS50 to Amp were overly bright which is not surprising from metal dome speakers. I much prefer the Revel M16 speakers over the Kef’s. Even knocking down the treble on the Amp only helped to a certain extent.
I’m using Arc, Sub, rear ones for Home theater, I didn’t find the Amp, passive speakers, sub and rear ones to be that cohesive, using the Arc instead sound more like a whole especially after Trueplay. So I’m using paired 5’s in front of my tv just for music.
I find the 5’s have better detail than the older Play 5’s and prefer them.
I even prefer the 5’s over the Kef LS50W which cost over twice as much. Both for sound quality but also flexibility. You can use rca to the 5’s, airplay. the Sonos app, or Roon which is what I use most.
By the way there is no comparison between the passive LS50’s and the LS50w. They are like different speakers. You would have to spend thousands on an amp for the passive Kefs to rival the LS50w.
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The Arc is designed to deliver incredible stereo sound when it is not in use as a home theater speaker
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With all due respect, then it’s poorly designed.
The stereo image is not wider than the sound bar it self. It’s stereo image is only wider than eg. the beam because the arc is physically wider. No magic or free lunch here I’m afraid.
It sounds fine for TV but for music it’s no match at all against any set of satellites.
So Sonos: take my money and come up with some solution where I can add a pair of one’s or 5’s and get true stereo music AND true 5.1 surround.
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The Arc is designed to deliver incredible stereo sound when it is not in use as a home theater speaker
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With all due respect, then it’s poorly designed.
The stereo image is not wider than the sound bar it self. It’s stereo image is only wider than eg. the beam because the arc is physically wider. No magic or free lunch here I’m afraid
It sounds fine for TV but for music it’s no match at all against any set of satellites.
So Sonos: take my money and come up with some solution where I can add a pair of one’s or 5’s and get true stereo music AND true 5.1 surround.
That’s not accurate. I don’t use my Arc/Sub/Ones for Music I have two stereo paired 5’s on either side of my TV just for music so thats tells you how much I care about music. But the reason the soundstage of the Arc is wider than the Arc itself is because off the placement fo the speakers especially and mostly on the ends of the the Arc giving it a wide soundstage more than jsut the phsuycial length of the Arc. Plus Trueplaying helps with soundstage as well. A lot of people would be just fine with an Arc and a sub for music.
I’m trying to figure out tradeoffs between a pair of 5’s, Kef LS50W’s or LS50+Amp setups.
One advantage of using LS50+Amp or pair of 5’s in my situation: I’m looking for both a stereo system (line-in from a DAC) for my computer and a 5.1 system in the same room, but reversed (ie: the back 5.1 speakers would be my main stereo setup which is a bit weird, I know).
I was thinking about pairing them with an Arc+Sub (as surround speakers) for the front 3.1 sound, but:
- I’m unsure how convenient it would be practically to mess with the grouping and degrouping of the 5.1 setup. Ideally would like the line input to be pair with the 2 backs for the stereo image and the hmdi input from the arc to be paired with the full 5.1 - anyone has insight on that?
- I’m confused by an earlier comment on the delays. My expectation would be that Sonos would take care of the sync of various speakers (Arc, Sub, Amp) for a perfect 5.1 sound experience and that the Arc would deal with audio/video sync
If I go with the LS50W, I’d likely need an extra pair of speakers for the 5.1 surrounds, which seems like too many speakers than strictly necessary in a single room. It also seems less flexible than an LS50+SomeGoodAmp for future evolution. Price difference between active and passive is about $1100 here, so that should buy a reasonable amp to drive the LS50s.
@DarwinOSX : Interested in more details on your experience on that one.
Having had the LS50w’s since they were released I can’t recommend them. They are badly in need of an update and lots of people have had reliability issues with them and mine had to be replaced twice with shipping both ways at my expense. Their support is terrible. Their app is barely usable even after all this time. I much prefer my stereo paired 5’s which I now have two sets of. The app is much better plus you get trueplay and they are much simpler in general. Sound quality is great on the Fives and I use them with the Sonos app, Roon, and sometimes airplay I initially night one 5 and couldn’t believe how good it sounded by itself. I stereo paired those and then got another set of stereo pairs.
As I mentioned earlier The LS50Ws are very different from passive LS50’s and amp matching will need to be done carefully. I also think there are better speakers in the LS 50’S price range like the Revel M16 which are $900 and I have used those with the new Sonos Amp anything passive I would just go with the Amp. For best stereo for music you can turn off the rears.
). Another alternative would be to place those speaker on the wall on the right side of the TV to direct the stereo sound from those speakers more twoards the entire room (even though this setup would probably be the least ideal setup).