I’m in the process of renovating my basement. I’ve included a schematic layout and I need the best way to power and control the speakers I’ve installed. All speakers have been hardwired back to the AV rack in the utility room. They’re cheap Micca 6 Ohm in ceiling speaks I got off Amazon. And I’ll only be using speakers for music as I have a dedicated home theater elsewhere.
Ideally I would like to have 2 zones. The first zone would be in the gym where there are 2 speakers. The other zone would be in the remainder of the basement where there are a total of 5 speakers. My first thought was to have 2 Sonos Amps, but I understand that since I have an odd number of speakers in total (7), that would cause an issue here.
Second thought would be to get a multizone amp and connect 2 sonos ports to keep the zones separate. I also have an old S2 connect I could implement somehow. However, based on my initial research, this option would likely be much more expensive than the 2 Sonos Amps.
Looking for some ideas and input on how to accomplish.
The 6 Ohm speakers will be a problem to drive with the Sonos Amp.
I'd suggest using your Connect a Port and a multizone amp.
I don't think that there will be much utility in providing stereo in the larger area. You can switch AMP to mono. Consider using an impedance matching device on each channel of the AMP driving the larger area because the speakers are 6 Ohms. You could use impedance matching Volume controls on each speaker. The controls will allow matching levels in the areas.
Pardon my ignorance, but I’m not sure I understand the issue w/ the 6 ohm speakers. These are the ones I have:
Should I bite the bullet and swap out for 8 ohm speakers? Ideally I’d like to use the Sonos amps, but if not could you recommend an amp to use? Would something like this work?
I think I understand Stereo for the pair in the gym, but Mono for the 5 in the larger area. Is this correct?
Thanks in advance for the education!
Except in the gym I don’t think that there is any obvious listening position where stereo would be beneficial. Plus, you would have a problem connecting that 7th speaker if you attempted to use stereo. Which channel should this speaker connect to?
You can attach two 8-Ohm speakers or one 6-Ohm speaker to each AMP channel. If you incorporate impedance matching Volume controls, you can connect multiple pairs of 6-Ohm or 8-Ohm speakers to each channel and adjust the Volume of each speaker individually.
For the larger area I’d say mono would be the more usual setup with the aim being to provide room filling music. The 4 speakers along the wider space don’t provide a good position for stereo listening, especially as you move between the bar to the lounge.
If they alternated L R L R the music would sound strange as the L R audio appears to moves relative to people in the room walking through it. If you were under the 2nd speaker you’d have R from above and L from 2 sides.
Similarly setup as L L R R would mean in the bar or lounge area you’d only really get one channel of the stereo music and only when in between the 2 middle speakers would you really hear stereo.
If you doubled the speakers in that section to 8 and had say L across the top side and R across the bottom side, then driving them as 4 stereo pairs could work better for the main width as there is a definite L R split along the space, but in the golf area you’d be back to hearing mostly the Left channel. You’d still keep the 5th lower speaker in the area outside the gym in mono so it wasn’t just half the music being played there.
For the speaker impedance, Sonos state the following in the FAQ on the product page
How many passive speakers can Amp power?
Amp can power two pairs of 8-ohm nominal passive speakers wired in parallel. Amp can power three pairs of Sonos Architectural by Sonance wired in parallel.
A pair of 8ohm speakers connected to one channel in parallel act as a total impedance of 4ohm. This isn’t Sonos specific and is the same for any amplifier. Connecting two pairs of 6ohm speakers would appear as a 3ohm load which is below the Amps rated specification.
The Sonos amp is rated to drive 4ohm - 8ohm impedance, so a single pair of 4/6/8ohm speakers is within it’s rating, only 2 pairs of 8ohm speakers in parallel stay within the Amps rating.
So I guess my best bet is to get a dedicated 8 channel amp and 2 ports to separate the two zones.
Or I get 3 amps and leave one speaker out. Either way I’m putting everything in mono not stereo.
Would the amp I posted a link to earlier work?
You could also insert a Volume control in each speaker feed. An advantage, in addition to the impedance match, is that each control could be located near its speaker.
