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Mayo
Trending Lyricist I
Apr 5, 2020 12:16 AM UTC
Answered

Sonos Sub too far from AMP

I am wanting to set a sonos sub up in a room where i have ceiling speaker connected to a sonos Amp.

The Amp is in a closet where I have a “home run” setup.  It seems the Sub is too far from the AMP to get a signal from it in the room, I can move it to a different room, closer to the Amp and it will work.

 

Evidently the sub talks directly to whatever its paired to and not separately like other sonos speakers.

 

Is there any way to get a better signal to the Sub?  current setup is WM:1

 

thx

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    Jean C.
    Jean C.Answer
    Retired Sonos Staff
    Apr 5, 2020 5:20 PM UTC

    Hello @Mayo,

    Welcome to the Sonos Community and thank you for reaching out with your set-up question.

    Since the Sub communicates to its parent Sonos player via 5ghz, if the Sub is out of range of your Amp you will not be able to bond the two reliably if at all. 

    There are three options available to you from what I can understand of your set-up:

    1. You can opt to bond your Sonos Sub to a different product that is within 10-15 feet of the Sub. 
    2. Relocate the Amp physically within 5g range of of the Sub and the ceiling speakers.
    3. Try wring the Sub to your network (I personally don’t like to recommend this) as this will put the Sub directly in network communication with your Amp.

    I’d be interested to hear about which option works best for you and you can certainly submit a diagnostic report from your system if you have any difficulty. Include the confirmation number in your response and we will be happy to look this over for you. 

        

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    ratty
    ratty
    Apr 5, 2020 5:27 PM UTC

    Further thought, although might be worth seeing if @ratty thinks it's  OK.

    If you cannot easily connect the Amp to your router by Ethernet, you might wire it to one of the other Amps then wire one of your other Sonos devices to your network. 

    This should work. However the controller may prevent the Amp from disabling its radio, as it won’t see a fully wired path. Or it will appear to disable, then re-enable a couple of minutes later. It may be necessary to temporarily wire the Amp to the core of the network in order to disable its radio, then move it back to the daisy-chain connection off another device afterwards.

    (It used to be so much easier with the hidden /wifictrl URL, but when Sonos put its official stamp of approval on disabling the radio they put all kinds of checks into the controller to prevent a user marooning a device accidentally.)

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    MayoAuthor
    Trending Lyricist I
    Apr 5, 2020 5:32 PM UTC

    Thanks for all the replies.

    My router is in the same closet as the Amps, So I can wire it directly to my network and assume disable wifi via the app - but the question then is will the sub be able to talk to the Amp still, as Jean says above   they talk via 5ghz -- is this the only way they can communicate?

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    Chris
    Chris
    Lead Maestro
    Apr 5, 2020 5:38 PM UTC

    They can talk via ethernet if the Sub were plugged into router.

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    ratty
    ratty
    Apr 5, 2020 5:39 PM UTC

    Wire that Amp and at least one other node before disabling the relevant Amp’s radio.

    So long as the Sub can see a 2.4GHz connection to another Sonos node I think it will try and connect that way in the absence of a direct 5GHz signal from its parent Amp. I would try it and see how it performs. 

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      MayoAuthor
      Trending Lyricist I
      Apr 5, 2020 6:01 PM UTC

      ratty - why do you say wire at least one other node before disabling?

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      ratty
      ratty
      Apr 5, 2020 7:17 PM UTC

      Because you’re going to be disabling the radio on the Amp in question. You need at least one other wired device with an active radio to enable SonosNet operation.

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      MayoAuthor
      Trending Lyricist I
      Apr 5, 2020 7:22 PM UTC

      Because you’re going to be disabling the radio on the Amp in question. You need at least one other wired device with an active radio to enable SonosNet operation.


      ok I can wire 2 of the amps to the router, or could I also connect the amp in question to another amp via Ethernet (disabling the radio in the amp in question on both scenarios)?

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      John B
      Apr 5, 2020 7:37 PM UTC

      I think either would work, but might ss well wire them both direct to router.

      It should only be a matter of minutes to test it - just give it a try!

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      MayoAuthor
      Trending Lyricist I
      Apr 6, 2020 12:08 AM UTC

      Appears this is working!  I did have to connect 2 amps the router, couldn’t piggy back from one to the other- although wasn’t connected to the same one that was connected to the router.  Non the less this is working so far.  Will let y’all know if any issues arise 

       

      thanks to all!

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      ratty
      ratty
      Apr 6, 2020 8:24 AM UTC

      I double-checked this on a Beam + Sub. After disabling the radios on the Beam and powercycling the Sub the latter eventually connected to 2.4GHz and everything played fine. 

      See how things go. As I remarked earlier, latency spikes could occasionally upset the Sub as the connection is potentially having to take a rather circuitous route.

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