Have you enabled HD playback in your Amazon music settings? I first had to upgrade before the higher quality would play.

https://www.amazon.com/music/settings

Can you play HD/Ultra HD directly from the Amazon Music app?

Also playback has to be started from within the Sonos app to get the higher quality streams on Sonos, rather than the Amazon Music app.

As a trial, if you remove/unbond your Sub from your Play:5s, do you then see Ultra HD?

Playback has to be started from within the Sonos app to get the higher quality streams.

Tried removing the sub.  Result was i could not even get HD.  Which doesn't make any sense!

Re added an get the HD symbol.

I’ve just gone away to test this and it looks to me like that the One (gen1 and gen2) are both supported for UltraHD

Here is a screenshot from a stereo pair of One (gen2’s) hardware version 1.26 called ‘Utility’ from my setup and they show ‘UltraHD’

If I play the exact same track to a stereo pair of One (gen1’s) hardware version 1.21 called ‘Patio’ from my setup it also shows as ‘UltraHD’

So it’s not that, as it shows all versions of the Sonos One hardware version 1.21 and 1.26 are supported.

From my testing, it can take a moment before the applicable audio resolution badge appears after removing the Sub. But if I play a track for 5 seconds or so then rewind to start it again a couple of times, the Ultra HD badge then appears after either no badge showing, or the HD showing initially.

I did note that it takes a short time for the ‘badge’ to sometimes appear on the ‘now playing’ screen. I’m now wondering if the local network conditions ‘perhaps’ might play a role in the audio format delivered to the player by Amazon?

Agreed, the local network conditions may be a factor, but all my sonos speakers are showing Green on the matrix and one of my Ones is wired.

Ken, are you able to bond a Sub to your Ones to see what badge then appears for you?

Tried again and waited and played a few tracks.  Then eventually Ultra HD appeared. This is on 2 Play 5 Gen 2s WITHOUT Sub

Adding the Sub back and it is restricted to HD.

In this I have realised just how much better the Sub makes the Play 5s and that without Trueplay this rooms sounds terrible.

Of course I have to prance around the room retuning after each change :(

I only have the newer gen3 Sub, but happy to try that - give me a moment to try.

Yes exactly, the Sub/Trueplay makes the music sound so much better!

But it proves the Sub is causing the issue here…

Anyone have a Sub Gen1 to try?

That would be a good experiment as if your gen3 Sub works then it shows the limitations of the gen2 Sub.

Or if your gen3 also restricts the stream to HD it is by design, or a bug in the software.
 

Cheers!

@Mr. T 

Added Sub to ‘Utility’ (One gen 2 stereo pair) and still getting ‘UltraHD’ here.

Thanks Ken, so it looks like an issue with the gen2 Subs…

A few observations:

• Atmos plays on my Beam/gen2 + Play:1s + Sub/gen2
• UHD plays on the above, on a One/gen1, and on a One/gen2 pair
• It can take a minute or more for the faster stream(s) to kick in. In the case of the UHD examples above it went from SD, then to HD, then eventually to UHD. Independent bandwidth measurements confirmed that the stream was indeed starting in SD, and that the badging is correct.
• I don’t care for this behaviour at all. When you ask Deezer for FLAC that’s what you have from the get-go.

@Mr. T - just for good measure I switched the Sub to the ‘Patio’ room (One gen1 stereo pair) - but that is also giving me UtraHD too FWIW?

On my Arc, the higher resolution (Dolby Atmos/Ultra HD) is available immediately, that’s not the case with the stereo pair Ones, even although one of them is wired.

Indeed. The Atmos badging is immediate. 

It’s the SD → HD → UHD progression which seems to take time to get going on a newly selected album.

FWIW the network connections are all fine. Low interference. Etc. In fact the stream starts in SD on a hard-wired Port, before eventually heaving itself up to HD, and then finally UHD at 2+ mins in.

Without any intervention they are working now, no lag with the HD or Ultra HD icon showing either.

I assume things have to be quite clever and switch between the 16-bit and 24-bit audio formats as a user decides to ‘group’ and ‘ungroup’ their rooms with older players like the Play:1/Play:3’s etc. without interruption to the playing track.

I suppose that could be part of it. A Port playing UHD switches to HD, and ostensibly rebuffers, when a Play:1 is added to it. (Dropping the P:1 does not return the Port to UHD until some time into the next track.) I’m not sure why tracks sometimes appear to start in SD though...

Yes, the transitions can be quick. Quite why it can sometimes take a minute or two to pick up speed is a bit mysterious, unless it’s simply down to internet traffic conditions. 

It’s also still early days with the new AM service on Sonos - I’m assuming, like everything these days, these transition timings between the audio formats may improve with ..er.. time .

Just following up on my original post.

If I remove the bonded Sub (gen 2), I see the UHD badge with the Play:5s (gen 2). When I add the Sub back, the badge returns to HD.

What version of the Sub are you using - it might help Staff to hone in on the alleged badge issue.. also did you wait a while (more than 2 minutes) and try other UHD tracks to see if it was possible to get a UHD badge at all on the bonded setup?