Now Playing Trueplay - Your Impressions

  • 10 November 2015
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Trueplay is now available for the world to try and we’d love to hear what you think about the tuning. Have you noticed a change in your home? What are your impressions?

Personally, I first set up Trueplay in the worst possible situation I had at home, an original PLAY:5 sitting half behind a hollowed out speaker tower speaker which was used as a table for a record player (it’s a long story). The room has stone floors, high ceilings, and a few couches. The difference was immense.

After my dance around the room the PLAY:5 sounded like a completely different speaker. The highs were much clearer, and the lows resonated better throughout the room. Friends in the house couldn’t believe the difference either.

The next room I tested was much better off. The PLAY:3 in there was in a better place already, sitting toward the corner of the room, on top of a table. Wood floors, much smaller room, lower ceilings. There was still a noticeable change, as Trueplay really does help out the PLAY:3, but it wasn’t as big as with that first room.

Let us know how it goes! We recommend testing out 5 tracks that you know very well and seeing the difference. What rooms did you try it out in? What did you notice? What are your experiences? Share your stories here.

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94 replies

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I think trueplay really shines when it comes to the Play:1. After trueplay tuning for me it sounded much more like the untuned play:3. Of course the play:3 was even better still with trueplay tuning. My play:5 in an open room was not as noticeable a change. Of course this makes sense in that the worse the room and more obstacles - the more the trueplay adaptation.
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Whacked on V6 and immediately ran Trueplay in the three rooms I've got with Play-5's. First impressions - pretty epic.

After doing the setup the screen read words to the effect that "The speaker placement didn't seem to make much difference and only minimal changes were needed" - I was a bit miffed !

But the changes I'd say are immediate and noticeable. Master Bedroom is about 15ft square, lowish combed ceiling and settee as well as bed and furniture. Much bigger sound, clearer high notes and much more bass. Overall a much more room filling sound.

Kitchen is about 17ft and 25 ft, high ceiling. Same effect, much bigger sound with better defined bass and clearer highs, much improved. Starts to sound thin when I get the volume up to a level that might kill fish but that no disrespect to what's a pretty small speaker for a room of that volume.

Overall - I'm fairly impressed with Truplay.

Advice: Listen to a favourite track immediately before running Trueplay so you're better able to compare.

Sonos - Still the best !
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Great post Pete! Thanks for sharing.

Also, for everyone using Trueplay, you can turn Trueplay on and off through the Room Settings by unchecking the box. It'll keep the same tuning settings, so you can toggle it on and off while listening to songs you're familiar with to hear the difference. You can also run Trueplay tuning multiple times on the same rooms to see if you get different results. Have some fun with it, enjoy the Trueplay dance!
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Well I have one play:1 in the kitchen, and two pairs as stereo pairs in office and bed room, and I have to say it's amazing the difference! Just sound more natural and open, although the app said I'd did not change much, turning true play off the on, you can really hear the difference!! Thanks Sonos! Can't wait for my new play:5's for the living room!!!!!
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In my time using Trueplay I have had some truely fantastic experiences with music and the way I listen to music!

My main setup consists of two PLAY:1's and a SUB (which receive a line-in signal from a CONNECT:AMP). This is in my room and what I thought was a great sounding room and environment for my players. I have always thought the sound from my setup was exceptional and the only thing I ever tweaked was the SUB volume (because I like a little extra house shaking bass). I've always been impressed with the sound these little PLAY:1's put out, and the excellent bass production from SUB.

My other tuneable player is a single PLAY:5 in a bigger living room. Over the time I have been using TruePlay this has changed location about 3 times. I always found the original PLAY:5 to be a little flat to my ears. It just didn't have that whole room experience to me and it never seemed to really immerse me in sound. It was very bass heavy and (of course I liked that), the highs were kind of flat. This could very well be the locations I had it in but it just never satisfied me like my two PLAY:1's have.

So now we get onto Trueplay.
I've tuned my room numerous times to see how it would change the way it tunes each time, when putting into account me moving in different directions around the room each time, and having SUB in different locations. Overall, every single time I tuned I got the same consistent experience.
This experience is actually one of the most satisfying I have ever heard from Trueplay. Almost every single aspect of my speakers has been improved. Highs, mids, lows, clarity, fullness, atmospherics, soundstage, precision. Everything I could think of has had a tune up. I really did not expect this when I first tried it and at first I thought "Wow. Those sound sharper.", until I turned Trueplay off while playing a song. WOW! What a difference it made.

I realised just how bad my speakers sounded before tuning them (in comparison). I noticed there was very, very flat highs. The mids were kind of soaking the rest of the audio and had a kind of muddiness to them, and the bass was very boomy. It was like a huge punch in the face of bass (which of course, can't complain there). - With TruePlay on those highs went crystal clear and the mid range was cut back considerably and also became more accurate in it's reproduction, it sounded very precise and accurate. The lows were cut back too, now the bass from the SUB still has a very impactful sound but for every kick it sounds as I believe it should, without the boomy splash that it did before (unless it needs to be). I am just truly impressed with just how damn good these speakers sound now, and I thought they were good before this. I also noticed the soundstage became a bit more accurate and more spread. I could now hear certain effects or instruments right near my ears, instead of in-front of me placed on the soundstage. This to me sounds excellent and gives the music another dimension where each sound really has it's own place in the environment.

So for the PLAY:5, it actually said there wasn't much it could do for the tuning. At first I didn't notice the difference, but I turned Trueplay off while playing a song and realised that it tightened up the bass considerably. It was really punchy now and thick and had a good dimension to it. Even some lows sounded more audible than before. The highs changed a ton. They were completely audible over the top of everything else now. A lot more pronounced in the mix, whereas before the mids drowned them out. In saying that, the mids were tuned ridiculously. Just the changes it made to the mids made this sound like a new speaker. It made everything else clear. It wasn't as big of a difference as the PLAY:1's + SUB but it did bring a new life to what I thought was an okay sounding PLAY:5, and it specifically focused on reducing the mids and increasing the highs, which is EXACTLY what I always thought was off. Overall, it now sounds a lot more accurate and fills out the area a bit more in all ranges.

I have also tried Trueplay with two SUB's and it was one hell of an experience. Trueplay seems to be so accurate that even the crossover and other dynamics between both SUB's were tuned accurately enough that there was no frequency clashing or issues or lost range. It was all perfect, and I've definitely noticed both one SUB and two SUB's play a very, very more audible 30Hz down to 25Hz frequency range now. I can actually hear that rated 25Hz and it has a very precise presence. Never heard those lows so well before. In one of the rooms I tested the SUB in, it would shake and rattle windows a lot. After I tuned it the window rattle was gone. The bass was still powerful but something about it was different because the windows now sounded quiet.

Overall, absolutely fantastic experience!
I am also definitely not saying I think my speakers sounded like crap before, I loved how they sounded, but now in comparison they do sound like crap without Trueplay. 😛 If you know what I mean! :P

To whoever reads this whole thing, I thank you for your patience and would love to hear your thoughts! 🙂
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To whoever reads this whole thing, I thank you for your patience and would love to hear your thoughts! :)

I read it! And I love it. Thanks for the detailed write-up kmjy! We're all really glad you've had such a great experience with Trueplay so far.
Just tuned my Play:3/SUB combo & boy...what a VAST improvement!

I've enjoyed my Play:3's for about 2 years with complete satisfaction, but with all the raves about the SUB, I recently added that to my system. It was great, like going from 9/10 to 9.5/10...a great investment. My living room with the Sonos is a spartanly furnished 14 by 16 foot room with an 8 foot ceiling. Hardwood floor with no carpet.

Now with Tuneplay, it is even better. Like upgraded speakers. I listen mostly to lossless acoustic jazz & folky pop. After my initial astonishment, I made a playlist ranging from old faves & newer classics. When doing an A/B comparison of tuned/untuned, it seemed like a veil was lifted off of the speakers. Degauzed, all the instruments seemed to pop & have separate identities in the mix. More like live music. It was at once warmer & more crisp. For me the difference in sound is more noticeable than when I first added the SUB!

And finally, all of the above applies equally to the streamed music from Amazon Prime. Even though these streams are compressed (I assume) the music still retains the robust soundstage.

It is obvious that a lot of research & development went into this beyond spreadsheets & graphs.
My ears thank you.
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Just tuned my Play 1,s, Play 3 and Play 5 paired with a sub.
All reported only subtle changes after using Trueplay.

The Play 1's sound better to me with a fuller vocal range and more clarity. EQ was set to centre on both bass and treble.

The Play 3 as above but a little tinny so after increasing the bass by one click to the right it sounded better. EQ treble and balance centred.

The Play 5 and sub I found a little disappointing. Whilst I'll admit I like a little bass with my music and it's an expensive bit of kit so I want to hear it!.
On the test songs I know well which go quite low and have a little kick, after Trueplay the bass was lacking. EQ settings all centred with my change to the sub settings being three clicks to the right and I'm happy again.
I did retest moving around just the seating area rather than the whole room as mentioned earlier only to have the same results.
My lounge is a large room with the sub in a corner so I guess it's difficult to tune room acoustics.

I would also like to say thank you to Sonos for the HLS stream fix and their ongoing commitment to updating and supporting their excellent products.
Ok, I was really disappointed when all my rooms came back with 'minimal difference to your settings. ...... until I then played music. Was my setting so far out before?
Well done Sonos - after 5 years its still my favourite gadget!
I thought my Play:1s sounded perfect before tuning them. After the tune, Sonos reported subtle changes, and I fired them up and they sounded on par with what I (thought) I was hearing before... until I turned off TruePlay. WOW! What a difference... such a full, well-rounded sound now. Fantastic job, gang!
My experience has been underwhelming.

I first ran this in a small bedroom with a single play 1 unit. Tuning done easily enough, reported only minor changes and on toggling back and forth there wasn't anything different.

In a larger open plan living room, for a 1 pair + Sub it took some time, the fourth attempt. The first three were aborted halfway through by an error message of "can't communicate with your player, try again" or some such. The successful attempt returned a similar report as above and similar results on a back and forth toggle - nothing audible.

In both places my starting eq for best sound was centre positions for the sliders.
Further to the above, I went back to see if I have missed something subtle in Trueplay in a duet album of Houston Person and Ron Carter. I toggled Trueplay, but I did not hear anything different from either. Toggling the Sub on the other hand makes a subtle but very palpable difference in how present Carter's voice is in the room because of the Sub.
You're obviously very lucky to be able to set your rooms up as close to optimal conditions as possible, in which case, as has been explained repeatedly, you aren't going to hear much difference.
Both rooms are perfectly ordinary domestic rooms and about the only thing that I have been able to do is provide the speakers with a decent place, which is easy given the diminutive size of the play 1 units. A month ago I bought Flexson desktop stands that tighten up the bass just a tad on the shelf located 1 units, by elevating them away from the shelf surface; I don't have the space to place the units on stands.

With my placement of the speakers and the Sub I know that I don't have a room nodes problem with respect to the Sub's output. Sub switch on/off toggling has only the desired subtle effect, before Trueplay.

Most room response DSPs I know deal with bass bloat from room nodes and smoothen out consequent bass peaks - which allows for a better mid range performance. In the few charts I have seen of post Trueplay measurements I haven't seen any smoothening of peaks, just a shelving roll off for the low frequencies. I am not sure what other tricks Sonos has been able to do via DSP that are unique and unprecedented and Sonos isn't saying.

Based on all the positive endorsements I started out by wanting to hear a difference. But I didn't, even so.

But I was and still am happy with the sound quality in both rooms, so I don't have any complaints.
In my main room there is not much difference with or without Trueplay. I have a low end calibrated measuring system and the difference between Trueplay and not Trueplay was well within what I would classify as "measurement error" -- literally a dB here and there. This is confirmed by the listening experience. In other rooms there is a profound listening difference.

The calibration demo suggests that one walk about the room. I think that one should concentrate on the primary listening location. Keeping the microphone stationary is not a great idea because the room response varies in three dimensions and your head will probably not be secured at that spot while listening. For example, if the primary area is a sofa, move the microphone around the sofa.

In one of my rooms there are two potential listening locations, some distance apart. If I dwell in one area the results are quite different than when I dwell in the other area.
In other rooms there is a profound listening difference.

The calibration demo suggests that one walk about the room. I think that one should concentrate on the primary listening location. Keeping the microphone stationary is not a great idea because the room response varies in three dimensions and your head will probably not be secured at that spot while listening. For example, if the primary area is a sofa, move the microphone around the sofa.


Where the difference is profound, are you able to see that on the usual freq response graphs and if so, how does it show up there?

I am going to take another stab at my living room in the way you suggest - as opposed to the video instruction of largely picking up wall reflected sound all around the room, from relatively close to the walls.

Perhaps that will result in something audible, but I now will not be surprised if it doesn't.
I suppose I should now hover around the listening area, with the mic pointed at the speakers, doing the wave?
I suppose I should now hover around the listening area, with the mic pointed at the speakers, doing the wave?
Yes. The Trueplay nanny may tell you to cover more of the room, so you'll have to move around just sufficient to satisfy her.
Thanks...the nanny let me do the different thing in both rooms.

No change in the reported or audible outcome in both rooms this way either.
I usually bring one or two of the 1s outside the RV... going to be interesting doing the wave once I get them placed. :D

Probably overkill, but will be interesting to see if the sound changes any from the smaller quarters inside.
Further to the above, I went back to see if I have missed something subtle in Trueplay in a duet album of Houston Person and Ron Carter. I toggled Trueplay, but I did not hear anything different from either. Toggling the Sub on the other hand makes a subtle but very palpable difference in how present Carter's voice is in the room because of the Sub.

I bought 'Just Between Friends' because of you. Thanks for that. Awesome late night living room listening treat right there.
:-)enjoy. The other three are just as good. Carter keeps the albums from sounding just more of the same, as Person albums tend to.
I noticed that with Houston Person, whom I also 'discovered' because of you.

Where the difference is profound, are you able to see that on the usual freq response graphs and if so, how does it show up there?

I am going to take another stab at my living room in the way you suggest - as opposed to the video instruction of largely picking up wall reflected sound all around the room, from relatively close to the walls.

Perhaps that will result in something audible, but I now will not be surprised if it doesn't.


Sorry, in this case I did not attempt to measure anything, but the overall balance had obviously been rearranged. In many "before" and "after" comparisons, one must flip back and forth several times in order to discover a very subtle change. In this case the change was almost startling. Similar to flipping a couple bands on a graphic equalizer from neutral to full. In earlier location (the one that I measured), one could flip back and forth many times and not be sure that there was a difference.
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Most room response DSPs I know deal with bass bloat from room nodes and smoothen out consequent bass peaks - which allows for a better mid range performance. In the few charts I have seen of post Trueplay measurements I haven't seen any smoothening of peaks, just a shelving roll off for the low frequencies. I am not sure what other tricks Sonos has been able to do via DSP that are unique and unprecedented and Sonos isn't saying.
Yes actually, in my experience it does smooth out the peaks and it also throws more mid/upper-mid to the PLAY:1's and lets the SUB do mostly lows, in saying that the SUB does still play the mids just at a more subtle rate to the point where I can't notice until I am near it very close, this just makes it (in my opinion) perfectly blended with the PLAY:1's. I like it!