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We have a large dining kitchen with a pair of ones in the working area as a stereo pair. All is OK with music but we often listen to voice, pod casts and radio. It is almost impossible to listen to spoken material over kettle boiling or extractor fan without raising volume to uncomfortable levels.
I have tried adjusting bass / treble and speaker positioning, but to no great effect, in the eating area we have a beam which is much better when playing the same material. When my son was visiting at Christmas he said he had the same problem. The problem is such that I am considering a change of system in this location.

In an experiment we tried a large vintage Bush transistor radio with FM ( over 60 years old ) which had no problem producing sufficient volume and clarity, as well as a surprisingly good music reproduction, it is a large radio with a large speaker and simple but effective tone control.

I have a range of sonos speakers throughout my house including an Arc which I like very much. 

Suggestion welcome.

 

Hi @Radiogram 

Thanks for your post!

I can’t recommend trying anything other that the things you’ve already tried, though your report does surprise me - I use a single One in my Kitchen and am happy with it, though I admittedly don’t listen to voice-only streams or radio with hosts and the room is small.

A Beam does not need to be connected to a TV (initial TV setup can be timed-out) - perhaps one of these would perform better here. You could temporarily move your Beam to the kitchen, test it out for a bit and if it is better than the pair of Ones, get a second Beam for the kitchen to have permanently. Or, a Five may be a better fit (though I find having a voice assistant in the kitchen very useful, so perhaps not). Or, maybe a third One - or even a second pair - resulting in a 3 or 4 speaker group for the kitchen. You can always return a new purchase if it turns out it doesn’t fit your needs.

Analogue radio in the UK should already have been turned off, but the switch-off been delayed until 2030 - your time with the transistor radio is limited (compared to how long it has lasted so far, at least).

I hope this helps.

Hi Corry

Thanks for your reply and for your suggestions. I have thought of trying the Beam in the kitchen but space is an issue. I may try the Ray as it is a bit shorter and offers speech enhancement. With the increasing interest in Pod casts perhaps Sonos should investigate in providing some audio pre-sets

i will also look at positioning in more detail, we already have a pair of ones in the kitchen area so probably more is not an option. 
 

Incidentally I do have a vintage Telefunken valve radio which has a set of audio pre-sets in addition to a tone control. They are labelled Speech, Bass and Solo, the speech setting is very effective, just with a simple press of a button!

With poor DAB reception and winter snow power cuts we are not yet ready to give up analogue radio in our area!

Thanks again for your comments.

Roger

 

Hi @Radiogram 

Worth mentioning is that the Speech Enhancement function (and Night Mode, for that matter) only operate on TV input - not on podcasts or radio. Do not count on these features to help you in this situation. Ray is smaller than a Beam and bigger than a One though, so may work for you.

 

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