Ace TV Audio Swap for Amp, Playbar, and Playbase

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I have seen that the Sonos Ace headphones will have TV Audio Swap at launch for the Arc and will have updates to add that same functionality for the Beam Gen 1 and 2 and the Ray. Is there any reason that the Amp, Playbar, and Playbase would be excluded from that functionality? I’d understand if it was about Dolby Atmos and limited to just the Arc soundbar, but with the Beam and Ray soundbars not being true Dolby Atmos either, I’m wondering if the Amp, Playbar, and Playbase would also be considered for future functionality.

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Corry PAnswer

Sonos Staff

Hi @lathamspeas

The older components are already pegged at close to their full capacity - they are simply incapable of doing the extra work that supporting Ace would require. Parts of the process are proprietary, so I can’t go into a lot of detail, but the soundbar involved is responsible for downmixing to binaural stereo while also encoding for virtual surround, and then arranging the spatial head-tracking adjustments too. It’s all very processor intensive - although Ray is smaller and cheaper than Playbar was, a decade is a long time in computing power advancement versus cost. Ray was also developed at the same time as Ace, so it makes sense that they were planned for one another.

I hope this helps.

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein

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M

MusicLover05

Contributor I

My guess is the Amp doesn't have Bluetooth Low Energy which is required for the swapping process. It's the only theme I can recognise. Playbar doesn't have BLE, and it was first introduced in the Beam Gen 1. BLE would be involved with the swap temporarily comunicating with your phone. Head tracking might need it too, and certainly the TrueCinema tuning technology coming in a firmware update would need it too. I have the Amp and Ace. Would you send the Amp back in to Sonos for a hardware update for $100? I would. Would Sonos bother? No. Will there be a multichannel Amp Gen 2 out end of year for $3 grand plus range? Yes. Will it be compatible? You bet ya. The cheaper set top box should be compatible on the horizon too - so you will have to use this through your Amp - but means you have to forgo your smart tv software to choose to use it. Starts to get expensive and messy with alot of compromise. You would be doing the same process if you also had a Soundbar or set-top box borrowing the hdmi arc port to use instead of the Amp to get Ace to work. You could probably buy a hdmi switch box or better still the un-released set-top box will provide you this feature wireless if you wanted to have Soundbar and Amp both plugged in. All of this points towards buying four propertary Sonos products to make things work. ACE, Box, Soundbar and Amp. $$$$$$

M

MusicLover05

Contributor I

Unsupported products

Currently, the Sonos app can update WiFi settings on Sonos products that are capable of using Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE). Some Sonos products don’t have BLE capabilities, so the Sonos app will not be able to discover them in order to update their WiFi network information. These products are:

Connect (Gen 2)
Connect:Amp (Gen 2)
One (Gen 1)
Play:1
Play:3
Play:5 (Gen 2)
Playbar
Playbase
Sub (Gen 1)
Sub (Gen 2)
SYMFONISK Bookshelf (Gen 1)
SYMFONISK Table lamp (Gen 1)

---My mistake - found a unrelated list which tells us Amp has ‘BLE’.----

Amp processor Quad Core 1.3Ghz A7 is the only resource which could be the difference for hardware compatiblity and Beam Gen 1 CPU isn’t published anywhere, anyone seen a tear down video and can report Beam Gen 1 CPU?

Unsupported products

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