Two pairs of surround

 🙏 Thanks for reply and the good explain, perhaps Sonos in future allow do this.

Extra: strange you’re not feeling the power of the Arc and Sub. Maybe you have your surround level too loud in the Settings - if you turn that down a little and increase the TV volume overall, you might get a more powerful experience at the front, with surrounds kicking in when they need to at a reasonable level.

The Sub is, the two Era 300 ok to but the Arc is little under, it’s just a feeling, I will try your setting, thanks again, thats why I think also add only one FIve in front but not in suround but you say we can’t, thanks again for help.

Actually,  you can add a stereo pair, in a group with the Arc system, to the front (this is not a surround pair, technically).

My set up:

1. Arc / Sub3 / Pair OneSLs: “Main Room”
2. Era 300 Stereo Pair Front: “Stereo Pair Front Room”
3. You then group 1 and 2, above. There isn’t much echo or delay,  both for TV or music, which can be controlled with the room volumes, but
4. Turning the TV dialog sync to +2 or +3 in the “Main Room” or Arc system does trim this considerably.

This YouTuber lays it all all out in an S2 App view, at the below video #1, with #2 for additional context:
 

#1

#2

Moderator edit: We do not recommend this at all - it will likely sound bad with all channels coming from the “front” speakers.

I can’t tolerate the echo/delay when grouping non surround Sonos to a TV source. 75 ms isn’t much but it really bothers me.

There should be no delay for music streaming but there will be if listening to music through the TV connection.

Understandable, @Stanley_4. Interestingly, I only notice it a bit with the TV input, and using the sync setting mentioned above eliminates it. Playing music, from within S2 on apple music evidenced no echo/delay, I was really surprised. Nice to hear the front driver in my E300s, for the first time, lol.

Yes, I can confirm that „tv dialogue sync“ option can eliminate the delay and that the resulting lip sync delay to video isn’t remarkable. 
But… imo such a setup just makes sense for stereo audio. As someone said before using that for multichannel audio ruins the whole channel separation, because the front stereo pair also includes the center, rear and even high channel information in a stereo downmix signal. So you would get these channels double… from their expected direction AND from the front. 
For me personally a no go. 

 Did you execute TruePlay?

I don’t understand your question about trueplay in context of the channel separation issue. Trueplay won‘t have any effect on that. 

Replying to @Schlumpf and @MoPac.

I just set it up this way today. So it will be interesting to see how I like it. Just a quick listen, to both Music and TV, sounded pretty good.

• First I had the OneSL pair as the duplicate fronts
• I then switched the E300 pair to the duplicate fronts; much wider sound stage
• Interestingly, I had no issues in S2/3, unpairing the stereo pair that was in the “Kitchen” room; creating a new stereo pair room, and deleting and adding the surrounds to my “Main Room”. I was surprised the app worked so well!!!

I TruePlayed each room separately.

In the end it’s a question of what you individually like. More power, dynamic and wider front stage on one hand… and on the other hand correct orientation of the signals. 

For stereo audio I really prefer to skip the soundbar and associated speakers outside of using to fill a room with sound for a party. I find a stereo pair of Play 5 properly positioned sounds far superior, particularly for positioning.

Ones or 100s or 300s with or without a Sub would also be on my list but I haven’t personally tested them.

My personal choice (that failed the spouse test) was going to be a Sonos Amp and some really sweet (and large) passive speakers and a matching sub.

I’d also consider a pair of 300s and a Sub or mini Sub for Atmos if I had a suitable room to place them in.

Hi all,

So my config is a Arc/Sub3 and two Era 300 in surround, like I say in the first post the sound Arc is little poor. I read many people have this feeling, I add one Sonos 5 in front and the feeling is really better and for the delay or echo it’s ok, perhaps my ear are not perfect 😄

@HimMich

Not MY choice of setup… and when looking at your photo my hands try to grab the Five for moving it to the center of the tv. 😂 The placement left to the tv imo makes sound orientation (especially voices) more bad. 
But hey… it’s YOUR setup and what counts is what YOU like. 
If you go with that setup I recommend to use the above mentioned option „tv dialogue sync“ (with level 2 or 3) to eliminate the echo/delay. 

If you read you can see I have a Arc and the Arc is in center of my TV, this sept is in test and for now it’s ok, I will buy an Era 300 for hear if it’s better, just I love play with setup and yes I’m satisfied 🤙

@HimMich 

Yes of course I read you have the Arc. But could have been it’s wall mounted. 😉

I tried that setup some time ago with my Beam wall mounted directly under the tv and put a P5 Gen2 centered on a tv low board. So it was exactly in the middle of the tv together with Beam. 
But even if I would have liked the sound, my wife would have „killed“ that setup because it was a pain to her eyes. 😂🙈

I will try if the sound is better with one Era 300 and yes in center and mounted on wall it will be better , I’m very lucky I have no wife or I’m unlucky I don’t know 😂

Field Test #1
“Condor”, streaming on MGM+ in… PCM 2.0 (2.0?)

Have to say for 2.0 content - the duplicate fronts just add volume and muddyness. I ended up turning off the duplicate fronts. “Correct orientation of the signals wins” here, if that was even the issue with 2.0?

Different folks have different reactions to many audio issues.

Delay / echo drives some folks nuts. I can’t understand voices with even a slight echo, like trying to talk across the house, much less a 75 ms one.

Schlumpf: 

 I was confused at first.  If I’m reading this correctly you were trying to use 300s as fronts with the Arc also being used, right?  Never tried that as my 300s are rears so Trueplay works for my setup.  I do like the idea of having 300s as front for music, but I think I would separate them and use them for music only.  Wish Sonos would someday allow 300s to be used as front LR, center & rear LR.  Can you imagine Atmos played through that setup.  Right now I think the Arc is the weak link when playing Atmos music.

@MoPac 

Ähm… no, I didn’t tried to use any stere pair in the front with grouping. I just tried that with a single Play5 Gen2 and in a different test with a single Era300, each in its test placed directly beneath the soundbar. But for me that setup had no advantage. Channel seperation suffered from that and without the grouped room the home theater setup also played quite well. 

For me, Grouping a stereo pair with a soundbar while watching TV is a disaster. I can imagine some listeners perceiving the delay as an expansion of the room and therefore a great benefit. Only you know what sounds “best” (to you).

You are correct in your understanding of my set up. For music, grouping the two “rooms” sounds great (with the 300s as duplicate fronts), thet little I’ve tested it. So far, with a PCM 2.0 audio signal watching TV, not at all. Just louder and mudier.

As far as Atmos goes, I think the whole thing is hype, unless one has downward facing speakers. Yeah, there are some objects in the horizontal space, depending on the mix, but nothing mind blowing (and that is with the 300s as surrounds, then creating .4 channels of atmos with my arc). 

Now that I”ve had my pair OneSLs as my surrounds (instead of the 300s). I’m thinking of returning the 300s, they just don’t add that much. I think this is the 4th pair of 300s I’ve bought, having returned the previous 3 for the same reason. I thought they would add something to my new room, which is MUCH larger than my previous space. But, alas...I’m starting to think not.

Sonos have limits on how big a space they can fill well and requirements for the room and seating positions that have to be met or at least come close to if you expect good sound.

My media room is a horrible one, L shaped with my Arc at the inside point, angled ceiling with the high point, about 15 feet almost over the Arc. I sit back about 15 feet from the Arc. With that configuration Stereo and Surround is decent, height is pretty iffy, even set to plus 4. However if I move to about 10 feet away from the Arc the height audio is much more apparent. Not perfect by any means but for my ears, budget and tolerance for intruding on my space Sonos is the way I went when I was replacing an older generation AVR setup.

If I had to fill a really big room well, then I’d not hesitate to go with a very good AVR unit and dedicated speakers for each channel it can power. So at least 9 speakers and likely 2 subs to keep the low frequency room modes somewhat under control.

Not recommending these but as a beginning something like them would be my plan. I’d add a second sub and rear height channels at a minimum.

https://www.klipsch.com/products/r-820f-7-1-home-theater-system

https://www.crutchfield.com/p_033AVX6800/Denon-AVR-X6800H.html?tp=179

Way out of the Sonos price range and likely to need a good contractor to do the electrical work. Maybe a good audio tech to do the initial setup and training if you aren’t up to that.