Does the Playbar sound better than the in-store demos?

I don't have a Beam so I can't specifically comment on that. I do find that Bose products seem to sound really good in store and not as good at home. I think their demos are set up to dazzle people in store so they buy. The Sonos demos seem to be more true-to-life. In a store like Best Buy, this would make it sound worse (big open space and lots of additional noise).

Why don't you try the Beam at home and if you don't like it, return it?

"Why don't you try the Beam at home and if you don't like it, return it?"

3/4 of my post keeps getting deleted. I'll try a new one below:

I haven't done the try and return plan mainly due to guilt 🙂 I used to do it more often, but nowadays I usually just keep it unless it's bad.

This was actually for the Playbar rather than the Beam, but that's a side note.

I considered that it might be that it wasn't properly tuned/setup, but I don't have an iOS device and thus can't use Sonos auto-setup feature either.

Ok, thanks for the thoughts!

If the sonos playbar wasn't optimized in store (run through the "true play" setup thing) then I guess the Bose one could sound better.
I bought a playbase for home and very happy with it. The dialog comes through exceptionally clear, (much better than my bose 5.1 surround system in another room). Once I ran through the true play setup I thought it did sound marginally better in that sweetspot in the room but when I move out of the room (open plan) I do notice a drop in the clarity of the sound.

The only criticism I have is it isn't really loud (compared to the Bose) and you didn't get that "cinema experience" when watching movies so I went out and bought the sonos subwoofer.

YES the Sonos Playbar sounds better in a living room than in a store.

I went to a high-end audio/video dealer. They sell nice stuff and have a high reputation for their customer service. The interior layout is not the one of a big retail store. They try to recreate house interior. It's not perfect but it's way better than listening to a sound system at BB.

I ended up buying the Sonos Playbar + Sub combo. And here's why.

SHORT VERSION
Sony, Yamaha (but the top YSP), Bose and all other ones sounded like crap. And I do mean total crap. No way I was gonna pay and use one of those. And yes the Bose Soudtouch 300 with the sub sounded horribly bad. The only one that sounded not so bad was the Sonos, so I bought the Sonos combo.

LONG VERSION
I didn't want to buy Sonos because my audiophile friends had already told me that with Sonos was crap and that you mostly pay for the app (the wifi multiroom features all the majors are offering the same, what's exceptional with Sonos it's their app) and you end up with very average quality speakers. So I listened to Sony, Yamaha, Bose, etc.

I like Bose products. So I'm not bashing the 300 because I'm an anti-Bose activist.

The home theater system in my main living room was a 7.1 with Totem speakers powered by Bryston amp and pre-amp. Yes I like my music crystal clear and as it was recorded in studio or live on a stage (ok well as the sound engineers recorded the music). That setup sounds the complete opposite of what Bose products sound. I also have not one but two Bose Acoustimass 10 sets. So yeah I like Bose products also (when on sale, because most of their products are overpriced). If your want a wife-authorized setup, you can't go with big speakers, 50 pounds power amps and speaker wires big as a garden hose on your living room floor. And having those garden hose size speaker wires floating up in the air 4 inches over the floor because you don't want them touching the floor (vibration, resonance, bla bla bla) is really a NOGO.

When you need a discreet stealth setup, nothing beats Bose in my opinion (in that price range). Everybody has to honestly admit that an Acoustimass setup in a living room or in a bedroom is absolutely subtile and very good looking. A lot of Bose products are a safe bet with the wife and the interior designer specialist. Do I like the Bose sound? Absolutely! From such a stealth setup, from such tiny speakers, the result is astonishing. For movies it's a GO. For ambient music it's a GO. For real music listening (sitting on your couch with your eyes closed and the light dimmed) it's a NOGO, a real torture, an experience that can trouble your mind for the rest of your life. TIP: The trick with a Bose Acoustimass is to replace the center speaker. The Bose is a really crappy center speaker that cannot reproduce well voices. So you take that small Bose horizontal center speaker and use it as a surround back channel (making a 6.1 setup). Then you choose a better speaker for your center channel. I have found out that a B&W center is a perfect match (models with a soft dome tweeter). So five tiny Bose speakers with a not too big B&W center, is still a lot more stealth than a traditionnal setup.

When I was at the high-end audio/video dealer I listened to Sony, Yamaha and others and the sound was terrible. No way I was gonna pay premium price for such terrible sound (because all soundbars are at the premium price since it's THE new thing everybody wants in their living room to match their TV). I listened to the Bose Soudtouch 300 and in the store it sounded horribly bad, even the salesman was not convinced. It was the worst of all I think. And for the price tag thanks but no thanks. Then I listened to the top-of-the-line Yamaha YSP (Digital Sound Projector) and that one sounded real nice. It was THE soundbar to have. But with that footprint can we still call that a soundbar? Yamaha calls it a sound projector and their right, this thing is HUGE! And you cannot fix it under your TV on the swing arm, way to big and heavy. So it was sadly a NOGO for me. Then the salesman didn't know what else to show me so he started his speech about a traditional setup, a Yam HT receiver with small Focal speakers that have a swivel wall-mount, etc. etc. etc. No not was I was looking for.

Then I said : Ok I can take few minutes to listen to Sonos.

It was a Playbar in a 5.1 setup. It honestly did not good, as it was expected. Then I asked the guy to turn off the ambient music in the store and to adjust the settings in the Sonos app (even in high-end stores, they have the bad habit to adjust equipments to give the best WOW factor in the first few seconds to catch the customers). The Sonos started to sound better. But the Play : 1 were doing a terrible job as surrounds, so I asked to turn them off and to listen the Sonos in 3.1. I had already listen to a Sonos Play : 1 at my cousin's house and I remembered telling myself that horrible sound, that's Sonos???? So with the Play : 1 turned off the 3.1 setup started to sound to my liking. But enough for 2000$ ? No way! So I bough... nothing and went back home completely disappointed.

Then a friend's friend invited me over at his house to listen to his Playbar and sub combo. Wow it was better than in the store!

So since it was the less worse solution, I pulled the trigger on a Playbar and sub combo.

Does Sonos sound as good as a good quality traditional setup? Not at all.
Am I happy? Super happy!

I wanted a soundbar, I knew I was not gonna have the best sound quality from it, but that what's I needed. And the Sonos is an excellent choice over the Bose Soundtouch 300.

But indeed, with Sonos a significant part of the price tag is for the Sonos app. When you buy a Sonos Playbar and a Sonos sub for 2,000$ don't think for one moment you're buying 2,000$ worth of hardware equipment. You're paying a lot for the Sonos app. But their app is very easy to use and very stable, so the app development team is doing a pretty fine job.

Now if you're wondering Bose Acoustimass versus Sonos Playbar + Sub combo, which is the best setup keep reading.

This my personal opinion as an audiophile with 25 years of HiFi and HT experience with my own equipment. Not infos I gathered from forums or from what my brother-in-law told me after he had four beers and a few Tincup shooters. Although the Tincup is the best whiskey/bourbon I ever drank.

One important thing, the Bose allows you to have HDMI inputs to get lossless DTS-HD Master Audio and Dolby True-HD. Simply for that Sonos already lost the battle of the soud quality. But sound is not the only factor, so here's my comparison.

Vanilla Acoustimass vs. Playbar + Sub

Pros:
- Better left/center/right separation
- You got good surround sound
- You got more bass coming from the sub, a bass which is more lousy, better for LFE/movies ; while the Sonos sub is a lot less powerful but offers a more tight bass so is better for music reproduction.
- You can have DTS-HD Master Audio and Dolby True-HD

Cons:
- Center speaker cannot match the voice reproduction of the Sonos Playbar
- Subwoofer has a bigger footprint than the Sonos
- You have five speakers mounted on the wall or on floor stands or table stands, you have a HT receiver and a bunch of cables (only you buy the optional Bose In-wall Speaker Wire Adapter Kit, which I did and it works perfectly)
- Not good for music reproduction

Custom Acoustimass / 6.1 / B&W center vs. Playbar + Sub

Pros:
- Even more better left/center/right separation
- You got good surround sound
- Better center channel (voice and everything else) than the Playbar
- You can have DTS-HD Master Audio and Dolby True-HD

Cons:
- Subwoofer has a bigger footprint than the Sonos
- You have not five but six speakers, and the HT, and the wires...
- Not good for music reproduction
- More expensive then the 2,000$ for the Sonos combo (unless you buy the Bose AM on sale which can get you in the same price range as the Sonos)

Important note : With the Acoustimass I found out that the choice of the HT receiver is as crucial as with any traditional setup. I had a 500$ Sony receiver and it was a great match with the AM for movie reproduction. For now there's no TV connected to my AM, I use it only for ambient music at low/med volume. Last week I switched the Sony receiver for a 1,000$ Denon to see if would be better music. Nope, it was a terrible match, the Denon was way too crystal and aggressive for the Bose Cube speakers. Then I tried with a low-end Yamaha RXV, and it was a good match, Micheal Bublé and Nelly Furtado voices on Quando Quando,Quando and the instruments were more natural, more open sound stage. Initially since the Denon was the most expensive of the bunch I tough it would have been the best. Nope! So do your homeworks and choose carefully your HT receiver when going with a Bose AM, as you would have to do any traditional setup.

The only definitive answer to the thread question is: it will sound different, as will any speaker.

Because - the sound you hear from it is always result of the speaker room interaction and that with your room will always be different than that with the demo room; it could sound better or worse. Which in turn is a subjective assessment on your part.

Which is why the only reliable way to determine how a speaker sounds is via home listening over a day or two, in its planned location and preferably, with music you know and like. In the case of Sonos, where possible, this is also best done after Trueplay tuning.

Thank you, DavinciQC, for the writeup. I was about to TL;DR it, but it was a very good read and very interesting insights! I'm even more happy that I got a Playbase and 2 Play:1s!