Question

PLAYBAR with PLAY3 and PLAY5 surrounds

  • 2 February 2018
  • 5 replies
  • 2837 views

Ok I bought a PlayBar sub 2 play3 and 2 play5 in the app i have the play 3 set up as surround but I wanted to add the play5 as surround also but the only way I was able to do that was pairing the 5 then adding that to my original group I can’t find a way to add the 5 to the original group as another set of surround is it even possible

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5 replies

OK, a period might be a good thing to make a friend. That's quite a long sentence :)

So, I think what I can get out of that is that you've found out that Sonos requires a pair of the same speakers (Sonos Ones, PLAY:1s, PLAY:3s, or PLAY:5s) to be the surround speakers. You can't mix and match surrounds, they must be the same kind of speaker. And any 5.1 "room" can only have one set of surround speakers, so you can't have both the PLAY:3s and the PLAY:5s acting as surround speakers at the same time.

However, you could potentially "group" the spare pair of speakers, under the assumption that you've made them a stereo pair, with the "room" that is the 5.1 setup. Now, you'd get only a stereo signal out of them. There's a small potential that there might be a slight delay between the two "grouped" rooms, but you can do testing and see.

Hope I've answered your question...if not, please post back, and feel free to be liberal with the periods 🙂
But i hate periods :)

Yes i think i did what you have already suggested. The way I have it set up is 2 groups TV Room 1 with the playbar sub and 2 paly 3, and then i have a group TV room 2 with the 2 play 5, i did see that i can merge the 2 which i have done and it does sound OK but I cant control the volume of TV2 with my TV remote, the only way i can control the volume remotely is thru the app, is there anyway of fixing that?

I guess what i was ultimatly trying to do was get a 7.1 surround instead of 5.1 but it looks like that is not possible.
Laugh. Delighted you have a sense of humor, too :)

No, unfortunately, the remote control volume speaks only to the 5.1 speakers, and not to any "grouped" rooms. No real way to fix that....at least easily. I might conceive of some way of perhaps programming a remote control like a logitech Harmony system to send 2 signals at the same time, one via IR, the other via wifi to control both volumes at the same time....but that's completely theoretical.

No, Sonos at this point doesn't support 7.1 sound. There's endless discussions and demands that they do so, but they've never said one way or the other that they'll do it. Lots of us long timers have speculation around reasons why it's not an easy task, but none of us know if Sonos is working on it or not.

Sorry I couldn't be of more positive help, though. But enjoy your Sonos.....and put that extra pair of speakers in another room. My bedroom is quite happy with a spare pair of PLAY:3s, for instance.
Ok thank you for your help it is much appreciated. Now I have to decide which set to return, ilove the sound of the 5 but I think I read somewhere that if I make them a SS it loses the bass and that is what I love about it. I do like the 3 and they are smaller, i guess I'll have to try both as a SS and see which is best. Thank you again and look I used periods 😛
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Be sure in the settings for the room...advanced settings... to set surrounds as FULL not Ambient. Then when you play music from sonos the rear surrounds will act as full stereo pair and not just minimal surround coming from them. Impressive music when set that way.