Third Party Subwoofer with Sonos Arc and Amp Surround

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I know if I have an Arc and two ceiling speakers in a surround configuration on a Sonos Amp, I cannot also have a third party subwoofer connected to that Amp. That said, is it possible to have a third party subwoofer on a Sonos Amp and third party surround speakers on a second Amp and then put that together with the Arc for a 5.1 system?

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Ken_GriffithsAnswer

If you were to forget about the Arc, you can have a Sonos HT surround system using two Sonos Amps, where the one Amp will handle the three front channels (incl. a phantom Center) and you can attach a 3rd party ‘active’ Sub to that. Then use the 2nd Amp for the rear channels (ceiling speakers). That will work fine for both TV/Music audio. But…

If you were to setup the Arc & Amp for your HT surround system and then also use another Amp with a 3rd party Sub attached (as suggested in your post) - you can ‘group’ that with the Arc and whilst that will be fine for music audio playback, it will ‘highly likely’ be problematic to you for TV surround audio, as the ‘grouping’ process uses audio buffering (approx. 30-70ms delay), which means the Amp/Sub audio will play out of sync with the Arc TV audio. So I would not recommend this approach - you would be much better off selling your 3rd-party Sub and getting a Sonos Sub instead IMHO.

Hope that assists.

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cgrey001

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You’re correct. The Diva / Vertex2 does not convert the audio signal. So I guess I would not get stereo if the source is Atmos. It looks like the Vroom does convert audio to the highest format for each output. Still not sure if L/R analog volume control is possible through CEC (i.e. the volume changes with a change in the CEC network).

melvimbe

You’re correct. The Diva / Vertex2 does not convert the audio signal. So I guess I would not get stereo if the source is Atmos. It looks like the Vroom does convert audio to the highest format for each output. Still not sure if L/R analog volume control is possible through CEC (i.e. the volume changes with a change in the CEC network).

I was even really thinking about the possiblity of the audio taking the lowest common denominator. I have a vertex2, and I don’t think I’ve really seen that be the case. Effectively, my two outputs are the Arc and a small TV that would be 2.0 PCM...although the sound is always off and I’ve never looked at what audio it’s getting. The Arc plays atmos just fine.

As far as CEC commands, I think it if originated from a source remote control, like an Apple TV, then perhaps the HD Fury device will send the command to both audio systems. However, if it’s the TV remote, I can’t see the command going to the audio system it isn’t directly tied to, if that makes sense. I say this as Diva/Vertex2/Vroom are essentially 4x2 matrix that should allow you to essentially operate 2 separate with audio/video combinations (call it A1 / V1 and A2 / V2) with the same sources. A CEC command from V1 should not reach A2.

Danny

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