I understand that music playback sounds better when one sets their surrounds to “full” rather than the default “ambient” but it is not as good as stereo.
I do my primary music listening in the same room that I do my television viewing. I want to be able to have my surrounds play in stereo when I’m listening to music and then, of course, take care of surround duties when I’m watching TV; I’d rather not buy a separate pair of speakers for only music in this room. What I really want is to upgrade to a pair of Fives and add the Sub, but I won’t as long as I have to go through the hassle of breaking up the grouping with the sound bar and then re-grouping to watch TV. When I had my traditional home theater set up I didn’t have to suffer with mono sound when I listened to music.
When Sonos updated the app, I thought this would be fixed. Alas not. I know that what I want is not possible, but I would really appreciate it if Sonos could explain why it is not possible.
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I should add that I really enjoy my Sonos speakers. I have pairs of stereo Ones in my kitchen, bedroom, dining room and single Ones dotted throughout the rest of the house. Love the ease of their whole-home audio.
If you set the system to “Full” the surrounds wil play stereo with the sound bar. Would that not be a solution for you?
You know you lose Trueplay every time you change your set up?
Setting the surrounds to “full” does not mean the speakers will play in stereo. It just means that they will play all of the frequencies; voice, music etc. versus ambient which is fewer frequencies. Music def sounds better in “full” but it is not stereo.
I’m trying to avoid changing set ups. I want Sonos to explain why I cant toggle between surround and stereo.
Setting the surrounds to “full” does not mean the speakers will play in stereo. It just means that they will play all of the frequencies; voice, music etc. versus ambient which is fewer frequencies. Music def sounds better in “full” but it is not stereo.
I’m trying to avoid changing set ups. I want Sonos to explain why I cant toggle between surround and stereo.
It is stereo. The left surround will play the left channel, the right surround the right channel. Play Whole Lotta Love by Led Zeppelin and you will hear it pan left and right.
No joy. Led Zep sounded great when I ungrouped my Ones from the Beam, though! There must be something wrong in my particular situation.
Your One’s are grouped to the Beam, not bonded? Can you explain your set up?
My Ones are grouped with my Beam and are LS and RS. After turning my Beam on its side to limit the sound, I can hear stereo from the surrounds from my listening position! As soon as put the Beam right, the stereo effect disappears and the surrounds sound mono (in ambient or full-it makes no difference). When I ungroup the Ones from the Beam, they sound as great as my other pairs do. So I guess my true problem is not being able to mute the Beam during music play back. Turning the Beam on its side to limit the sound that it emits is faster than ungrouping, albeit a very inelegant work around. BTW I have the music slider all the way up to +15 and the TV slider down to -15. I have my sofa as near to the surrounds as the room allows.
LS and RS means you have a set the speakers up in a surrround set up. To use the corrrect Sonos-speak: the One's are bonded to the Beam. To the best of my knowledge you should get stereo from the Beam and stereo from the surrounds when the surrounds are set to full - and you play a non-TV source (i.e Spotify). Again to the best of my knowledge the system does not know how you position your Beam. So it seems strange to me that putting the Beam on its side (front????) changes anything regarding the sound of the One's.
When you un-bond the surrounds, do you set them up as their own rooms (so two rooms), or as a stereo set up (both speakers in one room)?
I do not know where to find the music and TV slider you speak about. Can you post a screenshot?
Is it possible you’ve got the surrounds “reversed” so the LS is physically on the right of the listening position? This would send the stereo channels to the opposite side and could be countering the sounds from the Beam.
Have you seen that in Settings, System, <roomname>, Surround Audio there’s a volume control to increase the signal level to the surrounds when playing music?
I’m sure that the problem is due to the acoustic effect of having stereo coming at my listening position from opposite angles. The Beam seems to cancel out any stereo effect of the surrounds when I am in my listening position. If i remove the the Beam, the Ones sound great (stereo-paired). I wish that the app allowed one to mute the Beam entirely during music play back while in the Home Theater set up. I’m going to fiddle with “TV Auto play’” and “Ungroup on Auto play” and see if my solve is there.
The level sliders are located under “Surround Audio”. Having the music slider up as much as possible helps a little, but I’d really like to mute the Beam entirely. Having the surrounds set to “full” also helps with dulling the Beam, but it is not enough from my listening position. “Full” and “Ambient” have no bearing on stereo; if I muffle the Beam, I can hear the surrounds in stereo when playing music in “ambient”.
I wonder if the SonosSequencr app could allow you quickly switch from a surround setup to a stereo pair and back again?
...The other thing to try would be to boost the surround’s Music Level setting in the Sonos app to effectively drown out the Beam?
