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Hello Sonos Community. Thanks for sticking around if you are patient, this seems to be a strange one . . .

I am having a heck of a time getting an ARC/SUB/AMP configuration to be adjustable and tweakable the way it should. I have added the Amp as Surround and Sub to the ARC configuration in a single room. The amp feeds 4 ceiling speakers that sound great. The sub kicks in. The True Sound applet runs and sends its pink noise everywhere and sounds great. The issue is that True Surround gives a super heavy front surround mix out of the gate, and there is no way to manually pump up the Surrounds (AMP and 4 speakers) or Sub. There is a section to adjust these and the sliders do absolutely nothing. The ARC User Guide itself says that these adjustments are possible, and I quote:

Surround audio settings

During setup, surround sound is optimized for your room. These settings are adjustable:

   

Surrounds

Turn surround sound On or Off.

TV Level

Adjust surround volume for TV audio.

Music Level

Adjust surround volume for music.
None of this works. The slider goes back and forth for sub and surround and does absolutely nothing. So, when the user wants to juice the surrounds or bump up the sub volume (like everyone on earth) . . . Nada.  What you end up with is a super thin front heavy sound with 97% of everything coming out of the ARC, and the Surrounds barely audible with an occasional "typewriter in the corner" or "bird chirping" etc. In almost every situation in a new surround room since the beginning of time, the customer walks right in and points to the ceiling and wants to hear something coming out of their $1500 dollar ceiling. The light chirping of birds ain't gonna cut it. What we have here is a way too forward front stage surround mix after running True Sound with no manual adjustment options. I'm bringing my dB meter tomorrow to confirm this. I will do this by playing streaming surround content (pink noise) that will cycle through all channels.
 
Correct me if I am wrong, but the ability to manually adjust the level of surrounds and sub linked to a TV bar is something that has worked with Sonos products and software for over 12 years.
 
I spent 20 minutes on the phone last Friday with Sonos Support describing this in detail, only to have them suggest setting up the Surrounds as a separate room, linking them, and manually turning them up. This is an unacceptable Surround-Breaking Bandaid and Ray Dolby is literally rolling in his grave. I can say that because I worked at Dolby for 7 years and THX for 2. ;-)
 
So on to reality and a real solution. Here are the particulars: 
 
1. The TV is connected to the ARC bar over HDMI/ARC (unfortunate double Acronym). This is legit and working to the point of displaying the actual audio codec (Dolby Digital/Stereo/Atmos/LPCM) in the Sonos app. This in and of itself is awesome and thanks for implementing that, I was actually blown away by this. Super Cool!
 
2. The Amp is directly below it, and is feeding 2 pairs of ceiling speakers. This was added correctly and shows up as ARC+AMP+SUB.
 
3. Yes, all products are new and on the surround happy list. They have all been updated ad nauseam.
 
4. Streaming Music sounds absolutely amazing!
 
5. Streaming from the TV or Xfinity program material shows the proper audio codec, so I know it's getting there. But . . . super super front heavy with everything going to the ARC, regardless of audio codec (Stereo vs. LPCM, vs ATMOS etc).
 
6. In standard AV Receivers, I can calm the customer's jets by showing them "All Stereo Mode," which sends a stereo mix to all speakers and they can crank their whole system up. This kills the surround mix, so the caveat is, if you want to show off all your speakers or don't care about surround, use this, but make sure you switch it out for the opening scene of Gladiator.
 
7. I theorize that this may be a throw-back to when we used to have to have both the TV Bar and the Connect Amp on ethernet to use the amp as Surround. I think this was even a direct ethernet connection with a bunch of config and MAC Addresses (I’m dating myself, but I lived through it), it's kindof fuzzy history. This is ancient Sonos Lore which I thought was gone forever. Now you can define a bunch or Sonos products as surrounds (left or right Eras for example) over wifi. I will be rolling out a local Eero and switch, so can test out this theory tomorrow. 
 
8. Here is the quote from the User Guide on limitations using Amp Products for Home Theater. I know I am not using 2 amps, but does any of this gobbldygook still apply? Now I am even more confused, and I have been doing this for a living for over 20 years:

Limitations when using two Amps for home theater

You can use two Amps for home theater: one as TV front speakers and the other as surround speakers. When using two Amps in this configuration, there are some limitations on how they can be wired to the network.

The Amp powering your surround speakers cannot be wired to the network on its own – it must be wired in addition to the Amp powering the TV front speakers. However, if the Amp powering the TV front speakers is wired, the Amp powering the surround speakers can remain wireless.

Thanks so much for your patience and input! I will update with my audible findings and wired vs wifi tomorrow.

Hi ​@Chapmanaudio, 

I’m sorry to hear that you’re running into issues with your system. After reading your post a few time, it seems the main concern is regarding surround audio and the surround settings not working in the app, though correct me if I’m wrong.

You’ve mentioned Trueplay in your thread title, EQ and surround settings apply on top of Trueplay, only the Surround Distance setting is disabled when Trueplay is used. If these settings aren’t adjusting, then we’ll want to look into why and some troubleshooting steps. You mentioned reaching out to support but I can’t find a case registered under your email address, as well as your system under this address doesn’t match what you’ve mentioned in this thread. If you submit a diagnostics in the Sonos app and DM it to me, I should be able to find the support case from there and look into your system to provide the best next steps for you.

For some additional information, you’ve mentioned using True Sound and pink noise, is this a Dolby test track you’re using? If so, we’d recommend you test the system with a movie or show instead in the format you’d like, such at Dolby Atmos or TrueHD. While these test tracks can help tell if you’re getting Stereo PCM, 5.1, Spatial, etc, Sonos uses channel virtualization for our surround systems. Since this is a not a one to one map, this can make these test tracks inaccurate to what you’d actually hear.

Regarding the limitations when using two Amps, this is still correct, our surround sound guidelines and limitations support article mention this. You’re free to keep everything wireless if you want, but if you want to wire Amps used in a home theatre setup, you must follow those guidelines.

If I’ve missed anything then please let me know, but hope this information helps!

Thanks for posting this ​@Chapmanaudio. I want to add to what you’ve posted here, as I recently worked on a very similar installation for a customer ;)

When I spoke with Sonos support, they were very helpful, but they acknowledged directly that the product is NOT CAPABLE OF DOING WHAT THE CUSTOMER WANTS: 

  1. Ceiling speakers, subordinate and controlled by Sonos AMP connected to ARC ULTRA, but simply set as additional L/R stereo speakers, NOT AS SURROUND CHANNEL speakers. 
  2. They suggested a workaround, which is to simply configure the AMP as a completely separate component and then use the Sonos App’s “Grouping” feature to group it with the ARC ULTRA. This seems like a good workaround, as long as you never need to adjust the volume, (sarcasm). The customer did not want to have to fiddle with the complicated Sonos App, however - they just want to use the Volume Up/Down control on the their remote. And guess what? When the AMP is grouped to the ARC ULTRA, (and not ADDED TO IT as a SURROUND subcomponent), the Volume Up/Down on the TV remote does not control both components in the group - ONLY THE ARC ULTRA. Garbage. According the Sonos Support I spoke with, this is a limitation of their TV remote support. So the customer has to use the Sonos app to manually adjust the Group volume every time they want to change the volume. They hated that suggestion so much, they threatened to throw out the whole system and start over with non-Sonos gear.
  3. I slept on it and came up with a workaround, however: Since you CAN adjust the volume of the grouped components using the Sonos App, it stands to reason that you can use Sonos’ voice control to do it as well. This does indeed work - we tested it and the customer was willing to do it, even though it meant they would have to remember to never use the volume control on their remote, lest the ARC ULTRA and AMP volumes fall out of sync, as they preferred to have them adjusted at slightly different levels, naturally, requiring them to have to use the Sonos App to restore perfect volume levels.

My take away is that Sonos suffers from the same “***************” we see across all digital products now. In this case, charge a premium under the pretense of simplicity, then fumble on the execution (repeatedly, Sonos - come on!), and then apologize when called on it, and slow-walk the accountability (i.e. FIX IT).

Almost any inexpensive home theater receiver is a better solution than Sonos whenever speaker wires are present, imho. My own system is pretty old, and I can still use Apple Airplay to stream directly to the receiver, alone. And if I want to use my 5.1 system linked to the Sonos gear I have in other rooms, I can use Apple Airplay to stream to my Apple TV and Sonos gear simultaneously. I feel sorry for people who are relying on wireless speakers of any sort for home theater - wireless is always going to be less reliable than wires, and it’s just so destructive to the vibe when it fails.

 

Moderator Note: Modified in accordance with the Community Code of Conduct

Also, ​@Jamie A,  just saying, there is no amount of TruePlay tuning that can turn SURROUND encoding into STEREO encoding. It’s literally incapable of revealing a stereo signal. Sonos needs to add the ability for a subordinate Sonos AMP to be set up as stereo L/R. And then, yes, sure, TruePlay should do its thing on that, just like always.

Why anyone would purchase a surround sound system and want the same audio coming out of all the speakers instead of . . . uhhh . . . actual surround sound boggles the mind (and I certainly don’t expect a manufacturer to accommodate something which boggles the mind).  Anybody who has the notion that “I paid for those speakers, I want sound coming out of them at all times!!” doesn’t deserve surround sound.  Personally, I’d walk from the job if a customer said that and aren’t willing to be educated, because they are going to be nothing but trouble.

Oh and entry number 8 in the original post?  You assume correctly.  Those limitations are for the Connect:Amp only, not the Amp.  An Amp used for surrounds doesn’t need to be wired, nor does the front Amp/soundbar.  

@jgatie in my case, anyhow, it’s an example of how real world is not always ideal: The customer’s GC installed their “surround” speakers in the ceiling, but not where surround speakers belong. Costly mistake. Since it’s in their bedroom, where their ARC ULTRA is 15’ from the headboard, they just want to be able to hear the TV while in bed without having turn the soundbar up so loud. Do they wish they had consulted with a pro instead of trusting their GC? Yes. Are they willing to pay to move all the speakers? No. Real world.

@jgatie in my case, anyhow, it’s an example of how real world is not always ideal: The customer’s GC installed their “surround” speakers in the ceiling, but not where surround speakers belong. Costly mistake. Since it’s in their bedroom, where their ARC ULTRA is 15’ from the headboard, they just want to be able to hear the TV while in bed without having turn the soundbar up so loud. Do they wish they had consulted with a pro instead of trusting their GC? Yes. Are they willing to pay to move all the speakers? No. Real world.

 

The echo from the group delay would drive me bonkers, as would the lip sync if the delay is equalized.  Good thing I don’t rely on a general contractor or an A/V specialist for my home. 

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