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Contributor I
May 3, 2025
Answered

beam + laptop + projector

Hi there 

I have a Sonos beam and I would like to buy a projector. 
I will use it to watch movie. 
Could you confirm that I will be able to plug my hdmi cable between my projector and my laptop and at the same time cast the sound from my laptop to my beam through Bluetooth?

I am asking because last time I tried I had a few seconds lag. But it was a very old projector. 
thank you in advance for your answers. 
martin 

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buzz
buzzAnswer
Grand Maestro
May 3, 2025

This could get messy.

You need to support the HDMI-ARC audio channel input for BEAM. I didn’t see any simple devices that excited me. You’d also need a projector that supports HDMI-ARC. Later in the year some reasonable wireless HDMI-ARC extenders may become available.

If your projector offers an optical audio output, you could use a wireless TOLSINK extender and the SONOS TOSLINK to HDMI-ARC adapter.

6 replies

buzz
Grand Maestro
May 3, 2025

Beam does not support Bluetooth.

Do you want to add surround speakers?

Contributor I
May 3, 2025

Hey. Thanks for your answer. You are absolutely right, my bad. 
I meant casting the sound wirelessly with Airplay or WiFi. Do you think it is possible ?

buzz
buzzAnswer
Grand Maestro
May 3, 2025

This could get messy.

You need to support the HDMI-ARC audio channel input for BEAM. I didn’t see any simple devices that excited me. You’d also need a projector that supports HDMI-ARC. Later in the year some reasonable wireless HDMI-ARC extenders may become available.

If your projector offers an optical audio output, you could use a wireless TOLSINK extender and the SONOS TOSLINK to HDMI-ARC adapter.

Contributor I
May 6, 2025

Thank you very much for your answer, Buzz!

I wanted to avoid an additional device :/ 

Is it just me or it is a bit crazy that we can’t use a laptop as a simple mixer?

 

buzz
Grand Maestro
May 6, 2025

Some operating systems include a very crude mixing capability and I’m sure that there are some Apps. I’m not interested in any of this because laptop audio capability is usually poor and I expect there will be timing issues.

Airgetlam
May 6, 2025

And it might be complicated by the fact that Sonos ‘works’ from the speaker level, and grabs the data from that perspective. The ‘controller’ is merely a remote control, showing what is happening on the speaker level.

Bruce