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Hello,

New to Sonos so this is likely a silly question coming.

I’m looking to connect both the Arc and Amp to my TV as well to have it for music on my main floor. The Amp will be in another room powering a pair of in-ceiling speakers for surround as well as a pair in kitchen for music. 

Do I just connect both Arc and Amp with HDMI from the TV?

I have the ceiling down now so want to make sure this is all I need before I go ahead with wiring.

Much appreciated,

 

Not silly, just complex, and will require a wall of text to walk through.

Normally speaking, an Amp can be ‘bonded’ with an ARC to provide rear surround speakers. However, from what you’re saying, you’re not going for surround speakers, you want a second set of stereo speakers that are playing the stereo front channel coming in from the TV set. 

The challenge here is in the way Sonos is designed, specifically for handling Home Theater duties. What it boils down to is rather than ‘bonding’ the Amp as surrounds, you’re going to need to ‘group’ it as a second room, and the sound it plays will be slightly delayed from the sound playing on the Arc, roughly 75 ms. Streaming music will be in sync, just not the TV input. 
 

There is no way to connect both devices to the ARC output that I’m aware of, so you will end up with the delay.


Thanks Bruce,

 

I do want to use the ceiling speakers as surround while watching tv, sorry if I didn’t make that clear. When listening to music I would like to use that pair as well as the kitchen pair each as stereo left and right along with the arc and sub. I will add a channel selector to turn off kitchen speakers when watching tv. Does that make sense?

Does “bonding” them mean that they are connected through WIFI? In this case I wouldn’t need an HDMI running to the amp as well as the arc both from the tv? The arc is the main receiver and will send tv and music audio through WIFI?

Appreciate the advice!


Thanks Bruce,

 

I do want to use the ceiling speakers as surround while watching tv, sorry if I didn’t make that clear. When listening to music I would like to use that pair as well as the kitchen pair each as stereo left and right along with the arc and sub. I will add a channel selector to turn off kitchen speakers when watching tv. Does that make sense?

Does “bonding” them mean that they are connected through WIFI? In this case I wouldn’t need an HDMI running to the amp as well as the arc both from the tv? The arc is the main receiver and will send tv and music audio through WIFI?

Appreciate the advice!

 

‘Bonding’ means that Sonos setups up the 2 or more devices as a single Sonos room, always playing the same audio source at the same volume.  So surround speakers or sub added to an Arc are bonded to the Arc.  They bonded speakers can be wired together or communicate wirelessly.

For your case, it sounds like you will want to bond your amp to the Arc for surround duty.  When playing TV the ceiling speakers connected to the amp will play surround.  When playing outer audio, you want to configure the room for ‘full’ audio, so that the Arc plays stereo and the speakers connected to the amp also play full stereo.  You can use your a speaker switch to turn off the kitchen speakers you also connected to the amp.

Two points I would make though.  Ceiling speakers do not make ideal surround speakers, as the audio should be coming behind you at ear level, rather than from above.  It also might make the atmos upfiring speakers, which will come at you from above, less noticeable.  If you can do in wall speakers or a pair of Sonos One SLs, it would be better.

Second point, although your plan for the kitchen speakers will work, I think you’ll find switching them on/off manually to be annoying rather quickly.  If a 2nd amp for the kitchen isn’t in the budget right now, I would at least leave flexibility to add it in the future.

 

Mod Edit: Edited for clarity prior to marking as Best Answer


Thanks Danny,

 

Do you think if the ceiling speakers were behind the listener and pointed down at a 45 degree angle this would improve this as a surround setup? Or do I scrap this plan and go with the Ones? I think I will still do in-ceiling speakers in kitchen and living for music but will just change my placement.