Achieve 5.1.2 with Sonos Amp

In the above case, if I also wanted the Sonos features, this is what I would do:

Get a TV that has audio out jacks and wire those to the analog inputs on the Sonos amp. Wire a couple of quality third party speakers with decent bass capability to the amp, to stand flanking the TV, some distance away from the screen.

For just music this can be as good as a top end HiFi system, limited only by speaker capability. For TV, this can be surprisingly good, and you will not really lose as much as you might think by not having the surround speakers.

Don’t fall into the trap of adding more speakers just because the amp has terminals for them.

I am not familiar with the latest HDMI schemes for wiring the TV to the amp, but I have used the old fashioned scheme suggested to very good effect for many years now. Inspite of having a big TV in a dedicated to movies room.

Thanks everyone for helping me understand the Amp functionality better.

My contractor suggests we install a dedicated 20 amp outlet for the Sonos Amp. I am not certain if that is necessary. Isn’t the 20 amp outlet a different looking plug than what comes with the Sonos Amp power cord? Appreciate feedback from those that currently are using the amp.

That is overkill for Sonos amp. The normal domestic outlet is sufficient.

However, Sonos can work effectively on a 20 Amp circuit, the plugs are the same. You’d just be paying extra for wiring and a plug that wasn’t needed. 

The suggestion by @Kumar would lead to a 70ms delay when viewing TV. For some this would not be a problem, but I personally would hate this.

I would probably go for the Home Theatre set up you plan but would either uses a second Amp to power extra speakers (that would be grouped when playing) or try connecting four speakers to the Amp and if such a thingexists use a switch to disconnect the extra speakers if the fact they would only play surround (next to the two original speakers) when watching TV bothered me. 

I am not sure that this as subjective as is often made out. I have watched carefully and see no lip sync issue even then, so I suspect that my Fire TV sourced set up probably has a delay in the video that leaves any effective net delay to be a lot less than 70 ms. I am not complaining because - if that be the case - it suits me fine, but...YMMV.

I sometimes group my Sonos Connect with my Beam and listen to my headphone. I do notice the sound being out of sync, but live with it because I do not use it very often. Since one of the goals of the proposed set up is “home theater space”, I would advise anyone using the analogue connection to listen and decide if this is the way to go, especially for such an expensive set up.

I agree about the testing suggestions, but the example you have used does not work as a guide for assessing the effect of lip sync issues. In the case you have described, even a 35 ms delay will be heard and may be intrusive.

The way to see if lip sync is an issue is by seeing lips...or guitar finger actions and assessing if the sound heard from these movements seems to come after them.

Needless to add, this testing has to be done with line in auto delay set to the minimum option, with uncompressed line in. Something that can make grouped play a challenge, but that is a different issue that can be solved by ethernet wiring. But not all use cases for this set up may ever need grouped play and the consequent wiring.

Thank you for everyone’s input. It sounds like I should inform my contractor the dedicated 20amp outlet is not necessary to service the Sonos amp. Regular outlet will do the job just fine.