So what about my question regarding hooking my existing Yamaha soundbar to the line-in on a port, and then adding a couple of Play One SLs as the surrounds?
You won’t get 5.1 surround audio, only stereo output by grouping the two Sonos rooms together.
So what about my question regarding hooking my existing Yamaha soundbar to the line-in on a port, and then adding a couple of Play One SLs as the surrounds?
Impossible, I'm afraid
So I don’t understand why that won’t work. I understand the surrounds won’t be true 5.1, but the Yamaha outputs it’s version of 5.1 and for my purposes the back speakers would really serve the purpose of bringing the dialog closer to the listeners.
And if I hooked the digital out from the Port to a separate input on the Yamaha, wouldn’t I then be able to group that with everything else in the house when I’m playing music?
I must be missing something here.
So what sort of audio out does the soundbar have, that you would connect to a Port's analog stereo input ? It is unusual for a soundbar to have any sort of audio out.
A Sonos home theater speaker attached to the TV’s optical output or to the TV’s HDMI (ARC) port is required to create a surround setup.
TV requirements
Playbar and Playbase require a TV with a digital optical audio output.
Arc, Beam, and Amp require a TV with an HDMI ARC port in order to use Amazon Alexa or the Google Assistant to control your TV. If your TV does not have an HDMI ARC port, you can connect Arc, Beam, or Amp to a digital optical audio output using the optical audio adapter (only included with Arc and Beam). You will not be able to control your TV using voice when using the optical connection.
https://support.sonos.com/s/article/1920?language=en_US
the back speakers would really serve the purpose of bringing the dialog closer to the listeners.
It would actually serve the purpose of making the dialogue sound like it is coming from behind you, while people 's lips moved in front of you. That seems like a weird outcome to be aiming for.
the back speakers would really serve the purpose of bringing the dialog closer to the listeners.
It would actually serve the purpose of making the dialogue sound like it is coming from behind you, while people 's lips moved in front of you. That seems like a weird outcome to be aiming for.
The position of the voices won’t be a problem because the speakers will be more to the side than behind and I can adjust their volume. The soundbar has extensive beaming capabilities to create surround images from the front so the additional speakers would just blend in. I know that works because I’ve already experimented with a little bluetooth speaker and it worked fine except for the lag.
A Sonos home theater speaker attached to the TV’s optical output or to the TV’s HDMI (ARC) port is required to create a surround setup.
The miscommunication here is I’m not trying to create a true surround setup and I don’t care about voice control since my TV already has that. The Yamaha can beam a variety of surround patterns so I’m content with a “hybrid” surround system bringing the sound of voices closer through side Sonos speakers I can control independently. I contemplate doing that by running the analog TV output into the line-in of a Port and grouping the Port with left and right SL Ones.
I’m going through these gyrations because the Yamaha doesn’t have any capability for external speakers but I’d rather not replace something I paid $1500 for a couple of years ago. Another benefit is the ability to expand my existing Sonos S1 system into that room via Airplay. I would run the Port’s optical output to the soundbar and just select that as the source when listening to music.
So what sort of audio out does the soundbar have, that you would connect to a Port's analog stereo input ? It is unusual for a soundbar to have any sort of audio out.
HDMI Arc Out. You can buy an HDMI audio extractor on Amazon for $20-30.
If for no other reason, the audio lag on the Sonos line-in would make sync with the Yamaha audio difficult, if not impossible.
If for no other reason, the audio lag on the Sonos line-in would make sync with the Yamaha audio difficult, if not impossible.
Actually, that has not been my experience with line in from other devices but it is certainly a factor to take into account. I’ve used line in from the cable box to share TV sound in other rooms with Connects, and didn't notice any lag.
If for no other reason, the audio lag on the Sonos line-in would make sync with the Yamaha audio difficult, if not impossible.
Actually, that has not been my experience with line in from other devices but it is certainly a factor to take into account. I’ve used line in from the cable box to share TV sound in other rooms with Connects, and didn't notice any lag.
Do you mean line out from the cable box? What type of line? Connected to more than one Connect?
So the setup you are considering has TV connected to Yamaha soundbar (connected how?). The Yamaha soundbar plays the TV sound. It simultaneously outputs an audio out identical to what it’s playing, from an HDMI-ARC connection. This would go through an audio extractor./ DAC to produce a stereo analog output to feed the Port’s line-in. By grouping the Port with the One SLs you hope to have the same audio playing on the Yamaha soundbar and the One SLs.
Is that correct? Or total misunderstanding on my part?
I think I may have confused you by mixing apples and oranges.
In the past in a different room I ran HDMI output from a DirecTV box to a TV, plugged the analog output from the DirecTV box into the line-in of a Sonos Connect, and plugged the optical output from the Connect into a receiver. That way I could play the line-in of that Connect in other rooms. In the room where the TV was, the TV speakers were sort of a middle channel with the other speakers in that room. I experienced no noticeable lag among the TV speakers, the receiver and the Sonos speakers in other rooms.
The puzzle I’m trying to solve now is twofold. I want to (a) extend an entirely S1 Sonos system into a new room, and (b) figure out a way to add wireless surround speakers to an otherwise quite good sound bar which doesn’t have that capability. Wireless surrounds because there isn’t any way to wire anything in that room at this point.
Well my Sonos speakers got made redundant overnight without any prior warning or knowledge and then Support blamed me because I had “automatically update” box ticked. Basically the speakers got a software upgrade but my old phone which ran S1 App fine can no longer control my speakers.
Extremely frustrating to become part of a planned obsolescence after spent big money on SONOS to support them when they were first released.
Their answer...buy a new phone….my answer…...when will you rinse and repeat the same thing again with a new phone that I dont even need..
Funnily enough I checked out my Spotify App and it still controls the speakers fine via my “old” phone. Its just the S1 App or the S2 App which will not download to my phone.
Thank You Spotify.
I’ll take the 30% discount if I can use it on ANY speaker system EXCEPT SONOS
Your problem is off topic here, since is has nothing to do with the S1/S2-split. I understand it must be frustrating that apps will stop working if you own an older phone and have stated her before that Sonos follows the makers of OS’s (Google or Apple) much more closely than other manufacturers in supporting apps on phones that OS-makers themselves have abandoned.
But. Sonos does state on the supported OS’s on their website and the end of support for your phone from the maker of it’s OS was probably some time ago, so you could have anticipated this, indeed by locking updates to apps on your phone and the system.
I have however read that if you own an iPhone @controlav’s app will make it possible to command your system on an out of OS-support iPhone.
The problem I have is that I knew the app was unsupported but that S1 would continue to work, just that their would be no updates.
That was quite a few months ago and everything worked OK. Support said that overnight a SONOS update made my speakers incompatible with the S1 app and I couldn't “roll" it back.
Support still says that S1 will work on old speakers but it was my fault because I had “automatic Updates" ticked and I agreed to the update.
That's a long bow to stretch for anybody to think about ticking that box would make my system incompatible.
Lucky I discovered that I can still keep my phone if I just use the Spotify App to use as the control.
I think you misunderstood the final outcome of the S1/S2 split. The outcome is that S1 would still be supported for years to come, but that it would still receive safety updates, but no feature updates. So S1-systems will continue to receive updates. Sonos has not changed anything in it’s policy about supporting old OS’s. So your system will update and in my experience most updates will require an updated app, whence you run in to the problem you experienced: a no longer supported OS.
I think we disagree about who should think about the consequences of owning a phone with an unsupported OS - it’s owner or Sonos, though I do feel, as stated earlier, that Sonos support of older OS’s seems shorter than makers of other apps seem to maintain.
I think we disagree about who should think about the consequences of owning a phone with an unsupported OS - it’s owner or Sonos….
Fair enough, but don’t you feel that Sonos should explicitly warn users when they’re about to ‘obsolete’ their phone? Even if they can’t check the version being used, they could still put up a warning before the update, if they’re changing their ‘supported’ criteria.
...though I do feel, as stated earlier, that Sonos support of older OS’s seems shorter than makers of other apps seem to maintain.
‘Considerably shorter’ perhaps? ;-)
Yes I agree I had a unsupported phone but SONOS said, and they still do, that you can keep using S1 and it will function, just that it will get no updates.
This worked fine until last night when an automatic update came through and stopped the S1 app working with the “updated “ speaker.
in supporting apps on phones that OS-makers themselves have abandoned.
That’s an emotive description that doesn’t describe the reality.
Google may have stopped “supporting” Android 7 and earlier, but the big difference is that Google hasn’t retrospectively crippled their apps that run under Android 7. So on my “old” Android 7 phone, I can still use Google Chrome, or Gmail, or the Google Play Store or pretty much any other Google-written app and it still works.
Sonos, on the other hand, has deliberately modified their app so that, under Android 7 and earlier it doesn’t work properly. They have crippled the app so that you can’t do things that many people will need to do regularly, such as updating their music library, adding a radio station or updating the network settings if they change their router or their broadband supplier.
You don’t have to think about that for long to realise that there is a big difference between what Google has done and what Sonos has done. The Sonos approach seems, bizarrely, to be designed to annoy its own customers...
Sonos, on the other hand, has deliberately modified their app so that, under Android 7 and earlier it doesn’t work properly. They have crippled the app so that you can’t do things that many people will need to do regularly, such as updating their music library, adding a radio station or updating the network settings if they change their router or their broadband supplier.
Really? I though that the app simply would not load...you are saying that it does but with edited functionality? So someone would have the same version of the app, but with less functionality?
Yes - it has been deliberately crippled, so that it will load but numerous functions are greyed out.
It’s hard to imagine what Sonos were thinking when they decided to do this. It’s obvious that the end result is that they want to save money by reducing legacy maintenance staff, but the way they have done it doesn’t make any sense from a customer perspective.
But on the other hand they could say that this is better than it not loading at all. Some functionality better than none?
Yes I agree I had a unsupported phone but SONOS said, and they still do, that you can keep using S1 and it will function, just that it will get no updates.
This worked fine until last night when an automatic update came through and stopped the S1 app working with the “updated “ speaker.
No, that's not what the (eventually) said. See the first post in this thread:
“After May, systems that include legacy products will continue to work as before - but they will no longer receive software updates or new features.
Sonos will work to maintain the existing experience and conduct bug fixes, (...).”
Maybe a bit confusing as to what consitutes a "software update” or a “bug fix", since all bug fixes bring the need to update the system and also the app. In this last sense S1 wil still receieve updates and it's users wil be confronted by the Sonos policy of keeping up very closely with OS-makers. Maybe unexpected for you, but the S1/S2-split has made no change to this policy. So your products will “continue to work as before” including this policy.
@Antifon @Kumar The first step in stopping support for OS's with Sonos is cutting off the possibility to make certain system changes. The next step is that the app will not update and not contact the system.
@Antifon I'm not an Android user myself, but I have seen people lose functionality or even the complete use of apps because they ran an outdated OS on their iPhone. Whatsapp springs to mind. My wife's iPhone 4s was even kicked off her employer's wifi network a certain time after Apple stopped providing updates.
But on the other hand they could say that this is better than it not loading at all. Some functionality better than none?
If that was their intention, then they haven’t thought it through properly. They don’t seem to be thinking about the customer experience as being the most important aim. What they have done is to implement a technical solution that repeatedly disappoints the customer.
I can stop and start music, but every time I want to find a new station, or add an album to my library and re-index so that I can play it, or change my network settings, the system tells me I can’t. By design it disappoints the user.
So stopping all support would have been better?
As said, Sonos might be quick in stopping support for older OS’s. But at least they warn you about it, by first taking away functionality.
You might need a new phone soon anyway: https://www.google.nl/amp/s/www.engadget.com/amp/old-android-phones-lose-many-secure-websites-in-2021-224728196.html
