You are discovering some of the fine points of audio. For most speaker systems the highs are emitted in a cone shaped pattern and the apex angle of the cone narrows with rising frequency. This is why ear level sounds best to you. For speakers mounted above the cabinets, most of the highs pass over your head. Another problem with the speakers on the cabinet is that the nearby ceiling and the typically small space between the cabinet top and the ceiling are reflective surfaces and tuned cavities that change the balance of the sound and create multiple reflections, arriving at slightly different times, interfering with your perception.

If you want the music to have “focus” space the speakers approximately as far from each other as you are from the speakers. plus or minus 20-30 percent is not the end of the world. Obviously this “focus” will happen only in your favorite chair. Not everyone needs this “focus” because they never sit and listen to music as the main activity. For many people a “wash” of sound is best as they move throughout the space. Symmetrically placing multiple pairs of speakers around a large room will create a “wash”. It seems counter intuitive, but alternating left and right around the room is more satisfying in this context.

For home theater, you’ll need the “focus” approach for front and rear speakers. Don’t place the surround (rear) speakers too close to the listener because small listener position changes can result in one surround speaker dominating.

These are some basic points. One can spend a career wrestling with the fine points, boring, and amazing your friends. In the end only you know what sounds “best” to you.

Thank you so much for this! It’s everything I hoped for and more. Not every public forum yields such informed and thorough responses :) 

Taking in mind what you have described, I think I have some ideas of what I may be doing sub-optimally, reducing a balanced “wash” as I traverse the space. This is exactly the issue I have been trying to think my way through without understanding/realizing it. 

I recently added a single unpaired counter top level One between two cabinet level paired ones, and a single unpaired at standing ear level in the living room couch area in an attempt to balance/wash that lack of higher frequencies as I traverse.

My office space has a two level heavy wire rack movable narrow desk behind me where I have two ones about 4’ apart, about 1’ below seated ear level and this is my most perfect focused space where I often listen many hours per day. In the past I would run every stereo paired and single speaker in the big open space that I could (turning off bedroom/bathroom in the grouping) but lately I’ve been turning off even more, experimenting with more off/on. 

I ordered a Five tonight and will see where that fits. I don’t know why it took almost two years of being home and minimal work/personal travel to feel so passionate about tuning and optimizing, but here I am! 

Thanks again so much for your reply. It helped me set my next small path forward. Cheers!

RST

So I’m here almost as some kind of blog catharsis to share where my setup has gone in recent weeks and some troubleshooting I’m working on now. What happened in the last weeks? 

1. I discovered eBay and Facebook Marketplace and Mercari
2. I bought a lot of stuff
3. I’m optimizing, swapping and building lists of things I want to learn about how SONOS works in the networking and swarming/distribution side of things (I’m an IT guy by trade, I think data flows) 

So I bought two Beams Gen 1, Several Play:5’s and a Five and a Gen 3 sub. Sub will arrive tomorrow, and I’ve been exploring moving things around. Here is what I have concluded:

My most preferred personal listening experience is with an unpaired Five flanked by a stereo pair of Ones. LOVE that experience of sitting about a yard/meter away from that setup. I currently have this behind my work desk setup facing the back of my head and its such a great listening experience! The Five is a bit off the Ones are above the Five flanked.

My second setup was a kitchen area where I paired my first two Play:5’s. I honestly didn’t enjoy the sound for the space and found that separating the pair and placing them on opposing sides of the room helped that space. Flanked with Ones was also good there, but probably more than I want to pollute the desk with. 

As I grow with Play:5’s and Fives, I was hoping to reduce the overall number of devices I have in my loft. That hasn’t happened yet as I move, try, optimize and reconsider. And THIS leads me to some questions. I will continue my journey searching here, YouTube and elsewhere, I started to have some performance issues with my system that I haven’t had for years. I’m guessing it’s either my networking equipment so I’m looking to learn more about how SONOS works. 

1. I’m wondering when I start playing from an audio source and group members how does SONOS decide which group member will be the one to source the media and distribute? Is this how SONOS operates? 
    
2. I discovered through my network analytics app that I had plugged a Beam into a wireless bridge via ethernet, and I would guess because of that, the nearby SONOS swarmed onto that bridge via the BEAM (guessing here again) so I unplugged the Beam from that wireless bridge to reduce this overload. I had thought this would help things but may have caused some overload on that bridge
    
3. When streaming to all of my devices together, I sometimes get momentary pulsing dropout from some devices, and sometimes not. It seems like the more likely the source is HD or higher bitrate the more likely this is to happen. I have a 1GB internet connection and more than one set of home networking equipment (and two unbonded ISPs and separate modems) so I can flip between different networks and ISPs and because of this, leading to my final question:
    
4. Does having older equipment S2 (like Play:1’s) cause potential issues if one of those in a group if I have a lot of devices on my network? Does one device get selected as the coordinator of all activities in groups? If I have a lot of SONOS devices could a Play:1 be underpowered to coordinate 20+ devices? 

Not expecting thorough analysis and answers here but if anyone has a suggested resource to start learning about SONOS network and operational architecture this could help me optimize and take next steps to ensure all speakers are working at all times most successfully. Any ideas or links are appreciated.

Cheers!

Hi.  Good to hear your experiences and enthusiasm!

A few fundamental points:

1. Sonos has its own mesh networking protocol, SonosNet.  Originally, you had to have at least one device wired to the router to enable connection between the WiFi and Sonos wireless segments.
2. It is now possible to run entirely on WiFi, but with larger systems it is generally best to run in SonosNet mode.
3. When you group speakers, the speaker you start with acts as group coordinator, and handles the distribution of audio, timing cues etc.  So best to choose a speaker with a strong signal
4. A stereo pair is (in this sense) a special type of group.  The left speaker acts as coordinator.
5. Older equipment may have wireless radios that are not as powerful as newer speakers, but this is likely to be of marginal significance.

Well, that’s a start.

Thank you, I will get started on researching the SonosNet turn-up situation. Checking it in my app, that section seemed to be grayed out. I run multiple networks with separate equipment so I was wondering what all was possible I know tonight’s mission!  

If it’s greyed out, it means that you’re not using it. Once you connect one of your Sonos devices to the router with an ethernet cable, it will show up as an available option. 

Hard to add to John’s excellent post, but you can read a bit more information about wired/unwired setups in the wired and wireless modes FAQ.

Thank you, doing a bit of troubleshooting now.  

I previously had two rear channels plugged in, while the Beam was not, and removed those as rears for that beam. Doing a bit of troubleshooting to see why those being plugged in isn’t doing the trick. Thank you again for this link. 

Yea, the “rear channels” is an issue...the nature of a bonded connection and a normal connection is somewhat opaque to most of us. The wired device needs to be a standard speaker, not a bonded speaker, such as a surround or subwoofer. The actual nature of the way the system communicates to those devices is one way, and doesn’t allow a “SonosNet” connection to be established. 

Certainly not well called out in Sonos’ information, last time I looked. 

In the case of a soundbar (Beam), and surrounds, the only device you can have that will generate the SonosNet network is either the Beam, or a Sonos BOOST, which is basically a speakerless puck that does that function. I use it myself, since my speakers tend not to be easily reached by an ethernet cable. 

I had a small sidetrack during the network optimization (*ehem, V14) but once that was handled, unpairing rear channels, unwiring them, moving my One V2 SL’s into the ethernet available space, wiring up and BOOM! All is perfect in my SonosNet world. Thanks again both of you for all of the tips & advice. Now I’m back to placement optimization, and hopefully reducing some of those 21 devices in a 700 SQ foot loft apartment. 

After having so many Play:1’s I am slowly adjusting to the touch top of the One V2’s. I like their appearance more but I feel like an old person wanting to shine a flashlight on them every time to know where is play/stop/up/down/forward back.  I have a few more of various things to arrive in the Five or Play:5 or Sub world, another move & listen and sort, and then hopefully to scale back a bit. 

Out of all of this I was most surprised by the pair of Play:3’s that I picked up. Interested to see where the roadmap goes with Fives, lack of 3’s. I would love to have something the size of a Five but half as deep for counter top placement.  Hmm. So much fun considering and reconsidering placement. So much enjoyment. Hair raising, honestly. Thanks again. 

Well, back for a daily update of SONOS large space optimization! Gen3 sub delivered today, will pick it up this afternoon over the lunch or this evening.

SonosNet successfully activated! Things were very stable with my 21 devices but once I started using some of my static groups “front of house / back of house / office” it wasn’t so perfect anymore. Certain units dropping off and coming back almost like an audio carnival around a large open space at some point. 

Does the Sonos app or any toolset I can use to see what is causing the dropout: do I need to do a wifi mapping site survey ( have the tools to do this to know which channels may be crowded), am I overloading someone’s CPU, is a unit or two experiencing some kind of errors? Is the streaming service lagging? I’d love a toolset to do next steps diagnosis. Otherwise when I group fewer devices regardless of location, things work pretty reliably. I also get the dreaded “Sonos system unavailable. Fix it?” message, random messages that this or that (mostly Play:1) is unconfigured, then the error will disappear a few moments later, etc. The more actively I group and ungroup speakers, playing stuff, the more frequently this happens. I never intend to play more than one stream on other groups but occasionally one thing is playing one place and another thing another, not intentionally. A previous stream will restart somewhere 

The ultimate goal is to reduce the overall number of devices as I receive higher powered (with some hopes this will reduce my challenges) newer and more capable devices, but so far I haven’t found any I realllly want to get rid of 

Thanks for sitting in for today’s edition of “Large Space Coverage & Optimization” from a nondescript 700 square foot loft apartment in the Americas. 

No, there aren’t easily accessible “tools” or “reports”, although there is some legacy reporting from when Sonos purged most of that data due to privacy (my interpretation) requirements. You can log in to an individual speaker (not a Boost) to get the data by entering http://x.x.x.x:1400/status on your browser, using the IP address for the Sonos device to replace my x.x.x.x.

Given that there was a firmware update yesterday, I do wonder if you may have a duplicate IP address issue, which often rears its head at that time, since the Sonos devices request new IPs, and if the server is in a “bad’ state, where it’s forgotten what has been assigned or not, the Sonos can receive duplicate IP addresses. 

Two solutions to this. A quick one, by just unplugging all Sonos devices from power, then rebooting the router, and once the router comes back up, plugging the Sonos devices back in, so that they get new IP addresses from the refreshed router. But that’s semi-temporary, the next time there’s a firmware update, if your router is in an odd state, it might happen again.

The longer term, and recommended by me and others here, solution is to assign reserved IP addresses for all your network devices in your router’s DHCP table. Often, people need to refer to their particular router’s manual to learn how to do this, there’s really not a generic instruction set that works across all makes and models, to my knowledge. 

Note that the duplicate IP address issue can occur both on standard speakers, and bonded speakers, even though the bonded speaker generally aren’t directly connected to the router, but connect through the device that they are bonded with. 

Excellent advice, thank you. This will be the evening’s activities as well as activating my new sub and whatever else has come in today. 

This may sound laughable but at some points in the past I had Wemo devices attached to some of my SONOS equipment so I could conveniently power cycle it without climbing all around the house to do so. I didn’t come up with a simpler way than that but much of that has disappeared when things were stable in the last year. I would love some kind of monitoring dashboard to know a speaker is consistently losing connection (so I could optimize) or facing some kind of memory fault or other issues so I can take action, replace, etc. I get the point is simplicity so I’m probably in the minority here but… 

Very much value your advice and feedback. Thank you! 

Daily update: The IP reservations are done, the sub G3 is in, installed and functional. I’m surprised at how heavy it is and expect it must be some kind of cast metal or something!  I have SUB questions. I’ll Google, but I’m enjoying the conversation here! 

So the sub is installed behind my couch, which is in a big open space, and the back of the couch is the back of my office area (again open). Think back to back: sitting in the office, my back is toward the couch. Sitting on the couch, my back is toward the office, but they share a virtual line where the back of the couch is up against some open tables under which the sub lives. 

The sub is parallel to the back of my office chair. I’m feeling a little over-thuddy while listening to music in the office, but it seems rather perfect while on the couch listening to TV. So my questions are: 

1. Is there any best practice in sub orientation (parallel/perpendicular) to seating position? For some reason I was thinking changing it 90 degrees would let the air movement move out to the left & right instead of toward me. Of course I’ll try it but I’m interested in other experiences and suggestions/feedback
2. My past sub life experience I had the adjustments for volume and crossover point. I feel like I want to turn down the volume on the sub but not the surrounds, but not turn down the bass. Trying to understand what the bass slider on equalizer is doing exactly compared to two adjustments of volume or crossover point. 
3. Are there any restrictions on sub positioning? Right now I have it upright as designed, but wondered about lying on its side. 
4. Fourth and finally! My Roombas are going to tear up the paint on this thing certainly. Even before I had it powered on and installed it had started gathering dirt particulate from the air. I would guess I won’t go any kind of protection route, but thought about it. 

Thanks all who have so helpfully commented along this journey as I took it from “several years of just Play:1 growth” to adding Fives, 5’s, a sub, a pair of used 3’s, two Beam (regretting two G1’s but it got me through a learning phase) and future thoughts toward fewer 1’s overall and an Arc. 

Cheers!

StarDate January 28, 2022. Discovered that Sub settings stay nested in the Beam collection and not separate. Discovered that “volume” is listed as Sub Audio/ Level under  Sound/Sub Audio, wasn’t scrolling down far enough to find this previously. 

Sub -4 is the sweet spot for my area. Impressed by the range of the sub on the lower end, but not where the crossover is set on the upper end. 

Network has been stable. More 5’s and Fives arrived. Continuing this journey with another pickup of delivery items tonight. 

I honestly believe that those settings for volume of individual speakers has a lot more to do with three things: 1) The room acoustics….each room is slightly different, 2) the kind of things being played….in general I like my explosions loud when I’m watching movies, but less oomph when playing music, and 3) your ears, and opinions. From what I can tell, I’m different than other people and there’s no “this is the ‘right’ setting...it all depends on the individual, or sometimes partner’s approval. 

Along the lines of your point I would really like a setting like we have for surround speakers: ambient sound or full sound during music playback that could automatically throttle the sub a bit during music playback. 

This is a general complaint that I have about all subwoofer setups. At one point a manufacturer provided this capability for a couple years. The subwoofer could sense a video signal and switched setups when playing video. I thought it was a very friendly feature.

So I’m almost done with my loft transformation from all Play:1’s to adding 7 Fives (or Play:5’s) and a sub. The transformation has been remarkable. Hair raising. 

I’m using a Move to balance out a spot in the living room that was missing (missing wash? Is this the term? I’m not sure if I’m yet qualified to use that term correctly...) 

I still am a fan of the center and flank approach in areas that are not a TV: A Five or Play:5 in the middle, flanked by a couple Ones or Play:1’s or Play:3’s. That is a really great balance of sound for me. 

The Fives I’m using as rears near the living room face the office behind the TV so those double as my office setup and a bit below ear level, don’t need the “flank” approach. 

From here at some point in the future I will probably swap my main beam for an Arc, I still have some Ones on the way (in retrospect, probably didn’t need them but will help reduce the Play:1’s I have left) and still yet to install the Beam at the bedroom TV. A bit of a depth issue there with a cubic shelf I don’t want to replace and still imagining other solutions for that area. 

Thank you to EVERYONE who interacted with me on this thread-- every bit was extremely helpful, and especially BUZZ with the very first reply which helped me tremendously in creating several sound environments that please me very very much! Cheers!!!!!!

If you are using a FIVE as the center in a center-flank arrangement, experiment with deploying the FIVE in the vertical orientation.