Contributor I

connecting 1990's NAD receiver to Sonos system

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I’m exploring changes in our home music system. For decades, we’ve used a NAD receiver ( a C740 from around 1998) with two passive Polk speakers, a CD player and a turntable, all in the living room. The NAD has no phono pre-amp so I’ve wired one in and we play our vinyl successfully.

We’ve recently added a pair of ERA 100’s in a separate room, and finally joined the streaming generation via Tidal. Love it. In a third room, we’ve added a Beam 2 and a mini-sub to our TV set-up. Love those, too. Sometimes I add that room in when listening to music via Tidal. But right now, the old-school stereo isn’t connected to the Sonos gear. As a separate matter, we’d like to swap out the stereo’s pair of Polk SDA Compact bookshelf speakers (which ain’t so compact) for a pair of smaller speakers. The Sonos 5’s come to mind as a means by which the old NAD can connect with the new. Ideally that connection could work both ways.

The NAD has left and right channel pre-amp OUT ports in case a user wants to use a different power amp, I guess. But by default, there are jumpers connecting those OUTS to INS so that the receiver’s own amp can do the work.

I’d remove the jumpers, then connect the pre-amp OUT’s to a Sonos Five, using an RCA to 3.5mm plug-equipped cable. Am I correct that any source I have connected to the NAD----FM, CD, turntable, tape---can then be played to the Fives? And, if wanted (maybe I wouldn’t), any tone corrections made on the NAD would be effective? I think Sonos claims that the Five would automatically sense a signal at its line-in port and switch to it. Then, when wanting instead to use the Fives with Tidal streaming, we could do that, wirelessly adding in the Sonos- equipped other rooms if we chose.

By replacing the Polks with Sonos Fives, we could avoid something like the Port, which I’ve read may end up processing music data which will be processed again through Sonos speakers anyway.

Is this a workable plan? What are the problems, if any?

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AjTrek1

As @Stanley_4 indicated you are incorrectly using the term Group. In fact you are calling Rooms Groups which is completely incorrect. Your current Sonos setup per your post consists of:

“I have two existing “groups” which I call Sun Room (a stereo pair of Era100’s) and East room (a Beam v2 paired with a Mini-Sub)”

Those are not Groups...they are Rooms

Sun Room
East Room

If you combined them to play the same audio via the app which Sonos calls Grouping together they would form One (1) Group. Groups don’t have be named unless you want to make Sun Room and East Room a permanent Grouping. However, for now you have no Groups….only Rooms.

I inserted the diagram with Fives as a replacement for the NAD. As @Airgetlam said you can stream free Radio stations or subscribe to any station shown here. Some allow direct control of Sonos.

If you can’t part with the NAD; but want to bring it into Sonos, your best option is to buy a Port. The Port allows you to send whatever source you like from the NAD to any Sonos speaker (Room).

Yes, speakers wired to the NAD will be out of sync. You may also have volume control issues. However, that’s the price of admission to keep the NAD in the fold with Sonos.

Hope this answers your questions as there are really no additional legitimate options. Unless you want to create a SonoStien😱

Together Everyone Achieves More = T.E.A.M.

J

jonbarAuthor

Contributor I

😬 You’re so right--sorry to have conflated or confused these terms! I just reviewed the useful glossary of terms, and see the light. I have NO groups yet, only rooms. I’m very new to Sonos, kept the faith during the horrible out-sourced update of the system, and even then, found the set-up procedures so good that I paid less attention to the instructions than I should have. I am happy the company now seems on the way to restoring the quality it was famous for.

I also noticed this statement “If you have 3 or more rooms in your system, you can save a group so it can be remade easily later. There is an automatic group of “everywhere”, which is why group saving is not available if you have only 2 rooms.” Good to know.

I will likely buy the Fives now, add that new room, and make use of the advice offered me here. I will wait and see what improvements Sonos makes to the Port over time.

Thank you all again for your time and patience.

Stanley_4

Grand Maestro

Not a problem. I am trying to arrange a mass pummeling of the Sonos Marketing folks that pick both terms and Sonos device names. I’ll add you to the invite list. :-)

AjTrek1

@jonbar

Great that you’ve made a decision!

Just one more tip…

Multiple Rooms can exist inside a Single Space. For example in my Media Space I have three (3) rooms:

LG One (Arc Ultra, Era 300’s, Sub 4 x 2)
Stereo (Fives x 2, Sub 3)
Turntable (Amp, Pre Amp, Turntable, Wired speakers, Sub-Mini)

Together Everyone Achieves More = T.E.A.M.

J

jonbarAuthor

Contributor I

Oh...I read about having multiple rooms in one space. But it hadn’t occurred to me that it would be useful to make a room like the one you’ve called Turntable. Clever! Are the Wired speakers listed in that room the same Fives, but activated by a line-in signal to one of them?

AjTrek1

Ha ha…

In Sonos-Speak Wired speakers to an Amp reference traditional 3rd party speakers such as would be connected to your NAD or Sonos Architectural Speakers by Sonance. My speakers are Definitive Technology D7 Bookshelf speakers wired to the Amp. The sub is a Sonos Sub Mini that communicates with the Amp over its 5Ghz frequency. Yes, you can mix analog speakers (wired connection) with a Sonos Sub (wireless communication) with an Amp.

I chose to use an Amp and wired speakers because I wanted to keep my vinyl as old school analog as possible. That said I can still group the Turntable room with other rooms if I desire.

One last hint: Had I been using Fives with the turntable the Amp would not have been needed. 😊

Together Everyone Achieves More = T.E.A.M.

J

jonbarAuthor

Contributor I

Extremely useful, AJTrek1. I also hope to maintain as much old-school character from the NAD as I can. I just prefer to maintain an alternative for now that doesn’t need a smart phone to control it. I don’t have lots of space and would prefer not to have large speakers, or both passive wired and wireless speakers in one room. We’ll see how it goes.

AjTrek1

Extremely useful, AJTrek1. I also hope to maintain as much old-school character from the NAD as I can. I just prefer to maintain an alternative for now that doesn’t need a smart phone to control it. I don’t have lots of space and would prefer not to have large speakers, or both passive wired and wireless speakers in one room. We’ll see how it goes.

Understood. FYI, having passive (wired) speakers and wireless speakers in the same room do not cause any conflicts with Sonos.

Also, when using my turntable I don’t have to use the App. During initial setup I set the line-in function of the Amp to always select Turntable as the “Auto Play Room”. I set the starting volume level to a bit less than mid-way so as not to blow my ears or the speakers when the needle makes contact. I adjust the volume from the Amp or I can use the App.

Bottom-line I don’t have to interact with the App unless choose to. It’s a complete analog experience including walking over to the turntable to change the record 😂

BTW, I can select the turntable Speakers wired to the Amp to stream music (Spotify and the like) which does require the app. However, that’s no different than streaming music to any other Sonos speaker.

Together Everyone Achieves More = T.E.A.M.

Stanley_4

Grand Maestro

Oh...I read about having multiple rooms in one space. But it hadn’t occurred to me that it would be useful to make a room like the one you’ve called Turntable. Clever! Are the Wired speakers listed in that room the same Fives, but activated by a line-in signal to one of them?

Sonos used to call individual or Paired / Bonded sets Zones. That made more sense when you then said I have four Zones in my room. Now we are reduced to saying Room (the Sonos/set) in a room (of the house) and Zone has been reused to mean something else entirely.

Having just one set of Sonos in a room is pretty limiting, My main listening area has two Rooms, Chair (a single play 5) that is used for quiet listening and Media (Arc, Sub and Surrounds) for TV and Atmos listening. My office is similar, but a Beam HT set and a 300 Atmos pair.

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