Avid Contributor I

Answered

Grouping 3 Speakers...

33 replies
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I’ve been using a single Play 3 and two One SL as two separate groups in the same room to create a 2.1 surround sound. Adjusting the volume balance manually is a pain.

Is there a way to put all three speakers in a group together?

...and if not, why not?

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I

Ian_SAnswer

Prodigy III

I kind of get what the OP is trying to do here, he’s not bothered about perfect stereo imaging etc, but just wants to fill the room with sound without having to faff around with volume adjustments all the time via normal grouping of speakers.

Unfortunately there is no way in the Sonos App to permanently ‘bond’ a set of speakers that don’t fall into either a stereo pair or home theatre setup.

You can create a pre-defined group (under manage system) which appears in the top of the screen when you select a speaker to group, but if you have other speakers it doesn’t appear to work correctly and just adds the group to the currently selected speaker. (Unless you hit everywhere first followed by your group...)

There is an app (costs money) that may do what you want called ‘Soro - for Sonos’ on Apple products which used to have the facility to preset volume for a group of speakers.

It’s something that used to be in the Sonos App once upon a long ago and got lost in the drive for ‘improvement’. Perhaps @Corry P could mark it as a feature request?

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J

John B

Looking at your photo, the Ones seem to be positioned very low and behind,,,well...objects. Maybe you wouldn’t need the 3 if you culd hear the stereo pair properly.

W

WickedDNAAuthor

Avid Contributor I

Why are you obsessed with 3 speakers as one room? It’s been explained. A stereo pair is the most (other than a Sub as a third speaker) unless it’s a home theatre setup with a Ray, Beam or Arc. Whatever speakers/rooms you have you can group them to play together. You can create and save named room groups too.

I’ve explained that, and provided a picture.

You’re an angry man.

W

WickedDNAAuthor

Avid Contributor I

Looking at your photo, the Ones seem to be positioned very low and behind,,,well...objects. Maybe you wouldn’t need the 3 if you culd hear the stereo pair properly.

The sound is fine, and neither speaker is behind anything.

Smilja

@WickedDNA, as @John B has said it’s perfectly fine to adhere to your preferences. Heck, I have a surround setup, an Ikea Symfonisk Floor lamp and an ONE stereo pair crammed into the living room, and I love it! 😋

»And the world is like an apple whirling silently in space, Like the circles that you find in the windmills of your mind.« (›Windmills Of Your Mind‹ [1967]. Music by Michel Legrand ; English lyrics written by Alan & Marilyn Bergman)

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nik9669a

Senior Virtuoso

Why are you obsessed with 3 speakers as one room? It’s been explained. A stereo pair is the most (other than a Sub as a third speaker) unless it’s a home theatre setup with a Ray, Beam or Arc. Whatever speakers/rooms you have you can group them to play together. You can create and save named room groups too.

I’ve explained that, and provided a picture.

You’re an angry man.

Not angry, just perplexed.

It’s been explained in the first two replies above what speaker configs are possible, and how you can group rooms to play to multiple speakers. If you’re happy with the sound you’re experiencing from the speakers you have, in the locations you’ve put them: fantastic. We’ve just been suggesting alternative setups and how to control them - but not as “3 speakers set up as one room”.

J

John B

I think some of us (me especially) have taken this thread off topic by choosing to advise @WickedDNA on the sound of his system, about which he never asked.

As @nik9669a has said, the original question has been answered. A Sonos "room" is a label for an individual speakers or for a particular collection of speakers that forms a single unit for playback purposes, such as a stereo pair or a HT setup.

These Sonos "rooms" then form the building blocks of the system. They can each play different streams, or any combination of rooms can be grouped to play in sync, whether in the same physical room or different rooms.

This gives maximum flexibility and control while maintaining a clear, consistent architecture.

Allowing any random combination of speakers (e.g. a Play:3 and a pair of Ones) to belong to the same Sonos room would actually result in chaos. That way madness lies.

I

Ian_SAnswer

Prodigy III

I kind of get what the OP is trying to do here, he’s not bothered about perfect stereo imaging etc, but just wants to fill the room with sound without having to faff around with volume adjustments all the time via normal grouping of speakers.

Unfortunately there is no way in the Sonos App to permanently ‘bond’ a set of speakers that don’t fall into either a stereo pair or home theatre setup.

You can create a pre-defined group (under manage system) which appears in the top of the screen when you select a speaker to group, but if you have other speakers it doesn’t appear to work correctly and just adds the group to the currently selected speaker. (Unless you hit everywhere first followed by your group...)

There is an app (costs money) that may do what you want called ‘Soro - for Sonos’ on Apple products which used to have the facility to preset volume for a group of speakers.

It’s something that used to be in the Sonos App once upon a long ago and got lost in the drive for ‘improvement’. Perhaps @Corry P could mark it as a feature request?

W

WickedDNAAuthor

Avid Contributor I

I kind of get what the OP is trying to do here, he’s not bothered about perfect stereo imaging etc, but just wants to fill the room with sound without having to faff around with volume adjustments all the time via normal grouping of speakers.

Unfortunately there is no way in the Sonos App to permanently ‘bond’ a set of speakers that don’t fall into either a stereo pair or home theatre setup.

You can create a pre-defined group (under manage system) which appears in the top of the screen when you select a speaker to group, but if you have other speakers it doesn’t appear to work correctly and just adds the group to the currently selected speaker. (Unless you hit everywhere first followed by your group...)

There is an app (costs money) that may do what you want called ‘Soro - for Sonos’ on Apple products which used to have the facility to preset volume for a group of speakers.

It’s something that used to be in the Sonos App once upon a long ago and got lost in the drive for ‘improvement’. Perhaps @Corry P could mark it as a feature request?

Yeah, THIS!

I’ve been in this forum and a facebook group and learned little from questions I’ve asked.

Lots of responses and few to no meaningful answers.

You’re right about filling the room with balanced sound. My listening isn’t sufficiently nuanced to appreciate the full sound stage BUT if I could find a way to do it then I’d love it.

As is is, with a front firing standalone speaker the sound is outstanding.

Looks like I’ll have to get a Beam to make the sound right, and in a space that size, with a Beam and two Threes, and very tolerant neighbours, it’ll sound awesome.

Thanks Ian, you addressed what’s important to me and didn’t use your response to validate yourself.

I

Ian_S

Prodigy III

A small word of warning on the Three’s… they are getting near to end of life, and whilst they’re still supported, they are struggling on things like memory compared to newer models and may be more problematic with S2.

You might have more success (going down the soundbar route so you can bind the speakers together) to consider keeping the One SL’s and adding a Beam and Sub Mini…

If you look here

https://support.sonos.com/en-gb/article/sonos-app-version-compatibility

It shows you which speakers work with the older S1 ecosystem, which the Play:3’s would be better suited to. You would need to find a Beam Gen 1 one though to go down that route.

Corry P

Sonos Staff

Hi @WickedDNA & @Ian_S

Welcome to the Sonos Community!

It’s something that used to be in the Sonos App once upon a long ago and got lost in the drive for ‘improvement’. Perhaps @Corry P could mark it as a feature request?

I’m not sure what’s being asked for here - if I group two rooms together, adjusting the volume on the Now Playing screen changes the volume on both rooms - as described by @Schlumpf in the first reply here.

Thinking about what @WickedDNA is trying to achieve, however, I think the answer might lie in setting a volume limit on either the Play:3 or the Sonos Ones, depending on which ends up over-powering the others at higher volume levels. You can set a volume limit by going to Settings icon » [room to adjust] » Volume Limit. I have never tried this, so I am not 100%, but if I understand @WickedDNA correctly, I think it may be what they are looking for.

Or, if all three speakers were the same model, that may make balancing easier.

I hope this helps.

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein

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