I am considering Sonos set up for my new home. In my new home I have great room , dining room and kitchen all in one straight line. The kitchen is far from the great room wall where my TV hangs. I have prewire set up for rear channels in great room and two speakers in kitchen. So this is what I intend to do and please let me know if this is possible. I will have a Sonos Arc under the tv to act as 3 channels. I will have a Sonos Amp connected to Sonos Arc. This Amp should power the two rear channels in the great room to create a 5 channel surround in great room. Now since the kitchen is a bit far, I want the same Amp to also power the two in-ceiling speakers in my kitchen with the same audio as great room but as a separate room. I do not want to create a 7 channel system, what I want to create is a 5 channel system in the great room and a two channel system in my kitchen playing the same audio. Is this possible? Are there any recommendations or considerations for this set up? Would I need any more additional accessories do achieve this set up?
Sonos Arc and Amp to power for 5.1 in one room and same audio in another room
Best answer by GuitarSuperstar
Each Amp acts as one zone, meaning all speakers wired to a single Amp will play the same content at the same volume. So the problem with using one Amp is the two speakers in the kitchen will also act as surround speakers for the Arc. This will result in a total of four surround speakers for the Arc (two left surrounds and two right surrounds). This will be fine when streaming music (if Music Playback for Surround Audio is set to FULL). But this will be a problem when playing TV audio since the audio playing out of the surround speakers will only be ambient and background audio. You are better off getting a second Amp to power the kitchen speakers separately. This will give you a separate “kitchen” zone that you could group with the “great room” zone when playing TV audio and streaming music. There will be a slight delay from the kitchen speakers when playing TV audio, but it will play as separate stereo speakers (rather than surrounds) and the delay probably won’t be very noticeable since those speakers are so far from the great room.
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