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can i create in wall surround sound

  • 21 December 2021
  • 2 replies
  • 1086 views
M

Hello all after hours of research and phone calls I’m still a bit lost 

so lets see if this helps clear up my questions. 

 

When i built my house i had gotten 3 zones pre wired for in wall/ceiling speakers 

zone 1: living room 5.1 surround sound pre wired  (all speakers in wall)

zone 2: Kitchen 2 speakers (in ceiling) 

zone 3: Back patio (2 on wall, 2 in ceiling) 

 

 

ZONE 1

in order to create a true surround sound experience and keep everything simple and clean i want to go with everything from Sonos. 

For the 5.1 surround sound what I’m confused on is it possible to run 4 in wall speakers, 1 arc (in place of a center channel) and 2 subs off of just 1 Sonos  amp and it all actually work correctly to create a surround sound experience?

i did find  this video ( https://youtu.be/cUUyOMRvsiI ) similar set up to what I’m going for only difference is i would use in wall instead of in ceiling, and i want to run 2 Sonos subs. What I’m confused on is why he needed to use 2 Sonos amps when each amp can support 6 Sonos speakers? 

Can someone please clarify that. 

 

ZONE 2 

this seems to be the simplest zone straight forward 1 amp 2 in ceiling speakers. 

 

ZONE 3

A bit tricky since i need in ceiling and wall mounted speakers and Sonos only makes the outdoor set weather resistant. I would have to utilize other in ceiling speakers which is why i need a separate amp for outside. 

 

So where i make it confusing is in the event i do need to use 2 amps in the living room can i power an other zones speakers off of it? If i decide to add a outdoor sub or rock speakers outside would i need another amp or could i use the 2 free spots on the kitchen amp. 

 

 

 

If anyone has better alternative please advise I’m tired of companies trying to rip me off and give me something I’m not happy with. 

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Best answer by GuitarSuperstar 21 December 2021, 21:36

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G
Userlevel 7

ZONE 1
You will need two Amps:

  • One Amp will power the left front and right front channel speakers.
  • One Amp will power the left surround and right surround speakers.
  • The center channel cannot be used in this setup, nor can an Arc be used as a center channel.
  • You can connect two Subs to the first Amp but one Sub must be a Gen 3.
  • This would be a 4.2 setup with a phantom center channel.


ZONE 2
You will need one Amp to power the two in-ceiling speakers.


ZONE 3
You will only need one Amp to power all four speakers. You can find third-party in-ceiling speakers that are weather resistant. You don’t have to use the Sonos Architectural speakers. You will also be able to connect an outdoor subwoofer to this single Amp.

NOTE: The Amp is a single-zone product, which means all connected speakers will play the same content at the same volume. If you want the outdoor speakers to act as its own zone and be controlled independently of the kitchen speakers, you need to connect the outdoor speakers to a separate Amp than the kitchen speakers.

"Receive with simplicity everything that happens to you." - Rashi
Airgetlam

Zone 1: No, the ARC (or Beam, for that matter) can not be used as a center speaker. There’s no provision in the Sonos software for that, they both contain right, center and left speakers. 

Having not watched the video (sorry, time is a consideration), the reason that you would use two Sonos Amps would be that one Amp is driving the front speakers (and creating the faux center channel) and the other Amp would be receiving the surround signal from the front Amp.

You can use a Sonos Amp to drive up to six speakers (rare, but possible) with a single mono or stereo signal, but you can’t separate out front and rear signals from an Amp. There’s one pair of speaker posts that you can connect the speakers to, not six.

Zone 2: Seems like you’ve got this one figured out. 

Zone 3: Note, while Sonos does sell some speakers on their website from a company named Sonance, they’re not technically Sonos speakers. You would indeed need a separate Amp for these, if you plan to have them playing a different input than other speakers. Again, the Amp has a single pair (right and left) of speaker posts, and not multiples. Any single Amp can only be sending out a single signal at a time, and not two or more different outputs. 

 

Edit: I see @GuitarSuperstar types faster than I do.

Bruce
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