Sonos Amp - What floorstanding speakers to get?

Awesome Dan!  I’ll check these out.  Great to hear some more confirmation on the above notes.  Also cool to hear your perspective on keeping the Sonos subs.  Definitely helps and interesting note on the low-end cut-off.  Some music definitely has lower end bass but not sure at this point if it merits a switch.

I’d only change one thing at a time, so buy some bookshelf speakers and use them with the Sonos subs. If you’re unhappy with the bass, you could try a 3rd party sub, but not many instruments generate output below 30 Hz. The pipe organ is one. Below 30 Hz bass may be more desirable for movies than for music.

Another good candidate speaker is the Dali Oberon 3.

But all the standmount speakers mentioned on this thread are more alike than different from each other, and all are capable of delivering good sound quality. How good depends more on how carefully they are placed in the room, and the room acoustics.

Remember also to not be misled by how loud they sound at a given setting on the Sonos amp volume slider because that is a function of how efficient they are - and this can vary a lot across speakers with some less efficient ones rated at 85dB while some are 90dB plus. So the less efficient ones will need higher volume settings to get the same sound levels - and no comparative assessment of sound quality is valid unless sound levels are the same. But the Sonos amp has enough grunt to get all to deliver adequate sound levels for a typical domestic environment; all that is needed is the use of the volume control slider to elicit the required sound levels both for comparative testing and for regular listening thereafter.

Thanks Dan and Kumar!

That makes perfect sense. I’ll definitely test one thing at a time. I reached out to a local shop and luckily get to try a few of the different B&W’s (606/607’s). I’ll see if I can try out a third party sub too. Will be good to test everything. 

Thanks for the heads up on the sensitivity Kumar. I read a little about that before and it’s good to get further clarification. I think all the speakers are in the 84-88dB sensitivity range so hopefully that’s a good spot for the Sonos Amp and output levels. If not I’ll toggle the output of the surrounds while listening. 
I’ll report back on how everything sounds!

For the update:

The B&W 606 AE’s sound perfect for the system!  Honestly a great turn-out, I went ahead and purchased them.  Every frequency sounds like it’s accounted for now, and the balance of all the audio is superb. 

As I set these up, I immediately noted they make the 2x Sonos subs shine.  Not sure what did it, but the moment I plugged in the new B&W’s, the subs took over exactly where they were supposed to.  Maybe the floorstanding speaker’s bass output was muddling the Sonos sub output, and that’s why everything didn’t hit/sound right.

Thank-you to Kumar and Dan for pointing out this bookshelf direction may work best.

As an additional heads-up, I gave a third-party sub a shot for use with the Amp.  I was able to pick up a B&W DB4S (Great open box deal at best buy).  This sub has incredibly great sounding bass.  It fills the entire room with the feeling as soon as music is played.  

The 2x Sonos subs are tighter and punchier, but the B&W DB4S can hold lower notes longer and envelops the room in bass.  Additionally, the Sonos subs may move air around a little bit more, since they’re ported versus the sealed nature of the DB4S.  

Tough decision.. Currently I’m leaning B&W given the sound quality of the bass. 

Definitely open to hear thoughts here if anyone notes differences in these sub set-ups.

As a side note:  I noticed you can actually deploy a third-party sub through the Amp, and 1-2x Sonos Subs as an addition in the same home theatre set-up!  Once I noticed this, I tried adding 1x Sonos sub to the B&W DB4S, and this was intense..  Although the bass was loud & the frequencies worked together from both subs in some areas, they also cancelled each other out in others.  The Sonos sub would almost cut the extended note that was being deployed from the B&W in some cases.  Just thought it was interesting this type of set-up could be incorporated, since previously I heard this was not possible to do.

As always, welcome all comments and feedback and thank you to everyone again for all the help.

Where subs are concerned, 1+1 may often be less than 1, leave alone 2 - for the quoted phenomenon of cancelling each other out. Therefore unless one knows the subject well, more than one Sub in a domestic environment is not recommended, especially if the crossover is being set to 80 Hz or lower thereby rendering the frequencies rendered by the Sub not being locatable and therefore not affecting the stereo imaging.

Presumably when two Sonos Subs are being deployed in one zone, the Trueplay tuning is being done for both simultaneously; if not, it may not deliver good results, for the same reason quoted.

Update:  

I decided to keep the B&W DB4S and 2x Sonos subs in the same home theater set-up. 
It took some moving the subs around the room to find what works best but the final result is audio bliss.  Just wanted to share.

To conclude, the final setup is:

• Sonos Amp
• 2x B&W 606 S2 AE
• 2x Sonos Fives as Surrounds
• 1x B&W DB4S Sub
• 2x Sonos Subs

Thank you all!