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Sonos with existing in-wall speakers - Sonos Port?

  • 18 September 2019
  • 8 replies
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hi. wanting to know what product to use to achieve this:

i have 6 sonos play ONE with alexa speakers in each room of the house. when i bought my home the previous owners had high quality speakers installed in the ceiling of each room that i've never used. there are a ton of wires sticking out of the wall in the garage. how do i connect my sonos speakers to these speakers?

will this work?
i get a stereo system and connect it to those wires and then buy the new sonos port and connect it to that stereo system. the idea here is to have the 6 sonos ones play the same music as the existing wall/ceiling speakers.

if there's a different way, i appreciate any and all help!
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Best answer by melvimbe 18 September 2019, 20:02

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8 replies

Yes, this would work in general, but may not be the best plan to fit your needs. With this plan, you need a amplifier that can power all the different speakers. It may not allow you to change the volume between rooms (is there wall volume control) and you wouldn't be able to change the audio source in each room.

You might want to consider various combinations of Sonos Amps and/or Port + 3rd party amp depending on the difference spaces, volume control needs, and source control.

There is also no rule that says you must use the existing speakers. You already have a Sonos One in each room. Even if you want to stereo pair speakers, buying additional Sonos speakers is likely to be cheaper than buying Amps/Ports, etc to get the ceiling speakers operating.
thank you very much. just seems like a waste to have those really amazing speakers (each one was 500 according to previous owner) and not have them functioning.

what's an example of the sonos amp configuration you mention? does that mean i wont need a receiver?
The Sonos amp doesn't require a receiver, Configuration really depends on what your needs are.

As an example, say you have a pair of speakers in 2 bedrooms. You could connect all 4 speakers to a single Sonos amp. That means that both rooms would have to play the same music at the same volume level. Or you could use a separate amp for each room. Each room could play the same or different audio at different volumes.

That's really just scratching the surface though about what you could do the amp, since it can do mono mode, connect to a TV, connect to a different audio source, etc.

What other posters have done in the past, is put up an image of their floor plan with the location of current speakers marked, what TVs you plan on having if applicable, and what sort of features you want. We can then give better recommendations about what products to get.
Userlevel 7
Hi sonossocal

Oh well...Looks like @melvimbe submitted his response just before me. Happens all the time. However, you can read mine as well...it's all good. 😀

You didn't mention how many ceiling speakers you have. It can get very complicated (and expensive) if you want the ability play different music in each room. If that's not the case you could employ Sonos Amps with each driving up to 4 speakers at 8 ohms. You would the have two zones that could match what's playing on the Sonos speaker in the room via grouping.

BTW you used term Sonos play One to describe your speakers. There is a Play 1 and a Sonos One speaker. The latter has voice assistant capability (Alexa or Google) as well as native Airplay 2. Which do you own?

If all the wires are just are just sticking out of the wall in the garage your first course of action is to trace the wires back to their speaker room. You could accomplish that task by using an existing Amp (AVR) as a connection point to determine where the music plays and then mark the room wires with a name tag. If using an AVR any radio station will do.

Let us know what your exact plans might be once you determine what's what. Cheers!
you guys are amazing. i think to save money becuase i've already bought 6 sonos one with alexa, ill buy a receiver and connect all the speaker wires to it in the garage and connect a sonos port to it. i mean, the port is 399 and a receiver is god knows how much but i think that's cheaper than buying many amps im assuming? any suggestions on a receiver for the setup described above?

thank you guys so much!
you guys are amazing. i think to save money becuase i've already bought 6 sonos one with alexa, ill buy a receiver and connect all the speaker wires to it in the garage and connect a sonos port to it. i mean, the port is 399 and a receiver is god knows how much but i think that's cheaper than buying many amps im assuming? any suggestions on a receiver for the setup described above?

thank you guys so much!



It depends on how many speakers we're talking about, and whether you want to use those speakers for 'serious' listening, or just background music. That sort of thing. It might be best to familiarize with all that's available to figure out what makes the most sense for you...now and what you anticipate you'll want to upgrade to later on.

Here might be a good place to look:
https://www.crutchfield.com/m_321350/Multi-room-Receivers-Amps.html?tp=77817


If you had 6 separate rooms and don't need a lot of volume, this may be the way to go.
https://www.crutchfield.com/p_190SI12302/Niles-SI-1230-Series-2.html?tp=77822

Or you get get something more powerful. You could get something that supports less channels/zones than you need and then use a speaker switch. You might decide that it makes more sense to get 2 Amps and 2 speaker switches rather than a port, larger amp, and speaker switches. I'd come up with a couple plans and then decide which makes the most sense.
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dont need a receiver, get a multi channel amplifier and connect one pair of speakers to each output zone… then use Y cables to take the output of your Port or even an older Connect to the zones input. the volume will be controlled by the app on your phone or Alexa once you name the one feeding the house stereo. If you want a separate control on one of the rooms add another Port or Connect to just that zone input. this way you dont have to worry about impedance matching and or burning up a receiver whick will not handle all the speakers at once 

 

Try this from Amazon it will be perfect https://www.amazon.com/OSD-Audio-MX1260-Universal-selectable/dp/B004S3PY9M/ref=sr_1_18?keywords=multi+channel+stereo+amplifier&qid=1581117205&sr=8-18

 

hi. wanting to know what product to use to achieve this:

i have 6 sonos play ONE with alexa speakers in each room of the house. when i bought my home the previous owners had high quality speakers installed in the ceiling of each room that i've never used. there are a ton of wires sticking out of the wall in the garage. how do i connect my sonos speakers to these speakers?

will this work?
i get a stereo system and connect it to those wires and then buy the new sonos port and connect it to that stereo system. the idea here is to have the 6 sonos ones play the same music as the existing wall/ceiling speakers.

if there's a different way, i appreciate any and all help!

I have almost this identical situation which I could use some help with.   The only difference is all the speaker wires go to a closet with what used to be a high end receiver and amp probably from the early 2000s.  I want to make the speakers part of my sonos