Sonos ARC (Room Size Help)

[hammie14]

Hey,

Posted on the Sonos forum but didn't get any feedback, wondered if anyone here can help!

Im new to Sonos and this will be my first purchase.

I have just bought a new house with the main TV room is going to be 16’40” x 12’1” (5.00 x 3.63 m). I am looking to purchase the ARC Ultimate setup (with the era 300’s and the gen 3 sub).

Will this be too much for this size of room? Mainly for movies (streaming not physical media) and gaming (Series X and PS5). I’m not worried about cost. Just want to know if it will sound okay? I want the best sounding surround sound I can get from Sonos.

I know they changed their app and people are upset, and saying to not buy with Sonos, but the reviews say its an awesome soundbar!

I'm also aware there maybe a new version coming out soon but I think the current ARC would be suffix.

Thanks

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

No, that should be ideal if you want to go the Soundbar-based system way. I just helped a friend with a theater room about that size do exactly that (those exact speakers) and it sounds great in there. Buy with confidence!

The app change is much like Apple's occasional reinvention from scratch. They've already put a few things back into the new app that was left out of first release and I would guess what's left will return soon enough. In turn, the new app brings things that used to take a couple of clicks right to the top for one-click options. While it required a bit of learning vs. the old app which was around for many years, I've already adjusted to it myself and like it much better. I agree with others that perhaps Sonos should have waited a little longer to work in a few things dropped from the release, they'll get that back in updates soon enough.

That offered though, another way to go for "main TV room" that could be superior is to avoid the "Soundbar" approach and go traditional 5.1, 7.1 or similar with a Receiver. That would let you spread out your front left & right speakers instead of having left, center and right all smashed together into the width of the Arc. In general, soundbars are simple and best suited for smaller spaces (like an apartment). You have a fairly big room there.

You don't say if you are going to be positioning the TV on the 12' wall or a 16' foot wall but either of those offer a LOT of left & right space for traditional "dumb" speaker placement. Arc left & right is not even close to 12' wide... but you have the space for that in that room.

That particular Sonos setup will sound great in that size room but you could get an even better theater audio experience by taking advantage of the added separation.

If it's the non-walled-garden "smarts" that attract you, buy a Receiver with many smarts and let your Apple stuff fill in the rest. High quality "dumb" speakers will probably last you 20 or 30 years. When the "smarts" in this system get out of date, replace the Receiver (about every 10 years or so). Take care of the "dumb" speakers and they will sound just as good 20 or 30 years from now too.

But if you are sold on Sonos, it's a great soundbar system choice for that size room. There are plenty of very good ratings about it and I own an Arc myself (used like a HomePod for music in a spare room- sounds fantastic). Enjoy!

 

[hammie14]

Thank you @HobeSoundDarryl this is very helpful.

I had in my old house a Denon 3600h with Sony pascel speakers. It was a 5.1 setup I had, which I was happy with.

The reason for Sonos is I like the fact that it is wireless, the house we are moving into is brand new and we where not allowed to run speaker cables as the builder would not allow this, and I really don’t want to rip apart a new room just for surround sound, we don’t watch too many movies but ideally this will be when it will be used mostly, along with games, if I’m in playing say a racing game it’s great hearing the cars behind.

The TV will be going on the bigger 16 foot wall! Ideally with the arc below (wall mounted) and then the era 300’s on the Sonos floor stands!

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

Again, it should sound really great and, under those circumstances, may be best option. Enjoy!

Oh and don’t take the Sonos bashing around here to heart: “we” seem to hate everything that competes with Apple in any way. Since Apple makes HPs, nobody else can make good speakers anymore. 🙄 I suspect if Apple canned oxygen, some percentage around here would opt to smother by refusing to subsequently breathe the inferior kind if they lost their supply of Apple air. 😉

If it gets to you, hop on non-Apple-centric sites and read much more objective reviews & opinions or… best of all… let your ears in your own home pass judgement. There’s no existing or even rumored path to real surround sound, soundbar and sub from Apple anyway.

I’m fairly heavy into Apple but am perfectly happy with Sonos speakers over HPs. They have the bulk of the same capabilities- direct Music connection (and many others who have not yet been able to cut individual deals with Apple) Home compatibility (which, among other things, gets Siri through Apple devices), Airplay 2, etc- with our Apple devices filling in the few “smart” things Sonos can’t implement (like non-music, Siri stuff). Our own ears are the ultimate judge vs. the opinions of brand-biased strangers. So let the fans fan… but enjoy the great sound of a solid alternative that already delivers a full home theater setup that “just works.”

Lastly, you are prob well aware they are running a “Fathers Day sale” so make your move this week and save some money. Else next opp is prob Black Friday or their refurb section. Last I saw Best Buy is matching their prices and offering same-as-cash payments. The speakers you want are all in the current sale.

And Tip: As to the 300s stands, Amazon and similar have many good alternatives to the pricey ones from Sonos. Easily save 50%-70% or more by going off brand on 2 metal sticks. Metal is metal. The 300s won’t care and nobody else would know any different. Same with Arc wall mount.

 

[oneMadRssn]

My living room is almost the same size as yours. 21' x 11'. The Sonos Arc is great. The Sub is a must-have in my opinion. The whole system goes much louder than I would ever want, without distorting.

I have a pair of the Ikea Symfonisk Picture Frames as surrounds. They are easily disguised as pictures of the kids and blend in in the room better. Also, for what it's worth, those speakers sound awesome. Don't take my word for it, prolific and highly trusted Sonons reviewer Peter Pee at one point praised them as the best stereo pair Sonos made.

The only complaint about the system is that the center channel audio tends to be pretty meh. They say there is a dedicated center in the Arc, but something about the way they process the signal must ruin it or something. For this reason, I leave it on Speech Enhancement mode 90% of the time.

Also, I think the sweet spot for the Atmos height effect is like ~6 feet in front of the sound bar. I sit closer to 10 feet back, so we don't really get the Atmos height effect at all. It's there when I test it using a test track, but it doesn't "feel" like it's coming from above at all.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

Yes, IMO, I don't think ANY speakers that claim they are ATMOS or even surround but are physically only 1 or 2 speakers can deliver anything close to real ATMOS or real surround. If one wants "height," there must be actual speakers up there. If one wants surround, there must be actual speakers back there. Faking it is like ventriloquism- only somewhat effective up close (put the dummy behind the audience and the finest ventriloquist in the world won't make sound from their throat sound like it's coming from the dummy).

If one speaker down front & center could effectively fake it all, the cinemas would spend a fraction of what they spend on sound systems and put a good soundbar down under or over the screen (or HPs left & right of the screen for us Apple fans). You never see that in professional cinema. Instead, there is abundant speakers all over the place. Home theaters should take inspiration from how the pros do it.

Again, IMO: home Atmos requires speakers up front, back "there" and up "there" too. Anything else is faking it. often the faux option is better than nothing... but obviously not as good as actual sound coming from the directions where we want it.

IMO: best possible home theater option is still traditional receiver and a good mix of quality "dumb" speakers: at least 5.1 but upwards of 7+... and overhead speakers too if one wants true ATMOS. And that generally means speaker wires linking to them from that receiver/amp.

All soundbar-based setups are notches below that... though that Sonos Ultimate Immersive would get my vote for among the best of this type of audio hardware. Since OP needs wireless, it seems best option for them. IMO: main negative with soundbar options is relatively narrow stereo separation up front (width of bar vs. rooms that are typically much wider). For example, OP has a wall for the TV that is 16 feet wide (192 inches) and Arc- as good as it is- is only 45 inches wide. If we think of some chunk of that 45 inches as left and an equal chunk of that as right speaker (plus a third, middle chunk as center), there is abundant room for greater separation in 45 vs. 192.

Professional cinemas will NOT have center + front left & right all jammed in close together down front. Why? Because separation plays an important role in the overall sound quality. Soundbar systems are also limited into what can work together. For example, that Sonos option is great for what it is but no option for true overhead speakers in ceiling, etc... unless Sonos opts to include such capability in the future. As is, the approach is "good enough" with faux height.

If I was OP, I would go to some trouble to "find a way" with a Receiver and traditional speakers... maybe hide front left & right speaker wires in one of those flat speaker wire strips and/or behind baseboards made for that. Maybe look into the wireless Sub option to which 2 rears can be wired to sub for left & right surround. Such a combination would dodge wires running from front to back of room and wires could be hidden by flat strips or in baseboards.

Else, maybe I could get wires down under the floor or dropped down in hollow walls from attic space to get from front to back? In my prior home, I went to that trouble myself and it worked out just fine. I've seen people with TVs on outer walls run wires outside, buried in ground, around the house and then into the wall on the other side to "hide" the wires but still have all speakers fully wired. In short: I'd apply the old "where there's a will, there's a way" approach, especially if I thought I was going to live in this house for a LONG time.

Speakers like HPs are great for what they are... but limited to stereo at most... and thus- IMO- best suited for the originally-intended purpose, which was music playback vs. being used as theater speakers. Yes, they certainly can connect to AppleTV and they will very likely sound far superior to the crappy speakers usually built into TVs... but they peak at stereo sound and home theater has had true surround since about 1991 or so. There are not even any rumors of HP speakers ever getting a soundbar/center, sub or leveraging Minis or other as surrounds. So if I owned HPs but wanted a better home theater, I'd repurpose the HPs for other rooms (and music playback) and step up this hierarchy for MY theater.

For example, in my case, I have a Receiver + quality "dumb" speakers for my main theater room... then use Sonos speakers instead of HPs in other rooms for music in those other rooms. Sonos stands in quite nicely for HPs and works well with Apple tech too. No complaints at all on quality of theater sound and/or music quality in other rooms.

 

[hammie14]

I been on the fence deciding to go Sonos or not, after reading the advise here I have decided Sonos will be the best option for me as Im not keen on running cables etc, we are in the uk and the floors are concrete so can get cables in easy, and the wife don’t want an mess. Sonos seemed like the perfect all rounder.

thanks for your advise 👍

 

[oneMadRssn]

I been on the fence deciding to go Sonos or not, after reading the advise here I have decided Sonos will be the best option for me as Im not keen on running cables etc, we are in the uk and the floors are concrete so can get cables in easy, and the wife don’t want an mess. Sonos seemed like the perfect all rounder.

thanks for your advise 👍

My other tip, if you can wait, wait a bit.

Sonos is going through a major app transition, and right now things are buggy. I'm confident they'll fix the issues, and the issues don't affect TV home theater functionality per se. But things like adopting new speakers into a system, grouping speakers, and TruePlay tuning are buggy right now for some people. So I'm not saying don't go with Sonos, especially in the view of the good sale right now, but if you do just a fair warning that you might experience some bugs with the new app in the short term.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

My opinions along these lines usually line right up with oneMadRssn but I'll counter that one by saying the sale is very good and- in my own first-hand experience- the app problems seem well overblown. I'm using the new app myself every day and not finding much issue with it. It's just a big change from the old app which remained basically the same for years. Apparently this crowd around here really does not like change unless it's Apple doing big changes and then "we'll" quickly rationalize anything for the better (even if it is not).

Now, what I haven't done is adopted new speakers since new app took over so I don't personally know if there are real issues there or not. There could be but I would guess that if there are, it would be first priority at Sonos to fix that versus dealing with a wall of customer service whine from all the people buying during this sale and trying to set their new speakers up and having problems. That "pain" would be great and thus the software fixes would be beyond urgent.

So with the choice decision made, I'd buy. If you run into bugs, just be patient. Unlike Apple, Sonos is focused on speakers and only speakers... so they don't have to address dozens of very different things. I'd expect any real issues to be fixed quickly. If it makes you nervous, buy from someone with enough of a return period to return it if something isn't fixed in a reasonable amount of time.

If you miss the sale, the next opportunity at a sale is probably Black Friday, where they usually run a pretty good sale (but this one seems as good or better than I remember last years). Else, sometimes their refurbs get down to these "new" prices during this sale.

If you want a worry point, I've seen some speculation about an Arc 2 and maybe other speaker updates. A search for Sonos Arc 2 will find a story and that story suggests a dramatic price hike for it and it launching "in 2024". I've seen some speculate that this sale is trying to thin inventory before the new one comes out. Whether there's much to that or not is something only Sonos really knows. Wait and Arc 2 might still be 2 or 4 years out. Buy and it might release 1 hour after the last moment you could potentially swap existing one for new one. No way to know.

300s are new and I think latest generation sub is also pretty new. So the only piece that is about 3-4 years old now is Arc. But whether that means new one impending or still years from now is unknown.

 

[moyjoy]

My living room is almost the same size as yours. 21' x 11'. The Sonos Arc is great. The Sub is a must-have in my opinion. The whole system goes much louder than I would ever want, without distorting.

I have a pair of the Ikea Symfonisk Picture Frames as surrounds. They are easily disguised as pictures of the kids and blend in in the room better. Also, for what it's worth, those speakers sound awesome. Don't take my word for it, prolific and highly trusted Sonons reviewer Peter Pee at one point praised them as the best stereo pair Sonos made.

The only complaint about the system is that the center channel audio tends to be pretty meh. They say there is a dedicated center in the Arc, but something about the way they process the signal must ruin it or something. For this reason, I leave it on Speech Enhancement mode 90% of the time.

Also, I think the sweet spot for the Atmos height effect is like ~6 feet in front of the sound bar. I sit closer to 10 feet back, so we don't really get the Atmos height effect at all. It's there when I test it using a test track, but it doesn't "feel" like it's coming from above at all.

I also have the Arc + sub and also keep the Speech Enhancement on 90% of the time lol. My living room is 22 x 14 with super high ceilings and two walls of floor to ceiling windows and it sounds great.

My couch is also about 10 feet back and things like sirens, alarms and phone noises are hard to distinguish from real life. Sometimes I have to rewind to make sure noises are coming from TV and not inside my house.

Music sounds great too (and I work in music and have had zero complaints from peers, artists and mix engineers) but I keep Atmos turned off for music.

 

[hammie14]

I had my ARC installed for about 2 weeks now, and it’s awesome. I love the easiness of the wireless connection but also having amazing powerful sound!

I don’t regret it at all!

 

[moyjoy]

I had my ARC installed for about 2 weeks now, and it’s awesome. I love the easiness of the wireless connection but also having amazing powerful sound!

I don’t regret it at all!

And also it doesn’t stand out so much against the wall 😆