re: Whole home audio - new construction

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Multi channel amp and a google chrome audio for $35. You Can stream from pandora, Spotify, etc...

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That’s bobo as frick

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My question is this: what’s the best way to add to the Playbar to achieve a solid home theatre experience in my living room, while also adding Play:1/5 etc around the house? I’m definitely adding the Sub to my Playbar setup but just wanted some insight into what someone else would recommend to achieve decent surround sound in my living room and also have a speaker in my bedroom

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well i'm not an expert and really struggle with my reputation of even being a hack, so here's my 2 dogecoins worth of thoughts:

- not much you can do with the playbar setup you've described except get a couple of play:1s to complete your surround setup. even if you decide its not worth dedicating a couple of $100+ speakers to 'ambient noise' during movies, you can always place them somewhere else in your house instead. thats the beauty of sonos.

- as for sound quality my playbar is on a table under the TV. i haven't decided if its worth buying a mount & raising it slightly because i have a clean setup now and don't really want to cut more holes in the wall to hide the cords from the playbar. using trueplay, it sounds great already so i'm probably going to leave it 'as is'.

- last point on playbar: if you're like me, you already have ethernet running to your main TV to avoid WiFi hiccups when streaming 4K so go buy a 50 cent 3ft cat5 cable and hardwire the playbar. if you do that, sonos will automatically create its own 'mesh' network for your speakers meaning you will increase the overall range and your speakers won't experience any kind of WiFi hiccup...although the SONOS play buffer is MASSIVE so its almost never an issue. seriously; next time you're streaming music to your sonos, pull the plug and your router and watch how long those speakers continue to pay before they run out of music.

- *also if you plan to hardwire the sonos, you might go ahead & pick up a 5-port GIGABIT switch at monoprice for like $10 so you will have extra ports to wire in your chromecast, fireTV, Roku, etc.

- there are a few vendors on amazon who sell modified mounts for the TV that hang down and you can attach the playbar mount (which you'll still need to buy) to that & that will better hide the cables if you want to go that route. i still can't figure out why more TVs and soundbars aren't sold with consistent mount options like TVs have. not everyone wants to mount their soundbar to the wall.

- i haven't yet found a room in my house large enough to need a play:5. it sounds amazing, but i prefer the stereo-separation of 2 play:1s or play:3s over one big speaker in the middle of the room. bonus: play:1s are practically invisible. i've never had a speaker that is as good at hiding in your room as these are. they literally melt into the background.

- i would go for a play:1 in the bedroom. you likely just need something for background music there and you're probably not going to the bedroom to rock out so maybe at most, stereo-pair a couple of 1s, but save the bigger sonos speakers for gathering rooms.

- my strategy thus far is to 'continue' the sound throughout the house and my large living room is well represented already with a set of stereo 1s. as you walk through the house towards the bedroom area i have 1s sprinkled along the way so the overall mood stays consistent.

its WONDERFUL to have the house fully filled with warm music. it really brings your house to life.

- finally, take full advantage of the ALARM feature in sonos. the name is a misnomer because what it does is allows you to set

- which speakers to play
- what time of day (daily or skip days)
- how loud
- what music
- for how long

great way to always have music playing in the afternoon without hunting down a phone to set the mood.