I just replaced my PlayBar with a PlayBase and there is a noticeable improvement in sound quality especially bass output.
Interesting - any plans to add a subwoofer (or do you already have one)? I was a little disappointed that I bought the Playbar only a few months before the Playbase came out, and since my TV is on a stand the Playbase would work well for me. As I mentioned above I figure they'll be about the same once a subwoofer is added. Would be interested to hear more about your experience with the Playbase though.
While I enjoy its sound and have it paired with 2 Play 1s, integrating the PlayBar with my modest AV equipment has been a PITA and expensive. Optical switch needed, plus an HDMI->HDMI+Optical splitter (which failed once and had to be replaced). Elimination of optical out from the latest Apple TV was no help. Few options for Blu-ray players, too, that properly support Dolby 5.1 and THX over optical. To coordinate it all, SimpleHub subscriptions add up (and despite the niceties of the SimpleHub software, it doesn't fully support a lot of equipment that's more than a few years old). I tried the Sonos Sub and it was overkill for my home and also revealed a lot of low-frequency, distracting noise in standard TV programs (e.g., outdoor sports broadcasts with wind present).
I just replaced my PlayBar with a PlayBase and there is a noticeable improvement in sound quality especially bass output.
Why review the outdate playbar when the playbase was just released- seems like a recycled review
Sonos might have significant channel inventory of the PlayBar to clear out or the company wants to remind people that the new PlayBase isn't their only AV offering.
I just replaced my PlayBar with a PlayBase and there is a noticeable improvement in sound quality especially bass output.
Why review the outdate playbar when the playbase was just released- seems like a recycled review
The PlayBase, despite being a new design, STILL only uses optical input, not hdmi and lacks surround sound support just like the antiquated Play Bar...
"More problematic than the surround is the fact that the Playbase features an optical-only connection. This means the Playbase only supports Dolby Digital 5.1 and stereo PCM. We had trouble getting Netflix and Amazon to play its 5.1 audio tracks using our Nvidia Shield. It wasn’t until we switched over to using an Xbox One that we were able to get the Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track to play. The Xbox One was able to transcode Dolby Digital Plus and DTS to Dolby Digital on the fly unlike the Nvidia Shield TV. You’ll also have to check if your TV is capable of bypassing a Dolby Digital signal to the Playbase, which not all TVs do.
For a system that was designed to be easy to use, it sure took a lot of thinking, tinkering and visiting the Sonos support forums to get a Dolby Digital 5.1 signal. "
I own the original playbar for my bedroom TV and it is great. Don't listen to people saying that it won't work with surround signals over optical and other technical incompatibilities. It's fine.
I wouldnt suggest it as a main audio system in a real audiophile's theater room, but it's a huge upgrade to a secondary location, like a bedroom, plus adds a room to your Sonos system at the same time.
Regarding the Dolby 5.1 surround signal - if the Sonos Playbar does not receive a true Dolby 5.1 signal from the TV (see my previous comment) then it will create a fake surround signal for your Sonos setup, which likely isn't what you want if you've spent this much money on the Playbar and maybe the additional speakers to create a 3.0, 5.0, or 5.1 setup.
I do in fact use mine as my main audio system, but I live in an apartment and can't make very much noise. Overall you'll get more bang for the buck from a more traditional Dolby 5.1 setup, but if space is a bigger limitation than cost and you also want to avoid running cables everywhere Sonos is a great solution, in part because a Sonos Dolby 5.1 setup is wireless. Incidentally I think this is also why Sonos only supports Dolby 5.1 and not (uncompressed) PCM - PCM requires too much bandwidth to be transmitted wirelessly. Personally I think the tradeoff is worth it though.
I'm sure there are cases where a TV can't send out the required 5.1 signal. I'm suggesting its not a common problem. I haven't had a problem with my very mainstream TV. While shopping for the TV, I looked up several TV models I was considering on the Sonos compatibility list and none came up incompatible. Though, clearly, lots of people have incompatible TVs.
Regardless, Sonos is primarily a musical audio system. That's why I bought in. They made the PlayBar and PlayBase as an extension of the audio system into the multichannel A/V world. As much as I'd like them to support all the latest technological features, I love Sonos because it is laser-focused on musical audio and user-friendliness.
I'm sure there are other soundbar systems that are laser focused on the latest home-theater technologies. I'm not familiar with those. I'm also not interested in them. I built my home theater setup the old-fashioned way: Bought an A/V receiver and wired it into passive speakers and a couple subwoofers. Its a hell of a system.
I've found that the simplest solution for me was to buy a sound bar based purely on its sound quality and then buy an Apple TV to provide the streaming.
I paid £100 for a Wharfedale Vista sound bar which I really liked as it sounds good with Music not just films, and £140 for an Apple TV. Now I can stream virtually anything and play my entire iTunes collection. Plus I have Netflix, Now TV, games etc.
I just replaced my PlayBar with a PlayBase and there is a noticeable improvement in sound quality especially bass output.
Interesting - any plans to add a subwoofer (or do you already have one)? I was a little disappointed that I bought the Playbar only a few months before the Playbase came out, and since my TV is on a stand the Playbase would work well for me. As I mentioned above I figure they'll be about the same once a subwoofer is added. Would be interested to hear more about your experience with the Playbase though.
In truth, I was considering adding a Sonos Sub when I heard about the PlayBase. The PlayBase does such a great job with bass, that I am holding off adding the Sub.
Wow, for the same money you can get a proper surround setup which supports airplay AND had multiple HDMI inputs plus it supports dolby atoms and comes with a full speaker setup. Granted its not wireless but... Onkyo HT-S5800 5.1.2-Channel Dolby Atmos Home Theater Package
Wow, for the same money you can get a proper surround setup which supports airplay AND had multiple HDMI inputs plus it supports dolby atoms and comes with a full speaker setup. Granted its not wireless but... Onkyo HT-S5800 5.1.2-Channel Dolby Atmos Home Theater Package
Yes, absolutely. Wireless was a big selling point for me though - I don't own my residence and it's relatively small. I also happened to be in the market for a new TV shortly after I bought the Sonos soundbar, so I didn't much mind choosing a TV that would pass 5.1 audio from the HDMI ports out via toslink. In fact it was very helpful that that restriction narrowed down the choice so much. Even once you pick a screen size and a couple of other features you want, there are hundreds of models to choose from these days.
I'm sure there are cases where a TV can't send out the required 5.1 signal. I'm suggesting its not a common problem. I haven't had a problem with my very mainstream TV. While shopping for the TV, I looked up several TV models I was considering on the Sonos compatibility list and none came up incompatible. Though, clearly, lots of people have incompatible TVs.
Regardless, Sonos is primarily a musical audio system. That's why I bought in. They made the PlayBar and PlayBase as an extension of the audio system into the multichannel A/V world. As much as I'd like them to support all the latest technological features, I love Sonos because it is laser-focused on musical audio and user-friendliness.
I'm sure there are other soundbar systems that are laser focused on the latest home-theater technologies. I'm not familiar with those. I'm also not interested in them. I built my home theater setup the old-fashioned way: Bought an A/V receiver and wired it into passive speakers and a couple subwoofers. Its a hell of a system.
Good points in your post. The article I posted above is from about a year ago and is the only one I've found to date on the subject of Dolby 5.1 signal passthrough. Worth mentioning though that the only thing a TV strictly needs to be "Sonos compatible" is an optical audio output. It took quite a bit of my time to find out that many new TVs won't pass a 5.1 signal from the HDMI ports to the toslink port. Sonos mentions this issue in passing on their website but does not provide a list of which TVs pass the signal correctly and which do not. There are so many TV models out there now from so many companies that you'd have to check this on a case-by-case basis I guess. Since I was in the market for a new TV anyway I simply went with one of the brands mentioned in the article that did not have this issue in any of their models (Sony). There are probably other recent TVs that also pass the Dolby 5.1 signal through correctly but I don't know any easy way to figure out which ones do and which ones don't, short of buying one and testing it.
I also appreciate their focus, and I think having only one way to push audio to the Playbar is part of their focus. They're similar to Apple in that regard (and others). "Here's the only way to send an audio signal to our device, deal with it." My guess is that many people who dislike Sonos on technical grounds (which is entirely understandable) dislike Apple for very similar reasons. I understand this opinion pretty well but I don't share it.
A year or so ago Yamaha came out with a much more expensive soundbar that supports Dolby Atmos. Look up David Pogue's review if you like, it's quite an interesting product - it creates all of the channels (including ones that are supposed to be above and behind you) by bouncing sound off of the walls and ceiling in your living space. Great in theory but it turns out there's no good way to position this soundbar unless you bolt both the TV and the soundbar to the wall, and then you have to move your sofa a certain distance from the opposite wall for it to work correctly. I mention this soundbar because it's pretty much state-of-the-art, but it comes with so many tradeoffs (not to mention such a high pricetag, somewhere north of $2K) that I'm happy with the Sonos approach.
Wow, for the same money you can get a proper surround setup which supports airplay AND had multiple HDMI inputs plus it supports dolby atoms and comes with a full speaker setup. Granted its not wireless but... Onkyo HT-S5800 5.1.2-Channel Dolby Atmos Home Theater Package
Obviously you can buy a wired system for less. Or more. If you want to offer up something relevant to the article, you really need to point me to another wireless system.
Wow, for the same money you can get a proper surround setup which supports airplay AND had multiple HDMI inputs plus it supports dolby atoms and comes with a full speaker setup. Granted its not wireless but... Onkyo HT-S5800 5.1.2-Channel Dolby Atmos Home Theater Package
Obviously you can buy a wired system for less. Or more. If you want to offer up something relevant to the article, you really need to point me to another wireless system.
Its not just a wired system for less, you are getting better audio and support for HD audio formats. If you want to save space then Samsung do sounders with he same features (or lack thereof) as the Sonos. To me the Sonos is a decent soundbar but not anything I would ever consider even for basic home cinema.
Wow, for the same money you can get a proper surround setup which supports airplay AND had multiple HDMI inputs plus it supports dolby atoms and comes with a full speaker setup. Granted its not wireless but... Onkyo HT-S5800 5.1.2-Channel Dolby Atmos Home Theater Package
Obviously you can buy a wired system for less. Or more. If you want to offer up something relevant to the article, you really need to point me to another wireless system.
Its not just a wired system for less, you are getting better audio and support for HD audio formats. If you want to save space then Samsung do sounders with he same features (or lack thereof) as the Sonos. To me the Sonos is a decent soundbar but not anything I would ever consider even for basic home cinema.
And you get wires. Which was my point. Anything that isn't wireless isn't really a comparable product.
I'm sure there are cases where a TV can't send out the required 5.1 signal. I'm suggesting its not a common problem. I haven't had a problem with my very mainstream TV. While shopping for the TV, I looked up several TV models I was considering on the Sonos compatibility list and none came up incompatible. Though, clearly, lots of people have incompatible TVs.
Regardless, Sonos is primarily a musical audio system. That's why I bought in. They made the PlayBar and PlayBase as an extension of the audio system into the multichannel A/V world. As much as I'd like them to support all the latest technological features, I love Sonos because it is laser-focused on musical audio and user-friendliness.
I'm sure there are other soundbar systems that are laser focused on the latest home-theater technologies. I'm not familiar with those. I'm also not interested in them. I built my home theater setup the old-fashioned way: Bought an A/V receiver and wired it into passive speakers and a couple subwoofers. Its a hell of a system.
Good points in your post. The article I posted above is from about a year ago and is the only one I've found to date on the subject of Dolby 5.1 signal passthrough. Worth mentioning though that the only thing a TV strictly needs to be "Sonos compatible" is an optical audio output. It took quite a bit of my time to find out that many new TVs won't pass a 5.1 signal from the HDMI ports to the toslink port. Sonos mentions this issue in passing on their website but does not provide a list of which TVs pass the signal correctly and which do not. There are so many TV models out there now from so many companies that you'd have to check this on a case-by-case basis I guess. Since I was in the market for a new TV anyway I simply went with one of the brands mentioned in the article that did not have this issue in any of their models (Sony). There are probably other recent TVs that also pass the Dolby 5.1 signal through correctly but I don't know any easy way to figure out which ones do and which ones don't, short of buying one and testing it.
I also appreciate their focus, and I think having only one way to push audio to the Playbar is part of their focus. They're similar to Apple in that regard (and others). "Here's the only way to send an audio signal to our device, deal with it." My guess is that many people who dislike Sonos on technical grounds (which is entirely understandable) dislike Apple for very similar reasons. I understand this opinion pretty well but I don't share it.
A year or so ago Yamaha came out with a much more expensive soundbar that supports Dolby Atmos. Look up David Pogue's review if you like, it's quite an interesting product - it creates all of the channels (including ones that are supposed to be above and behind you) by bouncing sound off of the walls and ceiling in your living space. Great in theory but it turns out there's no good way to position this soundbar unless you bolt both the TV and the soundbar to the wall, and then you have to move your sofa a certain distance from the opposite wall for it to work correctly. I mention this soundbar because it's pretty much state-of-the-art, but it comes with so many tradeoffs (not to mention such a high pricetag, somewhere north of $2K) that I'm happy with the Sonos approach.
I know I found some resource when I was shopping for my TV about 3 years ago. I can't remember, but a little bit of Googling found this on Sonos' community forums:
Comments
http://www.techradar.com/reviews/sonos-playbase
"More problematic than the surround is the fact that the Playbase features an optical-only connection. This means the Playbase only supports Dolby Digital 5.1 and stereo PCM. We had trouble getting Netflix and Amazon to play its 5.1 audio tracks using our Nvidia Shield. It wasn’t until we switched over to using an Xbox One that we were able to get the Dolby Digital 5.1 audio track to play. The Xbox One was able to transcode Dolby Digital Plus and DTS to Dolby Digital on the fly unlike the Nvidia Shield TV. You’ll also have to check if your TV is capable of bypassing a Dolby Digital signal to the Playbase, which not all TVs do.
For a system that was designed to be easy to use, it sure took a lot of thinking, tinkering and visiting the Sonos support forums to get a Dolby Digital 5.1 signal. "
Good luck with that...
Regardless, Sonos is primarily a musical audio system. That's why I bought in. They made the PlayBar and PlayBase as an extension of the audio system into the multichannel A/V world. As much as I'd like them to support all the latest technological features, I love Sonos because it is laser-focused on musical audio and user-friendliness.
I'm sure there are other soundbar systems that are laser focused on the latest home-theater technologies. I'm not familiar with those. I'm also not interested in them. I built my home theater setup the old-fashioned way: Bought an A/V receiver and wired it into passive speakers and a couple subwoofers. Its a hell of a system.
I paid £100 for a Wharfedale Vista sound bar which I really liked as it sounds good with Music not just films, and £140 for an Apple TV. Now I can stream virtually anything and play my entire iTunes collection. Plus I have Netflix, Now TV, games etc.
Good points in your post. The article I posted above is from about a year ago and is the only one I've found to date on the subject of Dolby 5.1 signal passthrough. Worth mentioning though that the only thing a TV strictly needs to be "Sonos compatible" is an optical audio output. It took quite a bit of my time to find out that many new TVs won't pass a 5.1 signal from the HDMI ports to the toslink port. Sonos mentions this issue in passing on their website but does not provide a list of which TVs pass the signal correctly and which do not. There are so many TV models out there now from so many companies that you'd have to check this on a case-by-case basis I guess. Since I was in the market for a new TV anyway I simply went with one of the brands mentioned in the article that did not have this issue in any of their models (Sony). There are probably other recent TVs that also pass the Dolby 5.1 signal through correctly but I don't know any easy way to figure out which ones do and which ones don't, short of buying one and testing it.
I also appreciate their focus, and I think having only one way to push audio to the Playbar is part of their focus. They're similar to Apple in that regard (and others). "Here's the only way to send an audio signal to our device, deal with it." My guess is that many people who dislike Sonos on technical grounds (which is entirely understandable) dislike Apple for very similar reasons. I understand this opinion pretty well but I don't share it.
A year or so ago Yamaha came out with a much more expensive soundbar that supports Dolby Atmos. Look up David Pogue's review if you like, it's quite an interesting product - it creates all of the channels (including ones that are supposed to be above and behind you) by bouncing sound off of the walls and ceiling in your living space. Great in theory but it turns out there's no good way to position this soundbar unless you bolt both the TV and the soundbar to the wall, and then you have to move your sofa a certain distance from the opposite wall for it to work correctly. I mention this soundbar because it's pretty much state-of-the-art, but it comes with so many tradeoffs (not to mention such a high pricetag, somewhere north of $2K) that I'm happy with the Sonos approach.
https://en.community.sonos.com/home-theater-228993/home-theater-and-television-recommendation-megathread-6735001