Sound & Vision (2019-04)

By Darryl Wilkinson

test report

SONOS AMP STREAMING AMPLIFIER

Sonos

Empowered

RATING

Sonos Amp

Streaming

Amplifier

PERFORMANCE

FEATURES

ERGONOMICS

VALUE

in 2005: the ZP100. Although the

Connect:Amp wasn’t the first wire-

less streaming audio amp, it was on

the cuing edge of the paradigm

shi in the way we “consume” (I hate

that term) music.

WHAT DEFUNCT?

Why the sudden decision to

dump the Connect:Amp? For

one, it wasn’t sudden. For two, it’s

because consumer preferences

and the industry itself are evolving.

Generally speaking, many Sonos

customers, especially the ones

who are install-it-themselvers,

have gravitated to the company’s

self-contained wireless speaker

systems, such as the Play:1, Play:5,

and Beam. On the other hand,

custom integrators were starting

to use the Connect:Amp in a

variety of interesting and creative

ways —some of which even took

the folks at Sonos by surprise. So,

aer many years of what politely

could be called benign neglect on

the part of Sonos, the company’s

honchos felt it was well-nigh time

to embrace the custom integration

industry. Approximately two years

ago, they embarked on an intense

R&D project where they inter-

viewed a hundred or so integrators

and personally visited dozens of

dealers and showrooms around

the world. This research was then

used to design and engineer a new

streaming amplifier incorporating

the most-requested features. By the

way, although many of the capabili-

ties of the new model were asked

for by integrators, the freshly minted

Sonos Amp (congrats on the imagi-

native name there, guys) works on

the same phenomenal platform that

all other Sonos speakers do. All of

which means that the new Amp is

just as relevant to the more experi-

enced DIY-er as it is to the custom

integrator.

According to Benji Rappa-

port, Principal Hardware Product

Manager at Sonos, the install

community was not shy about

recommending changes. To begin

with, they wanted a beefier amplifier

with more “oomph” (a technical

term not on the spec sheet) so

there wouldn’t be limitations on the

speakers that could be used. Along

the same lines, they suggested

that the new amp should be able

to drive more than a single pair of

speakers in mono for installations in

great rooms or outdoor areas where

sound coverage is more important

than stereo imaging. That wasn’t all,

though. Benji told me that his team

quickly found that professional inte-

grators view the appearance of the

equipment rack they leave behind

in the client’s home as the ultimate

expression of their crasmanship

and technical capabilities —liter-

ally as works of art. Thus, the new

amp had to not only fit in a rack, it

also had to look like it belonged

“ALL GOOD THI NGS ,” goes the
proverb, “must come to an end.” As
if to prove the veracity of that old
saying, Sonos announced in early
2018 that the company was pulling
the plug on a piece of gear that’s
been in its lineup for so long that
most Sonos employees probably
thought it was (metaphorically
speaking) part of the building.
The doleful demise of the Sonos
Connect:Amp is even more lamen-
table considering that it—aer a
few small tweaks (mostly involving
amplification) and a couple of
name changes—is essentially a
cloned design of the first product
Sonos shipped to customers back

(^48) [ April May 2019 [soundandvision.com