Sonos Arc vs Sonos Beam (Gen 2): Closer Than We Thought?

the new sonos beam gen 2 of dolby atmos has taken a big step up towards the premium sonos arc soundbar making the choice between the two harder than ever but with no dedicated upwards firing drivers can it really compete let's put the two head to head to help make that decision easier for you [Music] hi guys it's jonathan from smart home sounds here and in today's video i'm going to be answering the question sonos being gen 2 or sonos arc now if you've watched our in-depth review of the new beam gen 2 then you'll know that we've covered this briefly in that video but this comparison will go a little deeper into the core differences and include a sound demo as i know you guys like to get involved in the testing as always i'll link these products below for the most up-to-date pricing and offers including that usual 6 year warranty you know the drill by now so we've got the sonos beam gen 2 here the more compact soundbar in sonos's lineup with an rrp at 449. then underneath it we've got the sonos arc which is sonos's premium soundbar with a more premium price tag of 899 and both are available in a color choice of black or white and since the update in design for the beam they do have very similar aesthetics overall now you might be thinking why are we comparing two products at very different price points well firstly you guys asked for it and secondly you guys asked for it no no i'm just kidding we do know that a lot of people will be shopping for a new sound bar and wondering whether the beam will be adequate for their home or whether it's worth finding that extra budget to jump up to the ark now in all honesty there is a short answer to this and this might be all you need to make your decision and make the rest of this video irrelevant so the ark is a bigger more powerful sound bar with more drivers including those dedicated upwards firing drivers and it's more suited for larger more open spaces or those looking for the best cinematic experience from a sonoff soundbar the sonos beam gen 2 is a more compact option which is more suited for small to medium-sized rooms with less drivers and a less powerful performance however the performance that you get from the beam gen 2 might be a lot better than you would be expecting considering the different price points and that is the reason that we are doing this video as we feel the beam punches way above its price tag and it could actually be the smart choice for a lot of you guys so if you want to delve into this in a bit more depth keep watching otherwise if that's all you needed thanks again and don't forget to hit that subscribe button first things first let's just reel off some of the main similarities for both of these sound bars now both are wi-fi only there's no bluetooth option for connectivity and they can be controlled in the sonos app now if you're not familiar the sonos app can be used for day-to-day control of your sonos speakers including setup grouping speakers eq adjustments streaming music from your music service accounts and controlling playback both of these sound bars also have an ir sensor so they'll work with your tv remote and both offer voice control with either amazon or google assistant for hands-free control and they're compatible with airplay 2 and spotify connect they both also have touch controls on the top panel and both the arc and the beam gen 2 have an hdmi e-arc connection which means that they support dolby atmos although there are some differences in how they're able to do this which i will come back to in a little bit both of these sound bars offer speech enhancement for boosting vocal clarity as well as night sound for reducing loud crashes and bangs when you're watching late at night and you can also optimize both the arc and the beam gen 2 using true play tuning which is exclusive to the sonos app on an ios device and that will acoustically calibrate the sound bars to suit the environment that they're in and finally both soundbars can become part of a wider home cinema setup if you add the sonos sub and two rears as well as form part of your sonos ecosystem around your home okay so time for the differences then so in terms of design the most obvious difference is going to be the size of these sound bars now the sonos arc is 8.7 centimeters high 114 centimeters wide and 11.5 centimeters deep while the beam is 6.8 centimeters high 65.1 centimeters wide and 10 centimeters deep i'll insert some clips here of how they both look under our 65 inch tv i do think both work under this size tv but i think the arc would look long under a smaller tv and also on the other side the beam would look quite small under a larger tv both can be wall mounted too so that is an option other than design the other major difference is the sound performance both for regular content and for dolby atmos first let's take a look at what we're working with internally then so the sonos arc has 11 speakers which are comprised of eight elliptical woofers for the mids vocals and bass and then three silk dome tweeters for the higher frequencies and for helping with the dialogue too and the positioning of these speakers show that there are dedicated upwards and sideways firing drivers for those dolby atmos height and surround channels the beam on the other hand only has five speakers which are comprised of four elliptical midwifers and one center tweeter unlike the ark there are no dedicated upwards firing drivers as there's just a solid top panel compared with the grille on the arc and the sideways drivers are at a 45 degree angle which are not completely sideways like you see on the arc but what does that mean for the sound performance well let's see what you guys think i'm going to include a sound comparison here using our binaural microphone as always you'll get the best results if you're listening on headphones and i'll just remind you of our normal disclaimer that you will not be able to experience the full results of our testing when you're listening via youtube on your device but hopefully this will give you guys a flavor where do we start [Music] [ __ ] i have a plan oh yeah what is it [Music] here we go again huh [Music] hello girl kick your ass where do we start [Music] [Music] here we go again huh [Music] [Music] hello girl kick your ass okay so welcome back now i'm sure you guys have drawn your own conclusions from that sound test but let's chat about what differences we've found from our testing and how these sound bars are delivering at us but first non-atmos content as this will be a lot of people's regular viewing so due to the form factor and the number of speakers the arc is always going to have the upper hand and offer a more powerful performance and that was clear from our testing most notably it offers a superior base performance and a wider sound stage over the beam gen 2 and it does feel more immersive when you're watching your content if you're familiar with the performance of the original beam and have compared it with the arc you'll probably agree that there was quite a distinctive jump up to the arc however this new gen 2 has closed that gap quite considerably for us one thing that we have noticed with the new beam gen 2 is a huge improvement on the center channel clarity sonos has stated that they've worked on this with oscar-winning engineers and although we were initially skeptical as you might be as well this is a clear improvement on the previous generation what's interesting in our opinion is how close the vocal clarity on the beam comes to the vocals on the arc with only one tweeter compared with the three on the others i still think the arc offers a slightly better vocal performance with crisper and clearer vocals but the beam gen 2 isn't far behind at all okay so on to atmos content then so for those not familiar atmos is an audio codec and sound technology and is a massive step up from both two-channel audio and dolby digital which was supported on the previous beam model it essentially puts you in the center of your content and creates a 3d surround sound effect which is object-based rather than channel-based and this means that producers have more control and freedom over what you hear and it also means the audio you experience can replicate what you're seeing on the screen so i always like to use the example of if a helicopter flies overhead you'll feel that sound travel around the room to replicate it and traditionally atmos uses upwards and sideways firing drivers to direct audio into those spaces and this is what we get from the ark the sound will be sent from the upwards firing drivers and will then bounce off your ceiling and back down to you for an immersive listening experience now the beam gen 2 as we've noted doesn't have those drivers so you're actually getting a virtual dolby atmos experience sonos have added a new 40 faster processor which have enabled them to create two new audio paths for a virtual surround sound experience and these paths are dedicated to processing surround and height information to make the audio feel more spacious and provide a separation between ear level and overhead audio and all of this is achieved using psychoacoustic technology which essentially tricks your mind to make you feel like sounds are coming from above and around you in our testing we were surprised how well the virtual atmos on the beam gen 2 worked do check out our full in-depth review for for more on that however it can't compare with dedicated drivers for a full atmos experience i think the beam does a really good job on delivering a wide sound stage and i would say it's the height channels where there's the biggest difference the beam definitely makes atmos content feel like it's coming from higher than the tv but the arc does a better job of making a sound feel like it's coming from directly above you i know i've used this reference before but it is a great one for testing so in le mans 66 there is a scene with someone talking over the tannoy and that shows the difference for me with dedicated upwards firing drivers on the whole when you put the sound performance of both of these sound bars in the context of their price point the beam gen 2 feels like it's really punching above its weight now i know some people might also use their soundbar for listening to music as well as for their tv audio now the differences here are very similar to those for tv content on the whole the arc has that bigger sound stage more powerful bass and a more immersive feeling however the beam gen 2 again isn't too far behind i'd say if you listen to a lot of more bass heavy tracks when then the arc is a clear winner there if bass isn't a massive factor for you then i don't think you'd be disappointed with the beam with those clear vocals and really decent mids okay so that's covered our main testing let's chat about which other factors you should take into consideration when you're deliberating between these two soundbars firstly room size and tv screen size generally have quite a bearing on which soundbar would make the most sense we tend to say if your room size is more than around 25 square meters which would equate to a room similar to 5 meters by 5 meters you'll be able to do the arc justice and it won't sound too boomy anything less than 25 square meters the beam tends to be a better fit however this isn't a rule it's just more of a guidance for you secondly will you be adding any other sonos components now we actually had a chat with jeff dederian which is sonos's vice president of product programs and the head designer on the beam gen 1 who had some interesting info on this so he noted that if you were to add surrounds to the beam gen 2 it will automatically adjust and it won't use the two arrays for surround instead the processors in the rears will cover the surround channels which will then free up the processors on the beam to maximize the height channels instead so if you were to add the sub you'd get a similar experience where the sub will take over the base from the beam where it's best suited to handle it now we do often forget that in a full surround sound system you've actually got four processors working together to create a cinematic experience which naturally will enhance your experience this leads me on to probably the most common question that we've had since the launch of the new beam and that is beam gen 2 with two one sls as rears or a sonos arc now these are at a very comparative price point 807 for the former and 899 for the latter first things first consider your room see whether you have the space for an arc see if you've got the space for rears as this will play a big part in your experience if you think you could accommodate either then it comes down to personal preference all things considered the arc is a better experience and if you have the money then you should go for it but adding surrounds the beam for a comparable price point does put a spanner in the works personally i would now go for the beam and the two sls with the introduction of atmos and that enhanced clarity but if i had a bigger tv and room i probably would still consider the arc it's worth noting i would have gone for the arc over the beam gen 1 and the sl combination okay so back to the main point of this video then should you buy the sonos beam gen 2 or the sonos arc ultimately i can't answer that question for you guys i think the decision between the two will come down to budget and most importantly room size and what you're looking for in a sound bar if you're looking to just amplify vocal clarity and boost the overall sound performance from your tv then the beam will do that and more and it's the right choice for you if your decision is based on what's the best option for a 900 pound budget on your whole surround sound setup then i think i have to recommend the beam and the two one sales as this will give you a more complete sound experience alternatively if you're looking for the best quality just from a soundbar and you're looking to really push things to a more cinematic experience with that added bass and overall more powerful sound then the arc is the choice for you if you're looking to grow a setup over time with a sub and rears then long term you've got to think long term the best setup would be based around the sonos arc truthfully we can't believe how close this gen 2 is pushing to the performance of the arc and we can actually see that this might end up taking some sales from the arc when customers demo both products now this is especially true since the price rise of the arc from 799 to 899 as i think people will be really tempted by the second generation of the beam comment down below what you guys think i'd love to hear your opinions on this one we've also got some more soundbar comparisons on their way for you guys too including a comparison between the sonos arc and the bose 900 so make sure that you've subscribed for that so you don't miss all of that and to join our growing community we're on the push for 50k so get subscribing if you're not already if you found this video helpful then do drop me a like and i've linked both of these products below for you to check out too i'll also link all the other content that we've done on these sound bars including full in-depth reviews on both so that's all from me thanks for watching and we'll see you in the next video [Music]

Channel: Smart Home Sounds

Views: 146,426

Keywords:

Id: MEUMjk-nj3Q

Length: 15min 36sec (936 seconds)

Published: Sun Oct 24 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/D3SPiTE]

Can anyone tl dw for us?

[u/AlwaysInTheHood]

Beam for master bedroom and Arc for living/family room.

[u/michary]

I hate click bait titles like these

[u/McFeely_Smackup]

well, I'm not watching a 16 minute video to find out what their expectations were and if they were met or exceeded.

[u/6E4cGFvTvd]

The top 2 most upvoted comments in here are complaints about the "clickbait" title and length of the video.

Neither commenters realized that the title of the post is not the title of the video, and the video itself has timestamped breakdowns with a short 1-2 minute summation of their thoughts at the beginning AND end.

Crazy to me that the people who are lurking in the dedicated SONOS sub weren't the slightest bit interested in this video and didn't hesitate to shit all over something they didn't even watch.

With that out of the way, I thought the video was really interesting and I think it's finally convinced me to just bite the bullet and replace my Playbase with the Beam Gen 2 instead of holding out for an Arc. I already have the Sub and 2 One SL's as rears, and it sounds like for what I mostly use it for (music more than tv/movies), and the space I have, the Arc wouldn't be that big of an improvement, certainly not a 300 hundred dollar one.

Would be interested to hear if there's any other people out there who have already, or are looking to, upgrade from the Playbase, and what their experience has been so far.

[u/Travelin_Soulja]

This is about as good of a review/comparison as one can expect from a retailer. I'd really like to see more comparisons of the Beam Gen 2 vs. Gen 2 to see if it's worth upgrading.

[u/getoffthebandwagon]

Really great and thorough walkthrough. Made my mind up between the two.

[u/Achenest]

Nice review. Also accents are strange sometimes, he pronounces the first and second half of sonos differently

[u/carlosdelroble]

No mention of combining Beam and a Sub. Does the Sub bring the Beam even closer to the Arc for performance, adding extra oomph and body? Thoughts?