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Sonos since its inception has been an innovator in home audio. In fact, to innovate is precisely why they came to be. With famous products like the Sonos Play: One and Play: Five they became the household name for smart speakers that could be seamlessly controlled by a smartphone or tablet. To this day Sonos remains at the top, featuring a wide range of excellent products all of which are similar in operation but differ in size, output, and intended purpose. No matter your needs, Sonos has a product that will be a pleasure to use.

We’re excited about Sonos’ next big change, not in their excellent software, ease of use, and nigh-perfect ability to integrate into almost anything, anywhere, but in how they reproduce our favorite music, movies, and other content. Welcome to a new Era of Sonos - the New Era 100 and 300 wireless smart speakers. Era really is the perfect name for the next evolution of their product platform.

The Era series is Sonos’ embrace of spatial audio which has become all the rage in the music/audio circles over the past few years. Some notable examples are Sony’s creation of 360 reality Audio Processing to be used in their AVRs, or Apple Music’s big push into Dolby Atmos for music as Dolby Laboratories have started remastering old music and producing new music with all of their reference multichannel expertise. Both are examples of something new in audio that genuinely surprised us.  Many brands have thrown their hat in the ring in a bid to create the most enveloping, immersive listening experiences yet conceived. 

So how does Sonos fit into all of this and what do they want to be able to achieve with it? Well, I’m glad you asked. The chief feature of the new Era line, especially the Era 300 is the ability to create spatial audio experiences from just one unit. Utilizing an array of forward, side, and upward-firing tweeters to call the soundstage of these new speakers “expansive” would be an understatement.

Spatial audio takes the concept of soundstage and transforms it. Rather than just a feeling of width you experience an expanse of audio in all directions. Even going above you, and ultimately looping around you. Somewhat like surround sound yet perhaps even more impressive as all of this emanates from a single source or point in space. 

One Era 300 is already enough to make an impression.  Two running in stereo to maximize natural imaging on top of the spatial effects is a real treat, and a genuine threat to more traditional stereos, as the extra dimensions of spatial audio being added to the stereo presentation, is compelling.

Finally, it is worth mentioning that Sonos is also doing a little something else in this new Era and that’s better listening to customer feedback. The Era series now features Bluetooth!  As a matter of convenience and portability, Bluetooth is so very welcome.  This makes it easy to take your smart speaker outside its usual environment. There is also a physical switch for hard-disconnecting the microphone when you want to ensure privacy.  You can now enjoy the best of Sonos without potential privacy concerns.

To step into this new era yourself, head to skybyygramophone.com to order yours, or visit any of our showrooms and we’d be happy to show them to you in person!

Welcome to Sonos’ new era!