School me on SONOS and other home streaming systems

my router's actually fairly recent, talktalk sent me an upgrade not long ago

the only thing I had an issue with when setting up some Sonos equipment was that my wireless access point at the time broadcast on both 2.4GHz and 5GHz and I had them separated because devices capable at connecting to the higher speed were stuck on the other when I only had one wireless name

I don’t think this is mark’s issue, sadly. But if you do run into this,if you can install the app but you can’t see the devices when they join to the network, it might be because you’ve actually got a separated network.

Maffew - the one way around having to use your mobile is to use the web player through Chrome and cast from there. You can control from the desktop app then. Still a fiddle arse, but takes the mobile out of the equation.

Anyone else using a free Google Play Music account for storing/streaming your personal library, and trying to figure out what to do now that it's shutting down over the next few months? I did the auto library transfer to YouTube Music, but only paid accounts can be added to Sonos at the moment. One Google rep said that free accounts are coming to Sonos, but if that's true I suspect it'll have ads based on my tryout of the YouTube Music app.

If I end up having to pay for a streaming service, YT Music probably wouldn't be my first choice -- but do any of the other ones offer easy storage of and access to your own library? I use a Mac and the Music app for local storage, but remember lots of horror stories about libraries getting badly messed up when Apple Music was first introduced. Are those issues a thing of that past? My library has been trouble-free and perfectly organized/tagged for years and I don't want to throw that all away.

I know I could just leave my computer on 24/7 or set up a NAS, but would prefer some sort of cloud solution. Mostly interested in my own library, but if I have to pay for something I suppose access to millions of other songs would be a nice bonus.

Ugh, just realized that I rely on a Chromecast Audio/Google Play Music for my outdoor speakers. Between library storage and Chromecast support, paid YT Music might end up being the best solution. Anyone using it?

I use / pay for / enjoy YT music (and did the transfer of all the stuff I had uploaded to GPM), though I don’t use Sonos or have your other considerations.

I feel like Tuomas has some thoughts on this

ok, i concede defeat.
the Sonos Pindrop/Electronica 'station' has become my default setting.
i suspect it's a simple case of randomly playing anything in the Sonos library with electronic as a metadata tag.
no dj chat, a couple of ads/idents here and there.
love it.

I got a Move for my birthday and have found it surprisingly useful. Of course it's great to take outside (where the wifi still reaches, surprisingly) and it's a stellar bluetooth speaker for places outside the home. Additionally, around the house it's useful to beef up the sound in the couple of rooms where I have only one Sonos speaker.

I agree. The Move is great.

If I wanted to buy just a single, good-sounding speaker to move around the house and stream YT Music, etc., would that be the one to get?

If you have or plan to have other sonos speakers, yes. I haven't used any other portable speakers with both wifi/bluetooth, so maybe there are other good options. But we use it as our kitchen sonos speaker for when we broadcast music in multiple spaces with sonos speakers, and grab it on our way out the door for outside listening. It's certainly the best in that context.

Thanks. I noticed Google has a new “Nest Audio”; I wonder how that sounds compared to Sonos (you can buy two for stereo, as with Sonos One, and it’s half the price).

...according to a few reviews I just checked out, I guess not as good.

For $100 the Sonos-compatible Ikea Symfonisk bookshelf speaker seems like a pretty great deal. They can be paired for stereo too.

In looking for a Google Play Music replacement over the past few weeks I've been seeing a lot of comments suggesting that YouTube Music integration with Sonos isn't ideal at the moment though, so if that's your primary music source you might want to check that the features you use are supported through the Sonos app before going that route.

Huh, thanks.

Am I right to be aggravated they have this whole second line of speakers that aren’t compatible with the older ones?

Yeah, they backed themselves into a corner with their hardware design. I was lucky enough not to get bit, how bad is it for you, just one or two speakers or more?

What is it about their design? I thought they were just being jerks. The bad press around them is enough to make me stay away from any sort of speaker(s) I can't fully control..... For that matter the powered speakers I got for my parents that had to be returned twice have me convinced to do all separates in whatever systems I set up.

I want the Five but it’s not one that they put on Black Friday sale :(

My (discontinued) Apple Express works extremely well - I believe it was this thread that convinced me to get it, so - thank you. It just connects straight to my stereo. I select it from the Airplay menu, or devices, in whatever I'm using. I like it so much I have another one in a box in the crawl space just in case this one dies.

looks like i will be sticking to my S1 generation Connect, as the replacement Port device offers absolutely nothing extra in functionality.
especially now that i have cracked the cause as to why when listening to certain 320 mp3s, the audio signal coming out of the Connect was distorted/clipping badly.
subsequently, my audio set up has never sounded so good and from the reports/feedback on the Sonos forums implies that the Port makes little difference in SQ.

anyone have an Arc and want to share their experience?

Sonos upgraded the chips inside their speakers to support new features, improve performance, etc. They designated these as 'S2' speakers that work with the S2 app. You can still use the S1 speakers and app, but if you want to use S1 and S2 speakers in the same system, you lose some functionality.

This is the downside of buying an active/all-in-one speaker - the hardware will only take you so far, and in fact you risk it becoming completely useless after some number of years. Like my 'smart' Samsung TV from 2012 - I had to add a Roku stick to replace the no-longer-supported streaming apps.

I have active Audioengine speakers in my living room and they've been rock solid, but if the internal amp goes, so goes the speaker. It's a risk I'm willing to take for a cleaner installation.

I got off topic a bit. There's stuff breaking down (that can probably be repaired) and then there's impenetrable black boxes that stop working when the company wants them to...

that's a bit unfair. they also come in white.

iirc S1 got shitcanned because they had a hardware vendor for chips that they couldn't grow past

I got a bunch of S1 speakers back in 2013 and a Connect once I moved into a house that had some built in speakers. I’d generally been really happy with the system as I thought Sonos had done a good job to that point.

First they nailed the wireless connectivity—who would want WiFi speakers that dropped out all the time?—and then they hired a bunch of engineers away from Bose (both in the Boston area) to improve their speaker design. I even did some bug testing for them for a bit.

It seems they’ve turned a corner however. The sense I get is that their new-ish CEO is trying to “grow” the business by trying to get existing customers to upgrade their existing speakers. So they made a new series of speakers that do just enough differently that they need new hardware to do it. I find that kind of obnoxious and disappointing as the company had a killer product.

I think the original ceo got burned, missing out on all the data monetization built into the google/amazon products. The slight upgrades are more a symptom of that "mistake" than a new desire for forced upgrades.

Also why they are offering a premium radio. I think they recognize the need to be more than hardware now (to have a stock price growth story).

This thread is highly relevant to my interests, seriously trying to decide between various wireless speaker options right now (or just not getting one at all and setting up a proper stereo). My sense is that Sonos has fallen victim to internet of everything bullshit and planned obsolescence. But I don't know what makes a good alternative, esp since I refuse to get anything with Alexa or Google built in.

I honestly think the planned obsolescence stuff is unfair in the sense that its fallout from the growth path they've taken. I don't think it's some planned printer ink shit. They want you to sign up for their radio and skim your data from other services?

i.e. the obsolescence came from playing catch up, and they hopefully are caught up now. The wireless, bluetooth (move), and sound design os very good.

I mean whether it's a deliberate dick move on their part or not, it just makes me hesitant to drop $1000 on a pair of sonos 5's that might no longer be supported in 5-8 years.

sure. I guess possible acquistion should be another worry.

setting up a proper stereo

I'm way more audiophile than the avg ilxor, so I would vote for this.

You can always add a wireless speaker to the "proper stereo" later on if you wanted that functionality.

I've used Logitech Media Server for years. You can use whatever you like as a wifi speaker. There's a tiny Raspberry Pi operating system dedicated to it (though my players mainly run off of old laptops and phones). I used to hesitate recommending it but this year i started using the "Material Skin" plugin which has done a lot to modernize the interface. There's still a good community working on it. Keeping Spotify and things working basically depends on those efforts.. but you run your own server (can be done on a Pi or computer) and it's not going to go away, or change without your input.

Basically Logitech was an early player in wifi speakers and got out of it (no more hardware is produced). The server was made open source so community development continues, with one engineer at Logitech.

Sorry for being dim but when you say use “whatever you like as a wifi speaker” how do you make the connection to a regular speaker? Some kind of dongle on the back?

Or if you’re you’re specifically talking about some class of non-Sonos speaker, can you give an example?

We have Sonos all over the house, purchased in pieces over the last 5 years or so. So far, they've all been good, give or take some bugginess now and then. I'm no audiophile, so the sound is good enough for me, though not perfect.

Alba: no no, please, i'm wondering if i am able to make this stuff sound practical! It is for me but I like tinkering and not throwing away electronics. There are many variants of the tiny "squeezelite" program for all sorts of computers, so anything from a phone to a desktop computer can be the hookup for your amp/speakers. Basically like a Roku for a non-"smart" TV.

Unfortunately the community wiki page is out of date, so it's not going to mention the Material Skin and stuff, but it should still be useful to get a picture of what I'm on about. https://wiki.slimdevices.com/index.php/Beginners_Guide.html

I'd ignore any mention there of Logitech's cloud service as it's basically just some streaming radio links at this point. You will want one of your devices running the server software - it can also be a player. If starting from scratch, a Raspberry Pi 3 or 4 is fine as a server. I'm using an 8 year old laptop hooked up to my living room system as the server. It stays on so that any player in the house can always access the music.

If I somehow haven't talked you out of having a go, I'd say grab the server software from https://www.mysqueezebox.com/download , optionally point it at a folder full of MP3s, and explore the plugin options for internet music once it's running.

The Squeezelite player software for computers is at https://sourceforge.net/projects/lmsclients/files/squeezelite/ (any other devices, have a Google or search the relevant app store).

For controlling, the Material Skin is great on computers and phones (no more need for installing certain Android or iOS apps).

Forums are at https://forums.slimdevices.com/ ... not much use before getting started, though there's photos of systems and projects and all that

I decided after several years of Sonos envy that I was not going to jump into that ecosystem because I didn't want to drop all the money on all the components for a distributed system in one go and the recent hardware swapout made me feel that that was the only viable path to join since there was no longer a guarantee or expectation that I could build out a system over 2-3 years and then my parents sent me a pair of One SL speakers for Christmas, so now I am looking at a subwoofer and TV soundbar because fuck it, you got me

For the regular stereo advocates: what sort of component do you recommend for translating from your iPhone/streaming devices to the stereo? Or do most receivers nowadays have that functionality built in?

Try a basic 3.5mm to RCA stereo adapter with the phone's volume on max. If it's a newer one with no headphone jack, you can use the lightning to 3.5mm dongle as an intermediary. Fancier receivers with USB audio input (as opposed to a USB socket for reading flash drives) may be able to take the raw data stream from the phone and then use the receiver's audio processing.

Or yknow, Bluetooth? :)

I mention this every time, but you can still find Chromecast Audios online it basically gives me sonos functionality for what I need

for like $80 for two

Where can you find them now? I got a couple for my parents, they were a great value. If you're just looking to play internet music to a system (or systems), yeah they can't be beat. The audio quality is good and if you ever want an upgrade in that regard, the port doubles as an optical audio out.

Isn't Bluetooth lossy in a way that Sonos isn't suppposed to be(?) And if you jack yr phone directly into a stereo, you need to keep walking over to the rig to make adjustments?

(I was a big stereo guy, but finally ditched it after barely having a chance to use it for years; and I'm leaning toward Sonos as a small step back in, for size/ease reasons -- but can be convinced otherwise)