[pascalo]

I've got lots of Sonos speakers, one in every room of my house. Before Soundcloud was an option I wrote my own SMAPI service to get that going for myself. Then, when I switched from Mac to Linux I created my own client app [1] to control my speakers.

I feel Sonos have really missed a trick by not opening up their API more. Most of the features I had a reverse engineer or check from other libraries. Their own apps have also not exactly gotten better. For example, I _HATE_ the unified search feature, it makes the search slow and sluggish. Controlling the speakers from Spotify directly also never worked glitch-free for me. Other niggles have to do with the grouping features, which are also a tad flaky and sometimes time out or only partially group. Most of all I am annoyed by the frequent updates asked for, without the ability to "pin" the speakers to a version and download a specific version of the client app.

All that said, I love their speakers because they sound good. The old Play 3 and the Amp especially. I feel they should focus their efforts on making the apps snappier and faster, not much more feature rich.

[1] https://github.com/pascalopitz/unoffical-sonos-controller-fo...

[pascalo]

Also, I forgot to say: There is no way I'd put an Amazon alexa or similar device in my home, period. I take a "speaker company" instead any day.

[notatoad]

i'm not sure what the difference is between putting a Sonos device running amazon software in your home, vs putting an amazon device in your home.

[pascalo]

I don't think the earlier Sonos models even had a microphone built in?

[exadeci]

First the Sonos will sound better, second the Sonos One has a button to deactivate the mic

[wgx]

Agree entirely. Sonos 3 sounds fantastic even to more discerning ears. And, I’d never allow an always-on smart speaker from in my home.

[flak48]

Bose allegedly collected and shared listening habits of its customers, too.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/4/19/15356108/bose-connect-pri...

[ModernMech]

I was sad when they integrated Alexa into the Sonos One. But it did make the Play:1 cheaper, and there's really not much room to improve on that speaker. Love it. I just hope they keep making Alexa free options.

[windexh8er]

Keep telling Sonos this. I do it at least once a month when I get stuck on a con-call where I'm waiting for others. Go to their site and pop open a chat. Tell them how much you like their products without "assistants", let them know how many of their speakers you own and then let them know that not having options without a microphone mean they will lose your business. Every time I do this they are very courteous and state they will put it in for management to review. Not sure what type of request they issue, or if it's just a patronizing response, but like others I like the product but will not continue to expand my Sonos ecosystem if forced to choose. I don't have a ton of their speakers but a Play 5, Play 3 and 4 x Play 1. Enough to be annoyed that I might not be able to expand that depending on the path they take.

[chmars]

AirPlay support would be great though … I hate that I have to use the Sonos app and cannot directly play music from a Mac or iPhone.

[TarpitCarnivore]

AirPlay 2 is coming "soon"

[samwillis]

But only on their newer devices! Would be ok if it was that you needed only one new “airplay 2” device on the network to act as a bridge but no, it will only work on the new ones (or a one and a play:1 in stereo)

[TarpitCarnivore]

They said if you have an AirPlay 2 capable device you can use it to pair with older speakers. It's right in their most recent press release on the matter.

[TarpitCarnivore]

Thankfully Alexa in Sonos products is opt-in

[Gibbon1]

Yeah cause a hardware company wants to sell you hardware.

Google and Amazon wants to spy on you.

[flak48]

Other than that one time when Bose was caught collecting the listening habits of its customers and sharing it with an advertising/marketing company.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/4/19/15356108/bose-connect-pri...

[tracer4201]

I don't agree with Amazon selling Rekognition to law enforcement, and I don't agree with their warehouse conditions. I do know many folks who are at Amazon who work on hardware and software for Alexa. The Amazon bit isn't true. There isn't anything nefarious going on. It's really easy to jump on this bandwagon and crap all over these companies. You don't really know what you're talking about. I think Amazon is legit wrong on some things, and people who work there agree with me actually. But again, your claims about Alexa are conspiracy crap like you hear on Alex Jones.

[dandare]

You may be right but you missed the point. Amazon "could" start spying on you with a flip of a switch and there is no guarantee it will never happen. Even if their intentions were pure, they can be easily subpoenaed to do nasty stuff.

[wslh]

Layman question: what is better in Sonos comparing it to good bluetooth speakers? Are there excellent bluetooth speakers?

I wanted to buy a Sonos but I am very confused if this will seamlessly work with the usual applications. I don't want to start firing a lot of neurons (e.g. reverse engineering) just to play audio an hour before going to bed.

[anonu]

Sonos, IMHO, works great when you have multiple speakers setup. They do well because the technology is almost dummy proof and reliable

Edit: was just going through their s1. Seems like most households have 2.75 speakers on average:

As of March 31, 2018, our customers had registered over 19 million products in approximately 6.9 million households globally. Based on customer data, we estimate that, on average, our customers listen to approximately 70 hours of content per month and to approximately 80% more music after purchasing their first Sonos product. We also estimate that our customers listened to five billion hours of audio content using our products in fiscal 2017, which represents 33% growth from fiscal 2016.

[tjohns]

Totally this. Sonos’ multi-room support is amazing.

I have 6 different Sonos systems in my house (living room, kitchen, bedroom, workshop, front yard, backyard). It’s wonderful to be able to play audio through any random grouping of speakers, all of which are guarenteed to be in sync as I walk between rooms. You can even plug in an analog source into any one of them (e.g. for a DJ setup at a party) and stream to the entire house — again, all in perfect sync.

They even work in areas where WiFi is weak, because they create their own independent mesh network.

I’ve yet to find anything else that works as reliably.

[gerdesj]

Sonos sound bloody good. I have a modern Play 5 and a 1. They absolutely fill the (12x6 ish = 60m^2 of ground floor in my house which is quite open plan). The phone app works pretty well and I have a Samba share for CDs. However it will only support SMBv1 which is a bit crap. In the past Jeremy Allison has actually offered to assist in fixing that but nothing happened. I use firewall rules to fix up security. Another crap thing is that the app is unable to find speakers on another VLAN. I wanted to lock down the speakers on my THINGS (no internets unless I say so) VLAN.

Anyway, if Home Assistant and https://www.home-assistant.io/components/sonos/ are unable to work the way that I want them to then Sonos will be relegated to "pretty but crap" status and fall off my list. I'm sure there is another way of delivering sound using wifi and IoT.

I own an IT consultancy and am evaluating stuff in this sphere. Some of the modern IoT stuff gets wow status and some doesn't but the times are changing very, very quickly. I'm slowly putting together a portfolio of products and parts. I'd like to include Sonos but the jury is out.

To answer your question: a single Play One in your bedroom for good night music will work very nicely and I don't think you will be disappointed - they do sound gorgeous.

[onyva]

I agree with the comment about their app (iOS). It really sticks out when you’re in the native music app, previewing samples which you can’t stream via your own Sonos set because of lack of support for airplay (coming soon I’m told, and there’s also air-connect for Linux and macOS which is great, only don’t like having my computer on just for that).

The sonos app must go and let users use whatever app is best for them. Also, not being able to remove the mandatory tunein service is really making me hate using their app.