Question

Best way to make stable groups

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After years of resistance, I now have a TV in the patio dedicated to music videos, to be played there and streamed to other Sonos zones indoors. I am seeing the group break up often, even where all the concerned Sonos units have solid green signal strengths back to Boost.

Line is set to uncompressed; both compressed and the choosing the Airplay device trick does not seem to work; the latter does not fix the lip sync problem caused by the former.

The TV is connected to a Connect in the patio, which is used to initiate a group with the 2 other zones indoors, which are also closer to the Boost than the patio Connect. Often, and usually when I choose to change the video being played, these two drop while remaining as a group, leaving the patio Connect playing on its own. When I add the Connect back to these groups, play resumes on all three zones, and, I suspect, in a more stable manner.

Any ideas as to solutions? If I wanted to wire an ethernet cable from the Patio to the router what would I have to do - one end would go into the jack on the Connect, and the other back to the jack on the Boost? Would that solve the problem?

PS: The TV is connected from its audio analog line outs to the Connect Line in.

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pwt

Virtuoso

Signal from CD player is in usually compressed digital format but signal from TV is usually in uncompressed format

They're probably just (clumsily) alluding to the fact that one needs to use Sonos Uncompressed mode for TV audio to maintain audio/video sync, whereas this is not a factor for audio-only sources so Compressed can be used.

Back to square one...with respect to the heaviness of the TV signal!

There is categorically no such effect.

4 x P:5 | Sub | 4 x P:1 | 3 x Connect | 2 x Boost | Connect:Amp | 2 x One | Amp | Move | Port | Era 300

K

KumarAuthor

Sonos Support seems determined to plumb new depths. Yesterday they wanted to see the discussions in this thread. Today, I get this email:

Sonos devices that fully supports TV audio are Beam, Playbase and Playbar. Also surround and sub with them are supported because they are connected with 5Ghz band instead of 2.4Ghz band. With other setups it is very likely that there will be audio dropouts if TV audio is used.

I have, in reply, asked the question about how TV audio is any different from turntable audio...

ratty

Oh dear.

K

KumarAuthor

Since except in the case of Airplay device, the uncompressed signals are all sent with a very small buffer, it begs the question whether even the latest audio products are by design able to send these signals in a stable manner to a group that is running wirelessly, be it on the regular WiFi, or on Sonos net. Never mind if the signals come from a TV or a turntable or even a CD player.
The thing to note of course is that there is the compressed option that can be a viable alternative for all sources except TV where the lip sync is destroyed in that option.
Audiophiles will disagree, but I don't think that compressed makes an audible difference for the pure audio sources like turntables, hence I say viable for the compressed option for such sources.

ratty

@Ken_Griffiths commented here that he had no major problems with sending Line-In to multiple rooms uncompressed. And back here it was emerging that local RF noise could be a factor. Did you ever get to the bottom of why the matrix left column looked poorly?

K

KumarAuthor

If you read the details of Ken's set up, it is not at all typical wireless Sonosnet; there are a lot of wired devices in it. The Connect that sends the stream is definitely wired, for instance.
The left column issue is one I am still struggling with although for Connect it will soon be moot. But the Connect has other devices close by, both of which I have moved to 5 ghz, with no significant improvement.
Both the play 1 root bridge and the bonded Sub can occasionally go to orange/red, although both are usually green in the left boxes. Another puzzle because all there is in the vicinity are the router and the NAS drive. The router is on channel 1 while Sonos net is on 11.

K

KumarAuthor

Quote from Ken:

my Connect is wired and the only other two Sonos devices wired is the Boost (Direct to the main Router) and my Sonos Beam (not its surrounds) which is linked into another (different) 8 port switch in another room.

Unquote

So he has three wired to core network Sonos units and if this is done strategically as I suspect he has, he must be able to leverage this for stable Sonos net wireless service to his total of 13 other Sonos units.

K

KumarAuthor

The latest Sonos Support response:

TV audio signal is uncompressed and CD signal is compressed. Compressed signal doesn't require so fast WiFi connection.
Uncompressed signal requires much faster connection and cannot always be used with 2.4Ghz WiFi band but works good with 5Ghz WiFi band.
Connect isn't designed to be used with TV.

There doesn't seem to me much point in going on in this manner with this set.

K

KumarAuthor

Photos attached in support of PM conversation with Ryan.

In the play 1 photo, this is the root bridge wired to the apple router that can be seen. Next to the router is the black modem, and the white WD NAS. Adjacent to the router, on the floor, is the Sub, in a dust cover.
Both the play 1 and the Sub are usually green in the left boxes, but can sometimes go into yellow/orange, and even an occasional red.

The Connect photo is really of academic interest now, seeing that it will be wired to the router as well, via a switch - as of now, because the ports on the router suffice, there is no switch.

K

KumarAuthor

Question for members as well - why would the play 1 suffer noise issues as the matrix indicates from time to time? Ditto for the Sub.

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