big house, 32+ devices, multiple groups?

  • 25 January 2024
  • 9 replies
  • 89 views
E

Hi, we have a household with 4 kids, which is pushing the whole sonos system to the limit, which is now why i will have to change the setup.

first, many rooms have a arc-sonos1 twice and subwoofer setup, so that is 4 devices per such room, which is how we easily get to 32+ devices. Add a few amps for outdoor music, some moves and bathroom music..

i have a unifi mesh network, the sonos support mentioned it would be more stable to use sonosnet instead of wifi in this case. I tried that years ago, was very unstable, so am a bit cautious. I have ensured the sonos devices are all attached to a designated access point, to avoid the unsupported roaming. First question is any tips or experiences with sonosnet with a lot of devices?

secondly, i need to have two households setup to go above 32. I have looked around on this forum, and see different experiences and failures and success with this on the same network. What is the best way to do it, any specific actions to make this work and maintainable?

third, it would be great to have a simple way to switch accounts in the sonos app, are there any tricks or automations or 3rd party apps for this?

last, this will mean that the users on the system will have to use spotify rather than sonos to put their music on the “other household”, correct. My spotify family account can only be connected to one sonos installation, so just by using spotify discovery i could connect to the other, right?

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9 replies

Corry P
Userlevel 7
Badge +18

Hi @Eelco69 

Welcome to the Sonos Community!

i have a unifi mesh network, the sonos support mentioned it would be more stable to use sonosnet instead of wifi in this case. I tried that years ago, was very unstable, so am a bit cautious. I have ensured the sonos devices are all attached to a designated access point, to avoid the unsupported roaming. First question is any tips or experiences with sonosnet with a lot of devices?

Sure. We recommend having one more wired connection for every fifth room in your system, and the more spaced-out these are around your home, the better. Just think of each wired speaker as an Access Point for your Sonos system - to have them all in one place wouldn’t help things much, and the more speakers that wirelessly connect to a particular wired unit, the more the available bandwidth is used up.

secondly, i need to have two households setup to go above 32. I have looked around on this forum, and see different experiences and failures and success with this on the same network. What is the best way to do it, any specific actions to make this work and maintainable?

The second system would need to be on a different subnet, which is to say that the pattern of IP addresses that each system has should vary on the third number of the address, i.e. if you have one system on 192.168.1.x, then the second system would be on something like 192.168.2.x. You would need to find some way of switching the phone between different subnets, or perhaps have one controller device dedicated to one system, another to the other.

It’s also possible that you could set up a new system for the second half of speakers on the same subnet after turning the first half off for the process, but you’d need someway of switching between the systems in the Sonos app, which it does not support. See below.

third, it would be great to have a simple way to switch accounts in the sonos app, are there any tricks or automations or 3rd party apps for this?

The Sonos app is written to expect to find only one Sonos system on a particular subnet, so there is no way to make it choose one system or another. If I remember correctly, @controlav’s third-party app allows this - I’m sure you’ll hear from him shortly.

last, this will mean that the users on the system will have to use spotify rather than sonos to put their music on the “other household”, correct. My spotify family account can only be connected to one sonos installation, so just by using spotify discovery i could connect to the other, right?

To be honest, I am not entirely sure. Please note that all of your speakers, regardless of subnet differences, will end up with the same public IP address - just like all the other devices on your network. If this is how Spotify determines if you are using more than one system (and I’m not sure one way or the other) then there shouldn’t be an issue just adding the account to both systems. I have an inkling that a family account will be fine, but please don’t take this as a guarantee.

Spotify Connect will find whichever speakers are on the same subnet - I don’t think it will care if some are on a different household (system).

This is all outside the normal scope of things, so I can’t provide guarantees, but I’m hoping that some community members with personal experience in this kind of setup will be able to assist - my replying here will get your thread back onto the list of recently active threads, which should increase the chances.

I hope this helps.

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein
controlav
Userlevel 7
Badge +23

As Cory said, everything will need to be on the same subnet, and you can set up multiple Sonos households on one subnet if you are careful. You will likely need to switch the Sonos app between them, though some third party apps (eg SonoPad/SonoPhone/mine) make this simpler.

You can add the same Spotify account to multiple Sonos households, but if you try and play on the same account on two households it will not work - Spotify knows which household you are using for playback. (Spotify allows the same account to play on multiple speakers on the same household just fine).

Author of the leading independent Sonos app for Windows, the only Sonos app for Xbox, and a Sonos app for iOS
E

Thanks Corry and controlav, really helpful. What i take from this is that i can use multiple households on one subnet, which will make it easier when using spotify. This does give the downside of having to logoff logon if i want to control the other household. 

i am considering taking only two dolby surround systems apart, as they are mainly used for watching movies with apple tv, so voice control etc are not very relevant. That saves me some 8 devices, i guess, which gets me to 26 on the other household, well within range. 
 

And Corry many thanks for the “cable every fifth room” rule of thumbs, that helps to strategize this s bit.

 

last question though. When adding a cable, the system automatically starts to setup a sonosnet config. So that means all devices will use sonosnet or wire. However, i have two sonos moves floating around as well, they will be still connected to the mesh wifi, correct? That just works?

Corry P
Userlevel 7
Badge +18

Hi @Eelco69 

Yes, all our speakers classed as “Portable” (Roam, Roam SL, Move, Move 2) and the Era models (Era 100 and Era 300) only connect to WiFi, even if SonosNet is available. Era models can be connected to ethernet via the Sonos Combo Adaptor, but will not broadcast or connect to SonosNet. SonosNet being made available will not affect the connection method of any of the speakers I just named.

I hope this helps.

 

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein
E

So my strategy should be:

  1. Find the devices that don’t need too much integration; arc+sub+2surround in two tv rooms are mainly operated by apple tv, so good candidates
  2. factory reset those devices
  3. unplug those devices
  4. start adding cable to as many devices around the house to create a stable base
  5. wait for the sonosnet to be up and running, maybe restart some devices
  6. unplug all devices (should i also drain the batteries of the two Moves to disable them?)
  7. plugin the factory resetted devices and use a separate ipad to create a system with a fresh s2 app, on the same network, best with a separate email account i guess
  8. plugin existing system

done?

Corry P
Userlevel 7
Badge +18

Hi @Eelco69 

Yes, basically. I think starting with devices/rooms that you are unlikely to command to play music would certainly be a good way to start picking which rooms should be part of which system. Those less likely to be addressed by an app would be the best to put on the second system. Just bear in mind that grouping across the systems will not be possible.

You won’t need to drain the Moves, just remove/disconnect them from their chargers, then hold the power button on the back for at least 5 seconds or until the light goes out to turn them off. Return to charge or press the button again to power them back on when needed.

You can add up to 32 systems to a single Sonos account, if I recall correctly (it doesn’t come up in conversation much), so there’s no need for a separate Sonos account - unless, that is, you wish to use Alexa or Google Assistant. Voice Assistants will only work with one Sonos account, so if you want the same VA to work on both systems, you’d need separate Sonos and Alexa/Google accounts to ensure proper functionality. You could easily use one VA on one system and the other on the other system, both using the same Sonos account, if you wished.

Other than that, yes - those steps should serve you well.

I hope this helps.

 

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein
E

Thanks! 
 

do i now understand correctly that one sonos account can have two households on the same network? How does sonos figure out then when i login to an app which of the two systems i wish to control? I have a software engineering background, so i am intrigued by this, as i cannot see a way to solve that puzzle. If i login to the app, does it show both households it knows and sees and lets you choose?

E

Thanks! 
 

do i now understand correctly that one sonos account can have two households on the same network? How does sonos figure out then when i login to an app which of the two systems i wish to control? I have a software engineering background, so i am intrigued by this, as i cannot see a way to solve that puzzle. If i login to the app, does it show both households it knows and sees and lets you choose?

Ps: in total i currently have 34 devices, and want to add 4 more
3x arc-sub-2sur = 12

1x beam-2surr = 3

5 amps = 5

2 Moves = 2

9 ones = 9

3x play 5 = 3

Is current 34..

Corry P
Userlevel 7
Badge +18

Hi @Eelco69 

do i now understand correctly that one sonos account can have two households on the same network?

Technically, yes it can. However, it is not a supported configuration, and the Sonos app has not been programmed in any way to deal with such a situation - hence my invocation of @controlav: he’s written his own app to control Sonos, and he mentioned above that it can switch between systems.

On the other hand, if you have separate controllers (devices with the Sonos app installed) reserved for each system, some could be registered with system A, and others with system B - that wouldn’t be too much of an issue, but is still unsupported.

To access both systems from all copies of the Sonos app, you’d need to use different subnets and switch between them to connect to each system, as I mentioned above.

How does sonos figure out then when i login to an app which of the two systems i wish to control? I have a software engineering background, so i am intrigued by this, as i cannot see a way to solve that puzzle. If i login to the app, does it show both households it knows and sees and lets you choose?

I presume his app (not ours!) just uses the Household ID (separate from your account, but unique to each system) to differentiate between the systems, but you’d have to ask him for the full story.

I hope this helps.

"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen." - Albert Einstein
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