Setup library from NAS from outside network


Hi,

I recently purchased and setup a NAS Synology DS218j with all my music in a shared folder, in my primary residence.

I have a Play 1 in my secondary residence.

I want to create a Music Library for the Play 1 to access the music located in the NAS in my primary residence.

However, whenever I enter the local IP address of the NAS or the name of the NAS, the library cannot be created as I receive error message "the computer refuse to let Sonos connect to it".

1. Do I need to forward specific port in my router in my primary residence?
2. Which IP address should I use for the library setup? Surely the local one won't work when I'm outside of my local network.
3. I have the"outside" IP address of my router but it still doesn't work. How do I point toward my NAS behind that outside IP address?

Thanks in advance.

This topic has been closed for further comments. You can use the search bar to find a similar topic, or create a new one by clicking Create Topic at the top of the page.

11 replies

if you can create a single broadcast domain layer 2 network that is shared between both your residences without filtering multicast traffic, or if you can build a vpn connection with a lot of IGMP and packet-forwarding rules, you should be able to make this work, but it's a medium to advanced residential network configuration, and you'll need to make sure all your network equipment is suitable for your topology and design.

If you don't understand that techno-babble, it's not going to be easily done. Sonos only seems to support rather basic home network configurations. They don't support wifi extenders, they don't support powerline ethernet, they don't support multiple subnets, they don't support many modern enterprise networking technologies.
Thanks for taking the time to answer me.

So it seems to be what I was afraid of. Sonos doesn't support remote NAS access. It's a shame that such an expensive product doesn't support such a (nowadays) basic setup. Even worse when you consider a product like Plex does it for free.
Lololuvemma,

Just curious, but can you actually remotely access and play the music files from the NAS using anything other than Sonos?.. can you access them via a network share using a laptop for example?... if not, then there is the problem perhaps?

What sharing protocol is in use, is it CIFS/SMB V1 ? ... because that is what Sonos uses to access the shared library files and I think you would need to forward ports on your router to gain access to those files.

My understanding is the SMB protocol uses these ports ... UDP\137-138 and TCP\137,139,445. Make sure NetBIOS over TCP is explicitly specified.

However I have also read somewhere that the SMB protocol may not work over some remote connections, so it maybe a case of trying and seeing if it works. Or try these things over a VPN connection.
In fact it’s probably far easier and less bother to just buy another NAS box and make a copy of your library for use at your remote location. It’s likely to be much more secure at the very least and it’s always a good idea to have an off site 'backup' of your (probably) irreplaceable music collection.
Hi Ken,

I have no issue remotely accessing any video, music or photos stored on the NAS. Either through the Synology dedicated apps or though Plex.

I'm not interested in spending extra money on another NAS given how expensive the Sonos products already are. Plus, the interest of the NAS (apart from data redundancy) is to have one centralised data base. Buying another NAS would defeat that purpose.
Upload your music to a free Google Play Music account and you can access it from both Sonos systems anytime you want.
Upload your music to a free Google Play Music account and you can access it from both Sonos systems anytime you want.

Yes jgatie another very good option that would solve the problem and act as a good off-site backup too.
Thanks. I will give it a try even though I'm not a fan of this solution.

1. Google Play Music is not available in my primary country.

2. It forces me to maintain two different music libraries (NAS and Google).

3. It forces me to rely on 3rd party (Google). Who knows when they will decide to charge for the service.
Userlevel 7
Badge +20
I have no issue remotely accessing any video, music or photos stored on the NAS. Either through the Synology dedicated apps or though Plex.
If you can access your music via Plex, is it not possible to configure Sonos in your secondary residence to connect to your Plex account? I've not used Plex so I'm not aware of the limitiations and practicalities of this, but I observe that Plex is available as a Sonos-supported service under 'Sonos Labs' in the Windows controller.
My understanding is the SMB protocol uses these ports ... UDP\137-138 and TCP\137,139,445. Make sure NetBIOS over TCP is explicitly specified.

However I have also read somewhere that the SMB protocol may not work over some remote connections, so it maybe a case of trying and seeing if it works. Or try these things over a VPN connection.

Sonos will work with a hard IP to an off-subnet share, but do not forward these ports inbound from the internet. One would be leaving oneself wide open to all kinds of unwanted visitors.
Userlevel 7
Badge +22
The networking tweaks to get this working might be very interesting but I'm too lazy to even consider them, I'd think VPN as my first option.

What I'd do is add a Raspberry Pi at your second location, set up to rsync to your main NAS and pick up your music library there for the remote site. Under $50 for the Pi and parts if you have a spare hard drive, SSD or USB thumb drive laying around. Set the PI up hooked to a monitor, mouse and keyboard and then enable VNC on it, unplug the KVM and it will happily serve your music. Mine has been up and happy for months now, sometimes serving four streams at very low CPU usage.

Actually I'd add two Pi's one local and one remote and then go back to my NAS and disable SMB v1 to increase my security for my real data.