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Amazon Echo / Dot and Sonos Integration

  • 14 September 2016
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190 replies

Chris
Userlevel 7
Badge +22
...or some marketing guy did the video who doesn't even know how it works
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nicka99
Userlevel 7
Badge +17
...or some marketing guy did the video who doesn't even know how it works

my thinking also. Just some happy family sequence filmed with some sonos and amazon gear in shot with the music and commands added over afterwards.
S
Userlevel 1
Badge +2
...or some marketing guy did the video who doesn't even know how it works

Indeed that could be the case, guess it all depends if you're a pint is half empty or half full kind of person;-)

However a company has to be very careful how they represent the functionality of a product even in marketing material - any mis-representation can land them in lots of bother. Also, Amazon will certainly have had sign off on any material released by Sonos and likely be all over any potential miss-representation of their echo product.

My thoughts, Sonos would be missing a trick not giving their speakers this capacity as other multi-room wireless speaker systems, that also have Bluetooth technology, will be able to link up to Echo devices. If Sonos don't implement this then they would be at a dis-advantage compared to competitors - however if they do implement this capability they can do it so much better, built into their firmware, giving them an advantage over other systems.
E
Userlevel 1
...or some marketing guy did the video who doesn't even know how it works

my thinking also. Just some happy family sequence filmed with some sonos and amazon gear in shot with the music and commands added over afterwards.

Maybe, but:

1. Let's say the video is wrong and there is no default zone when using voice. That means you'd have to tell the Echo which zone you want every time you use Sonos. That would make using Sonos via voice more complex than it is now. It's certainly in their interest to have a consistent user experience (voice or not) by using a default zone.

2. If the Echo's voice was independent from Sonos, it would make Echo just a controller. But Amazon is hoping that Sonos and other speaker makers will help it sell Dots. It's already compatible via bluetooth and wire. Amazon wants Dot to use other companies' speakers as its voice. Sonos should want that too, since the prospect of Alexa talking over Sonos in the same room makes for a lousy user experience.

If it turns out that Echo integration is not the way it's portrayed in the video, I bet that will be due to tech or drm limitations, rather than lack of desire by either party. I wonder how Apple feels about Sonos using Apple Music to help Amazon sell Echos.
Airgetlam
I'm pretty sure that the echo itself has bluetooth capability, so you could connect to the dot via bluetooth, and then through the line out from the Dot to your speakers. I would not expect to see Sonos adding bluetooth to their speakers, though. Nor Airplay, for that matter.

I could be wrong, though. I've been wrong in the past, and expect I can be at any time.
Bruce
S
Userlevel 1
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Airgetlam

Maybe I didn't explain myself very well. The fact that Sonos don't have, and likely never will have Bluetooth capability means they cannot connect to Echo Spots over Bluetooth like some of their competitors. However if they allowed a Dot to connect to different Sonos speaker groups in another way, say at Firmware level, then they could make the integration so much slicker than the competition.
Airgetlam
spcdust,

I think you've just confused me more. But that's OK, I get your general direction, regarding a firmware connection between Sonos and the Echo ecosystem. I would certainly hope that it heads in that direction, although I'm doubtful about how much "integration" would occur without Amazon purchasing Sonos (or vice versa, if you want to smile a bit). But the tighter the integration, the better for those of us who already use both devices, to be sure.

I'm just 99% convinced that there won't be a bluetooth connection involved, between the speaker and anything. But as I say, I could be wrong.

It will be interesting to see where they end up.
Bruce
S
Userlevel 1
Badge +2
spcdust,

I think you've just confused me more. But that's OK, I get your general direction, regarding a firmware connection between Sonos and the Echo ecosystem. I would certainly hope that it heads in that direction, although I'm doubtful about how much "integration" would occur without Amazon purchasing Sonos (or vice versa, if you want to smile a bit). But the tighter the integration, the better for those of us who already use both devices, to be sure.

I'm just 99% convinced that there won't be a bluetooth connection involved, between the speaker and anything. But as I say, I could be wrong.

It will be interesting to see where they end up.

I think we are likely reading from the same Hymn Sheet here and ultimately it's all speculation but, like yourself, I would like to see a tighter integration than just simple commands that control Sonos. Time will tell.
Ken_Griffiths
I just see the Amazon 'dots' being assigned over wifi to a Sonos room or zone, during their integration setup, like you would with any other Sonos device and It's resonse to 'nearby' voice commands, will be 'constrained' just to that same assigned area (usually where the ’dot' is located), but you can play, stop pause the music etc. in ANY room or zone, or grouped areas.

I think it makes sense to have each 'dot' attached to a zone and direct its responses just to that one room or maybe the 'user-assigned, rooms that have temporarily been grouped to it's assigned default zone.
S
Userlevel 1
Badge +2
I just see the Amazon 'dots' being assigned over wifi to a Sonos room or zone, during their integration setup, like you would with any other Sonos device and It's resonse to 'nearby' voice commands, will be 'constrained' just to that same assigned area (usually where the ’dot' is located), but you can play, stop pause the music etc. in ANY room or zone, or grouped areas.

I think it makes sense to have each 'dot' attached to a zone and direct its responses just to that one room or maybe the 'user-assigned, rooms that have temporarily been grouped to it's assigned default zone.

That's how I would envisage it.
jgatie
I gotta say spcdust, you've got me convinced. It's not something I thought of before, but now that I hear it, it's a good implementation.
chicks
Echo currently lets you select your default music source (I have it set to Spotify right now). I would expect the same sort of configuration for each Dot, to select a default speaker/stereo pair. Don't know why not, anyhow. But just a guess...
A
I don't particularly see the Sonos unit needing to be the "Voice of Alexa". I had my dot hooked to my play:5 as the voice and really found no use for it being the voice of Alexa. The only real reason I had it hooked was so I could use voice control to play music - which I found very limited because I do not have Spotify and Amazon music library is not very vast. So I ended up removing it from my play:5 and let the dot just speak from its own speaker. Once Sonos adds the ability to control music via Sonos then that will cover my desire to be able to ask for music and have it play.

Note: Not only did the play:5 being hooked to the dot not do me a lot of good. The play:5 would take about a second or two to come out of standby and I would miss the first word or 2 Alexa would respond with.

I believe you can adjust Play:5 settings to Autoplay from Line-In. Would this solve the issue?
Paulw123
Userlevel 7
Badge +17
No , as sonos has said it will work with all play units, and a play1 has no line-in. It will all be done over wifi, I guess with alexa grouping, un-grouping or using the sonos groupings...I can't see sonos giving away control of grouping, so alexa will have to access it only.
Control of grouping seems to have been what killed "play on sonos", so hopefully with full alexa intergration this will be solved......now what about the other elephant...bbc iplayer 😉...might have to wait for googles voice offering launch in October.
E
Userlevel 1
I expect Sonos to keep the overall experience as consistent with the current experience as they can. Right now if you want to listen to Spotify you set up an account with Spotify on their app, and you set up Spotify as a source on Sonos' app. It "should" work similar with Echo and Sonos. You'd set up Sonos on the Echo app, and then Set Echo as a service on the Sonos app.

That way when you command Echo to play music it knows you are talking about Sonos, and knows what credentials to send to Sonos' server. Via the Sonos app, Sonos knows which zone is the Echo default and what other zones or groups you have, so it can respond properly to the instructions it gets from Amazon.
jgatie
Well, since Sonos has finally opened it's architecture to casting from native apps, with Spotify and Pandora on board already, the ball is most assuredly in the BBC court even more than before. All the BBC has to do is enable casting to Sonos and Bob's your uncle!
E
Userlevel 1
The Sonos video demonstrate how this will work. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFJ7O7N5Yok

At the one minute mark, the home shows two zones: a Play1 in the kitchen (next to a Dot) and a Playbar in the living room. A guy says "Alexa play new music", and music starts to play in the kitchen. He doesn't name a zone, he just tell it to play music and the system knows to play on the Play 1. Then he says "Alexa play in the living room", and the music switches to the living room zone.

So, his kitchen Play1 must be the default zone connected to his Dot, but you can move the music to other zones via voice command.

The video gives hints as to whether Sonos replaces the Dot's speaker.
1. Whenever the Dot "talks", a Sonos speaker is also in the frame
2. The Dot's sound quality is quite good, indicating it's coming from Sonos not the tiny speaker in the Dot.
3. Music pauses when Alexa speaks the name of the song, and resumes again once Alexa stops speaking . If the Dot was merely a Sonos controller and used it's own speaker for Alexa's voice, it would talk at the same time music played from the Sonos.

Based on all this I conclude that you will be able to designate a default zone for each Echo, and that zone will always act as Echo's voice. It would not surprise me if there were also an option on the Echo app that let you choose whether to use the Echo or Sonos as Alexa's voice.

I just realized something odd about the video. When music is playing in the living room the daughter says "Alexa what's playing". The music pauses and Alexa responds with the name of the song, and then music resumes. When Alexa responds the video switches from the living room to the Dot and the Play1 in the kitchen, implying that Alexa's voice comes from the Play1. Let's assume that's what actually happens.

That's a problem. It means that music in the living room paused when someone asked the Dot a question in the kitchen. What if I tell Alexa to play music for a party in my den, and then someone in my kitchen asks the Dot what the capital of Kentucky is? Will the music pause in the den while it answers? Do we have to refrain from asking Alexa anything while music is playing in another zone?

I hope it doesn't really act this way. It aught to pause music only if the default zone is playing when you get a response from Alexa.
Paulw123
Userlevel 7
Badge +17
I can't see the bbc spending any licensce payers money on sonos, the numbers aren't there.
But they have worked with google and chromecast, so maybe they will work with amazon and get Alexa integration, iam sure amazon would like iplayer logo on the box in uk, and alexa can send it to sonos?? maybe...
S
Userlevel 7
Badge +15
Maybe they will, they've got the Bake Off money available now..:8
jgatie
I can't see the bbc spending any licensce payers money on sonos, the numbers aren't there.
But they have worked with google and chromecast, so maybe they will work with amazon and get Alexa integration, iam sure amazon would like iplayer logo on the box in uk, and alexa can send it to sonos?? maybe...

Well that will be disappointing to the folks who have been claiming for years that "If Sonos would just open their architecture like Squeezebox, this would be done by now!" Of course those people will find a way to blame Sonos anyway. 😉
nicka99
Userlevel 7
Badge +17
so Denon have again jumped on the same bandwagon:
http://www.slashgear.com/amazons-alexa-integrates-with-another-big-speaker-brand-denon-heos-20456795/

Hopefully this will give sonos some incentive to launch this sooner rather than later !
Chris
Userlevel 7
Badge +22
Wow the blatant copying continues. I guess we will see who does better job with it. I assume denon will do better with this then the announced Google casting ability they announced to sell more speakers then said they couldn't do it a year later.
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C
Userlevel 3
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Note: Not only did the play:5 being hooked to the dot not do me a lot of good. The play:5 would take about a second or two to come out of standby and I would miss the first word or 2 Alexa would respond with.
You can actually fix this. I set up my original Dot feeding into a CONNECT:AMP and observed the same issue. However, in the Alexa app, go to Settings for the particular Dot. In there is an option to have Alexa play a tone when voice response is activated. You can set this to either start or end of voice response. Setting it to start (e.g., when Alexa recognizes the wake word and starts waiting for you to give it a command) means the CONNECT:AMP has always come out of sleep before any meaningful audio is generated by Alexa, even if you don't really pause between the wake word and the command. If the CONNECT:AMP is already awake, the little "bing" noise is very unobtrusive and actually nice as you know Alexa is really listening to you without having to look and see if the ring is lit up.
Chris
Userlevel 7
Badge +22
Thanks CAW. I will have to check that out.
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jTemplar
Userlevel 2
Badge +3
Note: Not only did the play:5 being hooked to the dot not do me a lot of good. The play:5 would take about a second or two to come out of standby and I would miss the first word or 2 Alexa would respond with.
You can actually fix this. I set up my original Dot feeding into a CONNECT:AMP and observed the same issue. However, in the Alexa app, go to Settings for the particular Dot. In there is an option to have Alexa play a tone when voice response is activated. You can set this to either start or end of voice response. Setting it to start (e.g., when Alexa recognizes the wake word and starts waiting for you to give it a command) means the CONNECT:AMP has always come out of sleep before any meaningful audio is generated by Alexa, even if you don't really pause between the wake word and the command. If the CONNECT:AMP is already awake, the little "bing" noise is very unobtrusive and actually nice as you know Alexa is really listening to you without having to look and see if the ring is lit up. Thanks, that works a treat. 🙂
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