Sonos One - Alexa intermittently unresponsive & restarts audio at random

  • 16 December 2020
  • 3 replies
  • 148 views
B

Hi Sonos Community, 

So my early experience with Sonos & Amazon Alexa are far from impressive; she doesn’t listen, when she does its often having to repeat myself, she will sometimes when music is off, she will start playing randomly the music she was last playing… 

 

Now while i appreciate the sound improvement of the Sonos, the integration with Alexa is far from impressive. . .  On scan of forums, the usual gripes by other users, so is this ‘experience’ i am getting as good as it gets?   AND while i have yet to do the deregistration of the service, i’d challenge why deregistering a service via an app is going to fix these ‘intermittent’ issues . . . happy to try, but i’d be pleasantly surprised if this is the issue. . .  my bigger concern is how well Sonos & Alexa actually get on . .. at the current rate of success, it will be going back which would be real shame as all but Alexa works well.. 

 

PS - i am doing nothing more than requesting radio via bbc service (uk); but i can’t believe the fact she doesn’t hear me has anything to do with the app / music service in question. . . 

 

b

 

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3 replies

UKMedia
Userlevel 7
Badge +20

Hi Sonos Community, 

So my early experience with Sonos & Amazon Alexa are far from impressive; she doesn’t listen, when she does its often having to repeat myself, she will sometimes when music is off, she will start playing randomly the music she was last playing… 

 

Now while i appreciate the sound improvement of the Sonos, the integration with Alexa is far from impressive. . .  On scan of forums, the usual gripes by other users, so is this ‘experience’ i am getting as good as it gets?   AND while i have yet to do the deregistration of the service, i’d challenge why deregistering a service via an app is going to fix these ‘intermittent’ issues . . . happy to try, but i’d be pleasantly surprised if this is the issue. . .  my bigger concern is how well Sonos & Alexa actually get on . .. at the current rate of success, it will be going back which would be real shame as all but Alexa works well.. 

 

PS - i am doing nothing more than requesting radio via bbc service (uk); but i can’t believe the fact she doesn’t hear me has anything to do with the app / music service in question. . . 

 

b

 

As a general point; Your issue involves Sonos hardware & software, Amazon Alexa AI and integration to the BBC, which by default involves another organisation TuneIn.  To assume that 100% of the blame is with Sonos is disingenuous at least!

WRT general stability issues, please see my post here.

WRT the issues playing BBC radio: The BBC has stopped the initiation of BBC sources via Voice through TuneIn - please note this isn’t a Sonos issue.  If you Enable the BBC skill within the Alexa App, then the command ‘Alexa, Ask BBC to play Radio Four’ will work.

Remember: Sometimes Red Wine helps :)
B

Hi UKmedia,

Thanks for responding.

This issue I suspect isn't BBC specific, it just so happens the default service we use for radio. Why I state this, the device simply does not recognise 'voice' when spoken (IE microphone indicator light does not react to commands; could it be hardware or software good guess as naturally closely integrated. 

Interested as to how I can establish if root case is related to IP related issues your article references too; interested to also learn why this is only related to Sonos solution and not Amazon echo family of devices for example. If you can provide an approach to establishing the evidence, I will look into it further as part of the RCA.

Ps : I never inferred this was a 100% Sonos issue... But I have an issue that is tarnishing the end user experience, be it hardware, software, service or integration. If the experience is common, then the ecosystem fails quite radically : I can't believe given the success of the products, this is a common feature of this integration... 

 

B

 

 

 

 

UKMedia
Userlevel 7
Badge +20

Hi 

Duplicate IP addresses mainly impact devices that require commutation to other local devices. Alexa devices can also be impact if grouped together. Your issue about music restarting, is an indication of this issue.

Can you also touch the mic symbol to check that it is on, the small round white light will toggle on and off.

The other thing to try is to Disable then Re-Enable the Sonos skill in the Alexa App.

Remember: Sometimes Red Wine helps :)
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