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There are several system design issues that I cannot get around.  Please advise.

I have two separate locations in which I own and regularly use 19 Sonos devices. This includes one Roam that I take back and forth between sites.  I have Amazon Echos to control the speakers, along with the Sonos app on my phone and my PC.

Problem: I cannot use Alexa with both networks at the same time (even though Alexa has no problems controlling other devices across separate networks).

Details: In order to control Sonos devices with Alexa, I must use the Sonos skill in the Alexa app. When I enable the skill, Alexa knows I have Sonos speakers on two separate networks, and asks me to select one by listing the Sonos devices that are on each network. Once selected, things work fine on the selected network, but do not work on the other. When I wish to change locations, I must disable the skill in the Alexa app and re-enable by choosing the other network. This breaks the first.  If I am in location A but my wife (for example) is in location B, we have to choose which one of us can use Alexa to control our speakers.

Note that in the Alexa app I have set up groups representing rooms. I can group an echo and a Sonos speaker and tell that echo to play music. She will say “Playing xxx on Sonos” and the grouped speaker will play. I can also tell Alexa to play music on <Speaker Name> and that speaker will play. But these commands only work on the subnet selected in the skill.  If I am in location A and ask Alexa to play music on a device in location B, she says she is playing it on that device (because she recognizes the device), but nothing actually plays. 

Taking the Roam across locations is particularly problematic, because I must completely reset and re-register it every time.

Using separate Amazon accounts is not a solution because I lose the ability to control multiple locations. Using separate Sonos accounts is not a solution because the skill only allows one account, and this breaks the app, since there is no means in the app to log off and log back into a different account.

I have many smart devices that work well across multiple locations. Sonos is my only problem. It is hard to conceive of such limitations in an otherwise excellent system like Sonos.

@Harrigill 
The answer here is twofold…

One solution is to not create a separate Sonos Household, but to have one Sonos Household spread across the two Homes.. it’s long winded to explain here how to go about that, suffice to say, you simply could move a speaker (like a Roam) from your first Home to the second Home without ever resetting it and extend the speakers/system out from there at the second Home.

The Sonos Skill for Amazon Alexa will be linked to just the one Sonos HH and will work at both locations.

The second solution is to start a new Sonos system at the second Home (for example by resetting the Roam and the Sonos App) and so creating a new (2nd) Sonos Household ID.

To make Alexa work at the second Home, remove the Sonos Skill from the Amazon Alexa App and on reinstall, simply choose the second (newly created) Sonos Household and Alexa will now work with the second Home devices instead. See attached screenshot of choosing a Sonos HH in the Alexa App.

How you choose to go about these things is entirely up-to you.

Thanks Ken for the reply.  But I have never seen any option to combine speakers into a single “household”. That is exactly what I need if I am understanding correctly.  How?

As I note in my original post, separate Amazon or Sonos accounts are not valid solutions.

Sorry there aren’t many Sonos devices showing in my example screenshot of the two Sonos Households in the Alexa App, but it was all I could muster up in a short space of time to provide you with an example - but hopefully it helps to explain the concept of the two different approaches that you can take when setting up your devices with Alexa in two different Homes. 

Thanks Ken for the reply.  But I have never seen any option to combine speakers into a single “household”. That is exactly what I need if I am understanding correctly.  How?

As I note in my original post, separate Amazon or Sonos accounts are not valid solutions.

You don’t need separate Sonos, or Amazon Alexa, accounts in either of the two solutions that I provided. Just use the same accounts/credentials for either of those solutions.

This attached screenshot, in some ways, shows the same Sonos System/Household that’s available at different locations/wireless networks ..  I could for example now take my Sonos System to Home A and have it running on the MobileNet WiFi network, or carry any/all of the speakers to Home B and have them run on the Localnet-PC WiFi network and Alexa will be able to play to devices at either Home.

Thanks Ken for the reply.  But I have never seen any option to combine speakers into a single “household”. That is exactly what I need if I am understanding correctly.  How?

As I note in my original post, separate Amazon or Sonos accounts are not valid solutions.

 

Do you have any voice enabled Sonos devices, in addition to the Roam?  If so, have you considered the use of Sonos Voice Control (SVC) in one location?  This can be added in addition to Alexa on voice enabled Sonos devices.

I think you could get to Ken’s ‘single HH’ model as follows.  Can we park the migratory Roam for the moment?

Let’s assume you want to keep the playlists, favourites etc from HH1 (because I doubt they are now identical across the two HHs)

Let’s assume that Alexa is attached to HH1 and is working happily there.

I’ll assume you have no wired devices currently.  It doesn’t make a big difference

You would then need to:

  1. Take one speaker from your HH1 to your other home.
  2. Factory reset ALL Sonos devices in the second home.  This deletes HH2 and loses all Sonos playlists etc on that system (just so you know)
  3. Connect the HH1 speaker you brought by Ethernet to your router
  4. Confirm that you can play music on that speaker
  5. Add all your reset speakers to the system using ‘Add Product’
  6. Check it’s all working
  7. Add your local wifi credentials to Sonos
  8. Disconnect the Ethernet cable and check all working on Wifi
  9. Take the speaker you brought with you back to home 1

You will probably need to discover devices on Alexa.

I have ‘seeded’ one location from another in the past.  That was before Alexa.  No guarantees.

Edit: it might make things even easier if the SSIDs and passwords were identical in the two locations.

Really well explained by @John B - thanks John for taking the time to do that - much appreciated.👍

I think you could get to Ken’s ‘single HH’ model as follows.  Can we park the migratory Roam for the moment?

Let’s assume you want to keep the playlists, favourites etc from HH1 (because I doubt they are now identical across the two HHs)

Let’s assume that Alexa is attached to HH1 and is working happily there.

I’ll assume you have no wired devices currently.  It doesn’t make a big difference

You would then need to:

  1. Take one speaker from your HH1 to your other home.
  2. Factory reset ALL Sonos devices in the second home.  This deletes HH2 and loses all Sonos playlists etc on that system (just so you know)
  3. Connect the HH1 speaker you brought by Ethernet to your router
  4. Confirm that you can play music on that speaker
  5. Add all your reset speakers to the system using ‘Add Product’
  6. Check it’s all working
  7. Add your local wifi credentials to Sonos
  8. Disconnect the Ethernet cable and check all working on Wifi
  9. Take the speaker you brought with you back to home 1

You will probably need to discover devices on Alexa.

I have ‘seeded’ one location from another in the past.  That was before Alexa.  No guarantees.

Edit: it might make things even easier if the SSIDs and passwords were identical in the two locations.

 

Thanks for the good reply.  One thing I did not note is that I have a Sonos Boost in both locations.  Would this change anything?  TIA

Do you have any voice enabled Sonos devices, in addition to the Roam?  If so, have you considered the use of Sonos Voice Control (SVC) in one location?  This can be added in addition to Alexa on voice enabled Sonos devices.

 

I do have a Beam in both locations and an Alexa-enabled Sonos One.  However, I have the voice control disabled and use a nearby Dot, because there are many Echo actions that are not available by the brain-dead version of Alexa contained in the Sonos devices (e.g. communication capabilities such as calling, drop-in, etc.).

It is indeed unfortunate that Amazon does not allow non-Amazon devices the full functionality of the system. I’m sureSonos would love to be able to have the entire system available on their devices. 

Unfortunately, Google does the same thing, restricting which features are available.

It makes you wonder if these restrictions are part of the reason that Sonos has implemented SVC, and continues to work on it. 

 

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