I want restitution. Period.
I have a ZP100 that was perfect for my needs. It sits in my family room; I have the line-outs to my AV receiver to power my main speakers; Line-in from from phone or cdplayer; I connect speaker-outs to my living room & kitchen area; I listen to music stored on a NAS in iTunes format. This works for me.
Now it doesn't work for me. Why, because of the latest firmware update. I went to use the Android controller, and like every other month it forced me to update. Well I dont want to update. I wanted to use the damn thing. Given no choice, I updated. Now it will only stay alive for 1-2 minutes and then it's unresponsive and needs to be power cycled. Kaput.
So I called Sonos support. They were super nice, and we worked together for 30 minutes. I generated a diagnostic file and they looked at it. First they thought that the newer firmware is too large for the memory on this older unit. Then they changed their position saying that it was experienceing a boot issue. Then they change to a third position because it was successfully booting but then hanging up after 1-2 minutes. Ultimately they offered the 30% upgrade option.
This is simply unacceptable. I purchased this unit because it fit my needs: network enabled and reads music from various sources, an amplifier with speaker outs, line-in, line-out, a dedicated controller (CR100), and phone controller apps. I purchased my current automobile because it has specific features, as is fhe case with my lawn mower, TV, refridgerator, laptop, hot tub,... Sonos Corp thinks they can keep changing the features of our Sonos audio equipment. Does anyone here think they would not have passed over this brand had they known that Sonos would take the liberty of bricking the CR100 and now stuffing so much into the firmware that locks up the ZP100s & ZP120s. Where do they get off not allowing me to use my amp when they decide to update the firmware. Huh? Where do you get off, Sonos?
So predictably my conversation with support came around to them pushing me to upgrade. But it would cost me $400 and operationally be something that just doesnt have the features I'm using and have my other equipment integrated with. I can just imagine their board room conversation... "How can we force our loyal customers to upgrade their equiment... Let's kill the CR100 and force them to use smartphone apps--this will give control to force firmware upgrades, then stuff older units with bloated firmware making them unstable, then claim that in order to provide 'The Sonos Experience' we'll kill off the older units entirely and force them to buy new equipment.
I have news for you Sonos: Fool me once, shame on you; Fool me twice, shame on me.
So where does that leave ME? I'm out a ZP100. I want Sonos Corp to compensate me for this. There are two options that I would accept: 1) buy this unit back from me for $400 (plus the CR100, etc), or 2) replace it with another ZP100 (from their junk pile, whatever) with a firmware that fits the memory, and an android app that doesnt phone home collecting data on me, or I'll use the 3rd party app like SonoPad or Andronos.
So that's my position. I'm not going to fade away either, but research the validity of my complaint in terms of legal recourse. I'm fed up with the strongarming we as consumers are subject to, and it's time to do something meaningful about it.