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Play:5s drop out when used as surrounds

  • 16 June 2021
  • 2 replies
  • 88 views

Hi folks,

Does anyone have any detail on how networking operates for surround devices? (in WM: 2 mode).

I have a frustrating issue:

 - My pair of Play5 Gen 2’s work fine when configured as a stereo pair

 - If I then configure them as surrounds for my Arc + Sub, they work fine for a little while, and then later drop from the network - they show as ? in the app and they can’t be pinged on the network

 

I have a multi-room Sonos setup where a number of devices are connected by ethernet (but SonosNet disabled) and the rest of devices are on my UniFi WiFi network. Everything has been working flawlessly… however when I decided to switch my Play 5’s from being their own independent “room” to being the surrounds for my Arc setup (without physically moving them) the problem I describe above started.

I’ve completely rebooted my setup a number of times (including router, access points, all Sonos devices, etc.)… and initially I can get everything working but then (a few hours or the next day) the surrounds drop out.

I’m aware that subs and surrounds are labelled “WM: 2” in the “About my system” section of the app which Sonos advise means “This product is bonded as a surround speaker or Sub to a Sonos home theater speaker in a wireless setup.” …. there’s something about this bonded setup that isn’t working well.

 

Any pointers would be appreciated!

 

Thanks,

 

TheBobsta

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2 replies

G
Userlevel 7

The Play:5s will connect directly to the Arc as surrounds via a dedicated 5 GHz link. Be sure WiFi is enabled on the Arc. Also be sure the Play:5s aren’t connected by ethernet cable. You can also check and make sure you aren’t dealing with WiFi interference:
https://support.sonos.com/s/article/3286?language=en_US

"Receive with simplicity everything that happens to you." - Rashi
T

An update to my situation, as it may help others experiencing the same issue.

 

Thanks to @GuitarSuperstar for confirming that the surrounds bond to the Arc in this setup over a 5GHz link. Sure enough, if I pinged the surround speakers and then looked at my machine’s ARP cache, it showed the Arc’s MAC address for the Play:5s, sub and Arc - confirming that all comms were going through the Arc.

I was kinda intrigued as to why everything would work OK for a day and then the next day stop working, so I decided to set up some ping monitoring.

I installed a ping logger/monitor (I used EMCO Ping Monitor but there seem to be lots of alternatives) and set up periodic (5 second) monitoring to a number of IP addresses of my Sonos speakers (including the Arc, Sub, and each Play 5). I left it there with everything green.

A couple of days later I noticed the surrounds had become disconnected again. I checked the monitoring and sure enough both Play 5s had gone offline at 3:33am… weird.

I then started poking around in my Ubiquiti UniFi UI to see what other events had occurred around that time. The “Events” view showed me that lots of my devices had disconnected or roamed WiFi channels around that time. Curiously it also showed my Access Points changing the channel they were operating on at that time. This confused me as all my APs were configured with static channels, not with “Auto”.

I googled around in an attempt to understand what was going on, and got a few hits relating to Ubiquiti’s “UniFi AI” or “WiFi AI” feature. I searched for the setting in the UI and sure enough, when I found it, it was set as follows:

… on, and running daily at 3.30am.

This feature is intended to scan your network on a regular basis and automagically find the best channels to set your various APs to. In my case, it seemed to merrily change each of my 3 APs to rotate around 2.4GHz channels 1, 6 and 11 - and some random array of 5GHz channels.

Once I disabled this horrific feature, I looked in the logs to see what 5GHz channels had been in use in previous days when my Sonos surround setup was working fine and set them back to that. A few minutes after my APs had reconfigured my surround speakers jumped back online. The interference was gone and all was good in the world.

I’ve no idea how/why this AI feature could make such a mess of picking a “good” channel to use. It seems it was occasionally picking the same (or very close) 5GHz channel for my “kitchen” AP to use, which is located just a couple of metres from the Arc and surrounds. It would be helpful if I could adjust the 5GHz channel the Arc uses to bond the surrounds (or even see which channel has been chosen) to help plan around it. But at least with trial-and-error I’ve been able to get a setup which works consistently for me.

TL;DR: If you’re using a Ubiquiti UniFi WiFi setup (inc UDM, UniFi Dream Machine) and you’ve got issues with your sub or surrounds disconnecting, go search for the WiFi AI feature and switch it off!


TheBobsta

 

 

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