Sky Q and Sonos problems

  • 23 January 2021
  • 43 replies
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W
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I have seen that many people have experienced incompatibility between SkyQ and Sonos

I have a Sonos system - TV Beam, Play 5 (2) and 2*Play1.  All was fine until I installed SkyQ.

I had problems immediately on install - lost speakers, IOS App not finding the Sonos next.

I have done many of the basic bits - cycled router, Sonos devices on/off.

I have ended up with One sonos Play1 connected to network, via Ethernet and others linked via Sonosnet (WM0).  Main SkyQ box connected via Ethernet and mini via WiFi.  At the moment things are stable, in that I can see speakers using IOS App (from some places in the house- will need to give it longer to see how stable.

However if my iOS device is too close to either SkyQ box it does not find the Sonos system If I walk away from SkyQ box(s) to the other side of the house closer to the router (and Ethernet connected Sonos), then IOS App finds the sonos system and I can control the boxes.  There is obviously some interference in the WiFi (meshes).

I guess I can try to change channels and bands, but I don’t want to start messing around/ experimenting - home workers on network- is there a definitive solution (other than getting rid of SkyQ or Sonos).  Is there any chance that Sonos and Sky will provide updated software 

Not a brilliant customer experience!

 

43 replies

ratty

Other app/devices are almost always simply connecting out to the internet. Sonos is a multi-device system which depends heavily on local intercommunication and places additional demands on the network. 

These issues come up from time to time with equipment that doesn’t comply with the relevant standards. It’s not unusual for vendors to try and point the finger at Sonos. 

W
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I have now received a communication from a member of the Escalation Team at Sonos who is going to “own the issue”  - I’ll report back if I get anywhere

J

That’s interesting. There must be something slightly different about the software running on that device, since most (all?) Sonos devices have a 10/100 ethernet port, not a gigabit port. 

The silly thing is that instead of bridging/forwarding the Sonos messages (frames), instead the Sky Q wraps/tunnels them in its own messages.  If the Sonos frame was already as big as it could be or just below but still totally standard, wrapping it makes the result bigger still.  That is then too big for the switch.

 

So the Sky Q equipment is making good Sonos traffic into bad traffic for the switch. A normal wireless access point would not to this.  It would just forward the Sonos message to the switch, leaving it alone. It wouldn’t be too big because the Sonos never made it too big in the first place.

 

Sky Q can get away with this if the Q boxes are connected by Wifi as there is more headroom for the overhead it adds in Wifi than there is in standards based ethernet.  Although still not a standard as such, Gigabit ethernet also tends to have more headroom too and in actual fact often loads, to support what are known as Jumbo frames.  The oversized Sky Q frames would be called “Baby Giant” frames if you had to pick one of the wacky names that have unofficially been used for these non standards. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jumbo_frame#Baby_giant_frames

 

Over the years various 802.1 protocol standards have come about which reserve more space in ethernet headers not the main message part, but devices don’t police where the bytes end up. So there may well be some fast ethernet devices that were built to support such protocols around that will have enough headroom for Sky Q to work too but I would expect these to be more expensive enterprise devices that people wouldn’t come across in their homes.

 

The Sonos’s 10/100 port is generally neither here nor there.  Only if you were to put a Sonos with two ports in the centre in order to connect two Sky Q devices (I did this as an experiment) where it was acting as a switch/bridge might you wish the Sonos had Gigabit ports.  Sonos speakers are not designed to be general purpose switches of course so it would be a mistake to use them that way.  In this case, adding Gigabit ports to the Sonos wouldn’t fix anything as it is the fast ethernet switch that has trouble after Sky Q has mangled the Sonos traffic.

controlav
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What insanity is this? SkyQ tunnels all your data in order to provide a bizarre version of QoS to their own devices?? Wow.

UK telcos really do want to inflict pain on their users, with this Sky craziness and BT testing their router updates in someone’s basement for 10 minutes before releasing them.

Author of the leading independent Sonos app for Windows, the only Sonos app for Xbox, and a Sonos app for iOS
controlav
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Do you know anything about sky?

Ratty resides in Scotland (per his profile), so he stands a much better change of knowing things about Sky than many of us.

Author of the leading independent Sonos app for Windows, the only Sonos app for Xbox, and a Sonos app for iOS
ratty

A Sonos controller app remembers next to nothing about your system. When it wakes up, or the mobile is reconnected, the controller needs to ‘discover’ the players afresh. It does this by essentially yelling “is there anyone out there?” as a local subnet broadcast. Everything on the network hears this, but only the Sonos devices respond in a form that the controller will understand. 

A problem arises if, for whatever reason, the discovery broadcast from the mobile is not passed on by the network equipment. Sometimes this is because the equipment vendor considers broadcasts to be ‘insecure’, sometimes it’s because a configuration option needs tweaking to allow them, and sometimes it’s simply down to a coding error.

ratty

This sounds nonsensical to me. (I could use a blunter term.) I sometimes ask myself how much some of first line support really understand about networking in the home. Either that, or they’re doing a lousy job of explaining things. 

W
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I fail to see why this marked as “answered” by anyone other than the OP.

Its not answered and we are still working at it.

Airgetlam

The only Sonos staff that respond here are the forum moderators. You’d be much more likely to get a response to your diagnostic if you were to call Sonos Support directly to discuss it.

When you speak directly to the phone folks, they have tools at their disposal that will allow them to give you advice specific to your Sonos system and network.

 

Bruce
J
Why Sky Q Whole Home Wifi Breaks Sonos If 3rd Party Fast Ethernet Devices Are Added

 

W
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The problem is really Sky Q not Sonos.  As I understand it Sonos sends 1500 (+14).  Then instead of just passing this through SkyQ adds another 14bits and then some of this gets stripped off by 10/100 switches that confirm directly to standards (I believe that some 10/100 switches will actually pass 1528).

If you want a forensic explanation you should follow my link to Mad+Sweeney’s posts on the Sky forum.

A

I have just got Sky Broadband, was having weird issues where my One’s and Amp were fine, but the Roam was not showing in the app, but was via Airplay, but i could only play either Roam or the others.

Having seen this page, the first thing I did was untick “Synchronise 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz Settings” in the Sky router settings and instantly the Roam appeared in the app and is working fine at the moment…

I have not yet received the Sky Q box, but this worked instantly so thought I’d post it.

ratty

Does your primary Sky box include a router? Is the main router's WiFi still active? Where is the Play:1 wired to? 

W
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I believe the SkyQ box creates a “mesh” with the main Sky hub, so yes the hub is an active WiFi.  The Play1 is actually connected to a switch as there is only 2 Ethernet ports on the sky router/hub.  If you leave sonos just on the WiFi (ie not sonosnet) the situation gets worse.  I believe the sonos mesh (sonosnet) is interacting with the sky mesh.

ratty

Can we clarify the topology? Do you still have an internet router, as well as the Sky hub? If so, apart from the Sky hub is anything else connected to it? And is that internet router’s WiFi still alive?

W
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Do you know anything about sky?

Sky are the Internet provider, as such they provide the hub/router that connects to the telephone line.  They are also the providers of the TV service through a satellite dish, which is connected to the SkyQ box which provides the TV feed through HDMI to the TV.  In my setup this SkyQ box is connected to the house network by Ethernet.  Sky also provide a “mini” box to connect to a second TV.  The mini box is connected to the SkyQ box by WiFi.  The router/hub, SkyQ and mini box work together as a “mesh” to extend the WiFi coverage.

If you connect one of your Sonos boxes to you network by Ethernet, then Sonos establishes a Sonosnet which connects your sonos devices together rather than use the WiFi.

is this what you mean by topology?

There are no other routers just a switch.

 

W
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I had a SkyQ box/mini installed 5 days ago and have experienced several problems with interaction with the Sonos system.

The issue

I have Sonos App on the IMac which sees the whole Sonos system (this took a reinstall of Sonos to get working)

I have Sonos App on IPad (IOS 12.5.1) and on Iphone (IOS 14.3).  Both of these will connect and see the whole Sonos system if I am in the vicinity of the co-located Modem/router/Wifi Hub and cabled Play1 and also if I am close to the Wifi Play 1 which is not close to either Sky box.

However, if I am in the same room as the Sonos 5 (close to Sky mini box) or TV Beam (close to the SkyQ box) then the Sonos App will not connect to the Sonos system.  If I, then move to vicinity of the Modem/router/Wifi Hub it magically finds the Sonos system and connects.

There is clearly a problem with interaction between Sky mesh and Sonos.  The minor irritation is that in order to pair/change inputs/control speakers in rooms from the IOS App I have to walk to another part of the house.

The more major concern is that the Internet maybe (or become) flaky and will produce other conflicts in the future, hence why I want to understand this issue.  There is some anecdotal feedback from family members working from home that they have dropped out of on-line meeting systems since the SkyQ install

The Internet and Sonos predated the installation of Sky Q and had been very stable and reliable.  It is the introduction of SkyQ that has caused the issue

Internet - 

Broadband Provider: Sky 

Modem/router/Wifi Hub: Model SR203

Network 

There is a Cat5 cable serving parts of the house and also the Sky Modem/Router acts as the primary Wifi hub.  It is using channel 11.

There are two switches in the Cat5 cabled network.

My understanding is that SkyQ and Sky mini boxes provide some king of “internet mesh”, so for information

The SkyQ box is physically connected to the network by Ethernet.  I have never installed it on the Wifi (ie I have never given it the Wifi password - it was installed from scratch in its current configuration)

Sky mini box is Wifi, no cable connected - again no Wifi password given, so it is only talking to the SkyQ box.

SkyQ box and Sky mini box are currently 3m apart (through a brick wall)

Sonos - I have tried various permutations, but the current set up is

Play 1 on Ethernet - providing Sonosnet (positioned near Modem/router/Wifi Hub, but actually connected to a netgear switch, rather than the Modem/router/Wifi Hub

The second Play 1 is on Wifi

Sonos 5 on Wifi - positioned 2m from Sky mini box

TV Beam on Wifi - positioned close to SkyQ box

I have moved Sonos to channel 1 and the Sonos devices say WM0 (so using Sonosnet)

 

This is what I have done

I have limited what I have done to avoid creating issues for my homeworking family.

I have powered down all Sonos devices, rebooted Modem/Router Hub and reconnected the Sonos devices (Ethernet connect Play 1 first).

My Thoughts

I have seen suggestions that you should avoid mixing networks by keep the Sky Mesh, SonosNet and cable connected devices separate

I have moved Sonos system to Sonosnet - it had been purely Wifi before.

I had wanted to keep Sky Q on Ethernet for speed of downloads and Sky mini box on Wifi for the ability to move to several locations/TVs in the house.  I could try moving SkyQ box to a Wifi connection.

 

Before I do this are there any other thoughts as to what might be going on?

ratty

Are the SkyQ TV boxes acting as WiFi hotspots? If so do the problems correlate with the iDevices connecting to them? (The Fing app, amongst others, reveals the current BSSID.)

S
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Right up to the ‘Do you know anything about Sky?' ‘question', I saw nothing saying they were the ISP too.  Having SkyQ in no way means they are also your ISP or router provider.

W
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Are the SkyQ TV boxes acting as WiFi hotspots? If so do the problems correlate with the iDevices connecting to them? (The Fing app, amongst others, reveals the current BSSID.)

I don’t know enough about Sky to be definitive about this, but reading other posts they create a “mesh” with the Sly Modem/Router/Hub.  Does this mean they act as a WiFi hotspot?  Will have a look at Fing.

W
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Right up to the ‘Do you know anything about Sky?' ‘question', I saw nothing saying they were the ISP too.  Having SkyQ in no way means they are also your ISP or router provider.

It was a genuine question, not a sarky comment.  I assumed people on here might know about Sonos, but wasn’t sure if they would know about Sky.

ratty

Evidently where Sky is the ISP the other boxes act as hotspots. You might be able to turn it off if it’s causing problems for Sonos. The Sonos app uses multicast/broadcast traffic to locate the players. Some network kit doesn’t cooperate.

W
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Would that be true for other mesh system?

Evidently where Sky is the ISP the other boxes act as hotspots. You might be able to turn it off if it’s causing problems for Sonos. The Sonos app uses multicast/broadcast traffic to locate the players. Some network kit doesn’t cooperate.

 

ratty

Would that be true for other mesh system?

Not usually. SkyQ seems to disagree with Sonos.

W
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So yes, I have checked - when the Sonos App works the iPhone is connected to the main hub, when it doesn’t work it’s connected to either of the Sky boxes.

it is important for the Sky mini to talk to SkyQ to achieve the TV functionality.

So I could Connect Sky mini via Ethernet and switch off WiFi mesh entirely losing flexibility of Sky mini location and WiFi coverage benefit.

Some people have suggested that you could just turn off the 2.4 band on the sky boxes (not the hub) as I believe sky boxes only use the 5 frequency to communicate with each, but I’m not sure you can control what frequency other devices (eg iPhone) connect at, which would leave the app confused!

The iPhone manages to switch between access points, other applications run regardless of which access points iPhone is connected to, including the controlling Apps for other smart home connected devices (eg Hive).  Why is Sonos the only one that has a problem?

From my perspective at the moment Sonos needs to fix this - I feel like I would find it hard to recommend Sonos.

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