Just had my Sonos 1 die on me. I have a few others so unplugged them and swapped to see what the issue was and found the cable didn’t work either. Changed the fuse in the plug (this is something we can do in the UK) and the cable works. The unit doesn’t work the repaired cable or any other cables.
Before you all start saying “surge”, this unit was plugged into a 4 way extension lead/cord. None of the other electronic items on the extension broke, just this one. I’m guessing something went wrong with the Sonos unit which blew the fuse in the cord, saving the rest of the items. The only thing different with this Sonos unit is that it was the one plugged into my router. I’ve had to plug another one for now.
Given my unit is maybe between 5 and 10 years old, do you think they’ll offer me 30% a new one? 
Good idea/information.
I looked in my account and I see 7 devices that are not in my current system. I presume these are the returned devices. 5 of the 7 have serial numbers that start with: 48A6B8 and the other two are unique: 542A1B and F0F6C1.
seems the majority are the same “batch” maybe the other 2 were refurbs? No idea …
My Sonos Play 1 died about 3mos ago. Wont power up. The product looks and feels strong and robust, but clearly from my own experience, and from those on this thread...NOT.
My Sonos one (gen 2) just suddenly stopped working. There is power going to the unit but it is dead and doesn’t power on. Gutted, it isn’t that old. Loved my sonos but seems a lot of people have experienced this same issue. Come on sonos, you can’t leave us out in the dry with this.
If not done already, it sounds like you may need to contact Sonos, rather than users here in the community, particularly if the speaker is not powering on and you’ve tested the cable etc. Here is the link to contact the Support Staff, though it may perhaps be better to do that after the weekend…
https://support.sonos.com/s/contact
My Sonos one (gen 2) just suddenly stopped working. There is power going to the unit but it is dead and doesn’t power on. Gutted, it isn’t that old. Loved my sonos but seems a lot of people have experienced this same issue. Come on sonos, you can’t leave us out in the dry with this.
My Play5 failed with no power on. I am tempted to force open it (since it is dead and not usable anyway) and see it for myself.
Came here cause i just had the exact same issue with my sonos5 and i thought i could open it to check inside, from what i understand it’s not an option.
Did you finally try to force it open?
Agree buzz not enough data to make a conclusion. Also every unit from a potential bad batch won’t necessarily fail, just a higher probability… at least Sonos is covering them…
I love their ecosystem and the sound quality so hope it was just a bad component source batch…
Potentially some or all of the 48A6B8 units could be from the same batch. A block of MAC addresses is larger than a typical production batch.
I have two more still with that serial number fingers crossed…
The two One SL’s here begin ‘48-A6-B8….’
Just to add: The One SL’s I have here show in the Sonos App as hardware version 1.28.1.6-2.2 (if that info. is useful at all)?
I would need the hardware versions of the devices i returned not the ones I have … the ones I have aren’t failed so hopefully not from the bad batch…? I suppose only sonos has that data now.
They are likely still listed in your online Sonos Account, if you’re using the same account… maybe try here:
https://www.sonos.com/en-us/myaccount/system/households/devices
I would need the hardware versions of the devices i returned not the ones I have … the ones I have aren’t failed so hopefully not from the bad batch…? I suppose only sonos has that data now.
You can go to Settings → System → About My System and check the hardware versions. We have no idea what is different with the various builds.
I appreciate the input and ideas.
I have actually spent a considerable of time checking in monitoring the voltage in my house. I have a solid 115-120 V on both legs. I have them connected wirelessly, so there’s no ESD source there. They are all plugged into different rooms in my house on different circuits. I’ve even took a thermal camera and checked all the connections in my electrical panel and the connections outside of my house to look for heat indicating loose connections and there were none.
Could be that I bought all of those units at the same time from Costco so maybe they’re all the same bad batch and replacements they keep sending are refurbished which are probably recondition failed units so they’re just failing again.
I have seen batches of electronics from reputable companies go bad. A lab I worked and I had 10 of 20 Samsung monitors fail that we bought all at the same time just after about a year, we opened them up and it was bad capacitors in the power supply. In the same lab we also had batches of Toshiba, hard drives all go bad about the same time.
other people in this thread have had multiple speakers fail, and then people just jump on, and say mine didn’t fail so you must be doing something wrong, and that’s just not a logical conclusion to me
edit: I also just wanted to explicitly add Sonos has warranted and replaced every single one of my failed speakers so as a company they are doing the right thing. it would be nice if they sent me a new unit instead of refurbished ones, but I can’t complain too much about that I guess.
I do worry a little bit at some point these things are going to fail outside of warranty, but then I guess at that point I’ll take it apart and find out what’s actually going wrong with it.
I don’t know the sales figures, but it’s at least many, many tens of thousands, probably hundreds of thousands have been sold, yet very few users have come here to report failures. Of course I can’t know if users with failed units simply don’t come here, for some reason a number of prone to fail units have arrived at your doorstep, or there is something about your installation that damages the units.
I have literally hundreds of “sensitive” electronics in my house. None of them fail. Only marginally designed one SLs.
To me this high failure rate indicates something in your environment is contributing to the failures. The obvious candidate causes would be power line transients or static electricity discharges.
Power line transient intensity can vary from circuit to circuit. A rogue appliance on a circuit could cause major trouble on its circuit and less trouble on another. A wiring fault can contribute to the issue. Each unit has an ability to withstand a certain level of transient. In this respect it’s possible that the ONE SL’s are the weakest unit using the outlet. This does not imply a defective design, only that the specific level of transient is too low to damage the other units outright, however, they could be suffering long term damage. If you are using transient protection, it could be improperly installed or failed. After a certain number of large transients the protector will fail and it is not practical to test these units in the field.
If any of your units are wired to the network, the network wire is a potential source of transients from nearby lightning strikes.
Static electricity discharges are typically more of an issue in winter months because the relative humidity is lower. Do you touch the controls? If so, have you noticed any shocks?
Yes, it’s possible that there was a bad batch of units, but it is unlikely that all of your units have come from that batch. Based on reports from other users on other models, SONOS is aware of a few problem batches and has been generous with replacements for these units. These units are identified by serial numbers.
Same here in Spain, my Sonos One (Gen 1) which has been working fine since bought in May 2018 has powered-off today and will not power-on; I’ve tried unplug/plug-in, different socket, different cable (from a still working Play:1) all to no avail. #AnotherOnebitesthedust!
My Play5 failed with no power on. A few here claim that it is an electronic unit and Sonos is justified in not offering an easy service but instead offer a 30% discount for a refurbished unit. Their recommended reset solution is useless. Changing the cable as a solution is total nonsense. I have a Nakamichi sound bar that has run well for nearly 7years now. I have a 50” TV with its sound system functioning flawlessly. I have an old Sony shortwave radio that still pulls in stations from far east. And for people to accept a two year old sound system to fail within this short time and trash it must be quite happy with mediocrity - what a shame! And then comment that offering 30% discount on a “new” unit is “something they don’t have to do. If that isn’t backing their device, I’m not sure I understand what is.” - a Sonos -fanboy? I fully agree with Stymie222. Adding a WiFi/BT interface to a speaker amplifier is so common when you look at all the wireless headphones one can buy these days. Sonos does not want you to see how little electronics they have inside so they have a fully sealed unit. I am tempted to force open it (since it is dead and not usable anyway) and see it for myself. The mistake most people make is to accept a product and fail to read the fine print warranty statements. And the products are essentially throw away units like the ones we complain about coming from China.
Well Bruce, How many speakers have you owned in your lifetime that went out in just a couple of years. Most of mine would have lasted a life if I didn't think I needed an upgrade.
I live in a gated community and I handle most of the IT problems here. I sold a lot of Sonos here with little problems. After hearing how a few of these went bad and Sonos will not replace them. I will not recommend these speakers.
As Airgetlam noted these are active speakers (containing electronics), not simple passive speakers. Ask anyone who owned a pair of passive speakers in the 1970’s and 1980’s with foam surrounds and they’ll tell you that “life” was 10 years at most.
In your IT experience, how many funky routers have you encountered?
I’ve never owned a speaker that was also a computer and network device before I owned a Sonos. Sure, the old ‘passive’ speakers had much longer lifetimes due to the fact that they had both limited electronics and were not directly plugged in to the wall, instead dealing with only the ‘filtered’ electricity through the amplifier. Nor did they have a built in operating system in them.
But I’ve owned a Sonos since around the PLAY:5 Gen 1 was released, and am now north of 20 installed devices. While I’ve purchased newer devices, I’ve never needed to ‘upgrade’ a device, and they all continue to function. I have gifted that original PLAY:5 to another home, but at last check, it continues to operate on S1, whereas my home runs on S2.
Beyond setting them up with reserved IP addresses in my router, something that should really be done with any networked device, I’ve never needed to do much fiddling with them. My WiFi, on the other hand, is a different thing, but that isn’t Sonos’ fault, they’re just a client of that network.
I would heartily recommend them, and in fact I have, to anyone looking for a ‘wireless’ solution.
Well Bruce, How many speakers have you owned in your lifetime that went out in just a couple of years. Most of mine would have lasted a life if I didn't think I needed an upgrade.
I live in a gated community and I handle most of the IT problems here. I sold a lot of Sonos here with little problems. After hearing how a few of these went bad and Sonos will not replace them. I will not recommend these speakers.
I’m not sure I understand what you mean by Sonos not backing the Sonos One. The device is fully covered by the same warranty as all other Sonos devices. If it is under warranty, Sonos replaces it, if it isn’t under warranty, I believe they offer a discount in the purchase of a replacement device, something they don’t have to do. If that isn’t backing their device, I’m not sure I understand what is.
It kind of sad that Sonos does not back the Sonos One. Mine too has failed after a very short period. I have read too many bad reviews.