Line-In Latency/Delay Disable PLAY:5

I see it as an "operates as designed" and ease of use issue. It isn't marketed as a stand alone computer speaker, and nobody wants to keep switching between buffered and non-buffered output according to how one is using it. It is what it is, and isn't what it isn't, and allowing it to be what it isn't is both costly in engineering and confusing to the consumer.

ETA: As ratty says, it is most certainly a hardware difference that allows the Playbar to pass audio more real-time. The Playbar uses the 5 GHz band to send audio to the Sub/surrounds in the same room. Unfortunately, the 5 GHz band was found to be unreliable outside of the Sub/Surrounds, because passing through walls and floors proved to be too much for the faster, yet weaker 5 GHz signal. Therefore, for synchronized music* which must go between rooms, Sonos has to buffer the 2.4 GHz, and thus the delay on the line-in for music.

*Note, even the TV source, which is low latency at the Playbar/Sub/surrounds, is delayed a bit when playing in other rooms due to this buffering.

For the sake of adding another voice in favor: I am not buying a Play:5 because of the line in latency, even though I'd love to extend Sonos to the office. I had assumed the line-in could go direct, without Sonos latency, when used as a standalone unit. Glad I searched for this first.

For me, the compact, high-quality play:5 is ideal for a medium sized home office. But not if it means having two sets of speakers occupying the space: one for the Sonos network and another to connect directly to a TV or computer. Low, direct-input latency is necessary for anything other than playing an album, like sound from a TV, messing with garageband, playing with a keyboard, amateur audio mixing, cutting a large audio file into separate parts, or even video editing home video.

Why buy a nice compact speaker for a office or bedroom when it's going to necessitate a separate wired system right next to it?

Maybe we're a small subset of users, so Sonos is unwilling to do it. That's fine -- I'm just one customer. But it's just a design/business decision. Audio equipment is normally designed for a source input to route around certain features as necessary. My main integrated amp routes sources around the equalizer by a switch. Line inputs on amps routinely route around effects features. And, of course, Sonos already allows you to set compressed or uncompressed, which in essence routes around compression. This function would just route the line input source direct to amp, skipping the network. It wouldn't take a focused effort, just implementation of a basic internal function.

One vote here for allowing Play:5 (and Connect:Amp) to operate as a standalone unit. The setting options would be: Automatic (default) Compressed (higher latency, better network), Uncompressed (lower latency, worse network), Standalone (zero latency, no network)

Being able to use the Play:5 as a regular, latency free powered speaker from the Line-in is an obvious use case that many people would find useful, and would improve the product. I think it would be welcome and overdue addition to the feature set.

Moreover it has the potential to introduce regression problems in the players' existing audio pipelines.


No one has asked what exactly the above means; for sure this requested feature will add a lot of noise of complaints from people that have inadvertently selected it to the effect that Sonos multi room is playing music out of sync.

But the quoted seems to be much more than just that, I am guessing.

Moreover it has the potential to introduce regression problems in the players' existing audio pipelines.


No one has asked what exactly the above means; for sure this requested feature will add a lot of noise of complaints from people that have inadvertently selected it to the effect that Sonos multi room is playing music out of sync.

But the quoted seems to be much more than just that, I am guessing.

The way I see it, there would be no issue with multi-room sync, because the feature would turn the Play:5 into a simple powered speaker, just directly playing what's coming into the line input. There would be no multi-room in this instance.

Yes, but what when someone tries to group it without remembering or knowing about changing the no sync feature?

More important is the ratty caution I quoted.

Yes, but what when someone tries to group it without remembering or knowing about changing the no sync feature?

More important is the ratty caution I quoted.

I guess when in 'direct play' mode, it wouldn't be groupable.

Yes, but what when someone tries to group it without remembering or knowing about changing the no sync feature?

More important is the ratty caution I quoted.

I guess when in 'direct play' mode, it wouldn't be groupable.

Exactly. In 'direct play' or 'standalone', the unit wouldnt be groupable cause the playback is not going through the network process. To switch, you'd change the setting, playback would stop, and then you'd restart it. Pretty sure playback stops like this when switching between compressed and uncompressed too. Not a big deal.

Not a big deal.
Except to those that don't know about this and stumble into consequent issues with sync. And any unforeseen consequences on doing this on other synced/grouped players in the home are of course a VERY big deal to the market at large.
My bet is on Sonos foregoing the market of those that needs this feature for the gain of not rocking the stable boat of multi room audio. Even more so when their declared focus is on voice control/streaming services.

Not a big deal.
Except to those that don't know about this and stumble into consequent issues with sync. And any unforeseen consequences on doing this on other synced/grouped players in the home are of course a VERY big deal to the market at large.
My bet is on Sonos foregoing the market of those that needs this feature for the gain of not rocking the stable boat of multi room audio. Even more so when their declared focus is on voice control/streaming services.

Fair enough to everything in that second paragraph.

On the first, I just frankly don't understand this concern at all. It's a really straightforward function that would remove the Play:5 from the group while in standalone mode... it wouldn't exist on the Sonos network. What happens when you unplug a device and use Sonos elsewhere? And who is going to set their Play 5 to Standalone mode and then freak out confused why it isn't streaming with the house?