Sonos & Amazon Echo

I don't think the beta program was due to start until sometime in October, so it's probably not in play yet, if it is it'll be in private beta, so nobody will be permitted to discuss it anyway.

Many thanks. Looks like i'll hold off on my purchase of Amazon Echo for a few months to see how its roll out is received and see how the Sonos integration actually works.

I got an Echo last week (UK). Most exciting bit of tech Ive had in a while. The voice recognition is far superior than anything else Ive used and the ability to hear you across the room is great, even with music playing. However, the sound quality (compared to sonos) is average at best so Im looking forward to the sonos integration.

Im curious to know if sonos will actually take over all the speaker duties of the echo or just the music part.

Given the recent Sonos-Spotify Connect announcement, and that an Echo is a seen as just another spotify connect source, I was initially inclined to think it will be limited to 1) only music services supported by Alexa and 2) only for music output rather than all output (i.e. with the voice response kept within the echo).

However, I saw this over the weekend which seems to indicate passing all Alexa duties to a 3rd party device (ie the listening) which opens up more possibilities for sonos - particularly the new play 5 with the build in mics.
http://hometheaterreview.com/dts-to-add-alexa-voice-control-to-play-fi-products/

so to answer your question - no one knows how it will integrate but it will surely be better than a hard wired connection. In the short term you could try out Yonomi where you could set up 'routines' with sonos devices but they may be a bit clunky in operation such as 'Alexa turn on Living Room Next' (next track in Living room) or 'Turn on Living room pause' (pause living room). The 'Sonos announcement' options are quite entertaining but there is quite a lag the longer they get - presumably as the text announcement is converted to speech.