Enthusiast II

Sonos is forcing people to buy new hardware as they've broken the Connect:Amp and they refuse to fix it

Forum|Forum|2 years ago
December 31, 2023
294 replies
16587 views

Hi,

I'm recreating this thread, as the discussion wasn't finished, but it was locked. I also wanted to make it obvious this is a Sonos issue, not a client environment issue.

https://en.community.sonos.com/components-and-architectural-228999/connect-amp-keeps-dropping-out-audio-6885634/index2.html

I've been following this for a while because I've been having the same issues, and when I spoke to support they said the connect amp can't cope with modern software and that I should upgrade to the amp, which is clearly unacceptable.

This has been confirmed by people in that original thread who have been told the same thing.

BillJanzen

“FWIW, these issues seem to have occured after the June 2023 software update to S2 version 15.5. Interestingly, there is an alert posted in the release notes of the 15.6 update released July 25, 2023 about adjusting how older Sonos products use their internal memory. See below (copied from https://support.sonos.com/en-ca/article/release-notes-for-sonos-s2): Alerts: With this update, we’ve adjusted how some of our older Sonos products are using their internal memory. Because of this change, updates for Play:1, Play:3, Boost, Connect, Connect:Amp, and Sub (Gen 1 and 2) will take longer to complete than before. The reset process for these products will also take more time to complete after this update.”

BillJanzen

“We continue to have intermittent drop-outs on all 4 of our Connect:Amp devices, so here’s my update after 1.5 hours on the phone with Sonos today. They said the diagnostics for one of the Connect:Amp devices the chose to investigate showed multiple major alerts, including: Cannot allocate memory to full status Write failed Player crashed: out of memory OOM Killer These items all sound like they are related to memory issues with the older Connect:Amp product, as Big Bull mentioned in his previous post.”

Big Bull:

“Ok latest is I powered down 3 of my 4 units and just had the one I use most running hard wired to the router through my switch and it still gave dropouts so I sent 2 diagnostics to Sonos and they said :

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Thanks, so on this one in specific I can see the audio interruptions are caused because the product basically is old, and it is reaching its capabilities, there are some things that can be done to try to reduce the impact of this, but if it continues this product will need to be replaced with the upgrade program.

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I am being advised to replace any affected units with the Sonos Amp which can be costly.”

Birchan

“ Same problem, 4 AMP of which two lose sound... SONOS did a wrong analysis and accidentally said that there were memory failures in some of the units. But since they only give a 2-year warranty, mine was 2.5 years too old. How can SONOS sell products that obviously have manufacturing problems and then say that they can replace them with a 30% discount on new ones? Wonder if Tesla would sell cars that stop working after 2 years and say, sorry you have to buy a new car every two years because the warranty has expired. So bad from SONOS so I will be discontinuing my SONOS system and switching to BOSE... “

For context, in my situation I have a connect amp, connected via ethernet with WiFi off, and I started to get regular drop outs around June. It's incredibly annoying, the audio will drop out for a few seconds before continuing, if other speakers are grouped they will carry on fine.

It's absolutely 100% not a network issue. When I was debugging it, I briefly made the connect amp the only wired device and turned on WiFi, and other speakers in my house worked perfectly at all times. I've also reserved IP addresses, and I ran a ping monitor on it to check for any network dropouts. There were none. I've put the system back now, so the connect amp has its WiFi off.

So it seems to me that Sonos have released a firmware update that the connect amp cannot handle, and rather than take responsibility for it, they're just fobbing people off telling them to buy expensive new hardware to solve the problem, not even with any substantial discount. It's unacceptable. This connect amp worked perfectly before June.

Sonos needs to release a new update that solves the issue, or give people affected substantial discounts on replacement amps, and formally announce that the connect amp is end of life. Currently people with issues on this forum are being unintentionally gaslighted by well meaning people who don't know that this issue exists. Sonos cannot say the connect amp is supported when they've released a broken update.

People need to know about this issue, I've seen loads of topics about this issue and people get fobbed off with network issues, which is absolutely not the case, at all. Big Bull proved this by doing a replacement to amps which solved his issue.

This topic has been closed for further comments. You can use the search bar to find a similar topic, or create a new one by clicking Create Topic at the top of the page.

Pinned Reply By Corry P

Hi @britcowboy

Thanks for bringing this back to my attention.

We now consider this issue to be largely resolved, and any remaining cases are being dealt with on an individual basis. If you still encounter the issue described here, I recommend you get in touch with our technical support team who have tools at their disposal that will allow them to give you advice specific to your Sonos system and what it reports.

I hope this helps.

Show previous replies

K

Kumar

For those that have found rolling back to S1 to be a workable solution, I suggest you close down your system to any more S1 updates. All that these do now is address potential security issues, but I do not lose sleep over a hijack of my bank accounts via running Sonos at home on S1, on version 11.12, till Sonos hardware dies at end of life.

My bigger concern is on the chances of memory on my 2010-2014 vintage Sonos units driven to failure by having to deal with further updates to S1 beyond 11.12.

Hence the full stop at 11.12.

Ken_Griffiths

I recall when the S1/S2 split occurred that Sonos mentioned they would do their best to keep S1 secure with updates, but they (perhaps more importantly for some users) stated that they would also reflect the changes to the existing music services within the S1 App and try to keep those running for as long as possible, but that there would be no new features/services etc.

My thoughts are that not upgrading may not only risk network security matters, but also some music services may stop working if an update is not applied. I assume aswell that Sonos support would not be available for those running older software/firmware and after several updates are missed, there’s ‘sometimes’ no option to update a system without the help of Support Staff if a system has fallen too far out of date.

So stopping receiving any updates may ‘for some users’ also quickly cause problems. My own preference is to continue receiving updates for my S1 system and to receive the Support that Sonos provides.

K

Kumar

Nah; I will take my chances with the streaming services. I don’t trust Sonos Support to fix my play 1 if it is broken by a future S1 update beyond 11.12. I trust Sonos less than others here do.

I remember people - that don't come here anymore - running 8.2 or such without a problem for all the time they were posting here.

But others here should know this: I now largely use Echo devices as front ends for all my music, wired to line in jacks on Connect Amps and Connects; as long as my Sonos units work from a line in analog signal, I am good till my Sonos hardware dies a natural death. I see no sense in consigning it to a landfill because of a flash memory card defect that has been exposed by Sonos software updates.

J

Jon_R

Avid Contributor II

Just to add another voice. I’m also having drop out problems with several Connect Amps where audio frequently cuts out for a few seconds and then comes back.

All other Sonos components (not Connect Amps) on my network are fine. I’m running the very latest firmware (build 76249050).

S

Sardan

Contributor I

I have this problem with a Connect.

E

Encinitasguy

Lyricist I

Hi, I have been experiencing the same Connect:Amp music drops since May or June of 2023. We have two 5-6 year old Connect:Amps as well as three newer 1 year old Amps. Since the update both the Connect:Amps drop periodically for about 5-10 seconds, the newer operate fine. Frustrating that the only solution is to drop another $1400.00 for two new amps.

Bumper

Hi, I have been experiencing the same Connect:Amp music drops since May or June of 2023. We have two 5-6 year old Connect:Amps as well as three newer 1 year old Amps. Since the update both the Connect:Amps drop periodically for about 5-10 seconds, the newer operate fine. Frustrating that the only solution is to drop another $1400.00 for two new amps.

You can wait and see if they are able to fix the firmware issue with an update. They say they are working on one so you never know.

IMO Sonos really should do the right thing and let owners know about the flaw so that they don’t trash units or waste time chasing non existent network errors. This is an eight month old problem at this point, not just connect amps. The usual little to no communication from Sonos for this is bs IMO.

K

Kumar

This is an eight month old problem at this point, not just connect amps. The usual little to no communication from Sonos for this is bs IMO.

I agree. Sonos comms are never very good. But, at this point it is already more than connect amps?!

A

ANOpax

Enthusiast II

This is an eight month old problem at this point, not just connect amps. The usual little to no communication from Sonos for this is bs IMO.

I agree. Sonos comms are never very good. But, at this point it is already more than connect amps?!

Yes. It seems to be affecting Play 3 as well.

Anyhow, apologies to those who are on mixed S1 capable and S2 only hardware - you’ll have to wait for the Sonos fix. In the meantime, if you can roll back to S1, my amps have been constantly powered up for five weeks now since the rollback. They’re totally stable, the amps are found immediately by the control apps, they play immediately and apart from one hesitation when switching from group to individual play and one episode of a few seconds of initial dropout after an overnight pause, the amps have been flawless.

If you can do it, I strongly suggest the rollback to S1.

A

Alex.Dickson

Lyricist III

Hi,

We have been a SONOS dealer for years and have sold hundreds of setups each year.

Count me in on tracking this issue. Since last summer we have had multiple clients reporting audio interruptions. This has been affecting multiple different devices across multiple different setups we have sold. The most common device we’ve witnessed having this issue is the Connect Amp. Although we have also seen similar issues with the new Amp as well.

SONOS has been a reliable product for years, I hope to see this resolved!

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