Dark Colours on Desktop Controller

It is not just you, other people complain about it as well.
I happen to like it; because it looks good!

It's a little dark...but I think the degree of complains are directly correlated to how old you are. 😛

PAS1507;164283 wrote:

Is it me or is anyone else finding it really difficult to read and see the screen. The dark colours may be nice and sexy but they are rubbish to work with. I keep having to move the screen around to try and get it in exactly the right place so that I see anything. It's a real pain!

While it it darker than most others applications, I do not seem to be as annoyed by it as others who have posted here to complain.

The Desktop Controller does have a less-forgiving viewing angle than many other PC applications, but nothing that can't be accommodated with the correct viewing angle of the LCD screen. This also gives me the best angle for other programs.

All-in-all, I am not disturbed by the 'issue'.

YMMV

Best of Luck

If you know something about USABILITY aspects within software development you would know that light letters on dark ground is less usable than the other way around (dark letters on light ground).


Look at: http://www.usability.gov/pdfs/chapter11.pdf

To Dark on my Macbook Air
I also mis a quick way for my Favorite Radio station.

I like the dark blue and black color scheme. But I don't understand why Sonos can't provide at least one alternative with dark text on light background so customers can choose what works best for their eyes and/or desktop theme.

I'm one of those Sonos PC App users who thinks the "light black on dark black" is a terrible choice! It can't be that hard to have users pick colours for the text and/or background, now can it?

Dimitri Kokken
Belgium

ControlFreak;164294 wrote:

It's a little dark...but I think the degree of complains are directly correlated to how old you are. :p

Well speaking as an oldie, I don't find this to be an issue. Since we are talking about desktop issues, one suggestion I would make is it may be related to the viewing angles on your screen. My screen's angles seems to be quite generous but if I increase the angle it does indeed darken. Interestingly I find the problem in the opposite direction - when the background becomes too pale - because the contrast level between the blue background and white font goes too low.

I also think it depends on how the individual interprets the colours.... I'm so accustomed to dark background, light text. Normally, the minute I'm creating a new profile on any computer, the first option is to change the background to flat black. White/grey text..... Maybe step up to a forest green/which combo.

So I'm used to the current colours, and don't have an issue. Maybe others who like the light background dark text...... it's a totally different story.

For me, the color scheme is between gray text on a darker gray background is less then optimum. On a (now retired) desktop CRT, I had to change the monitor's gamma before I could see much of anything at the top. My replacement LCD display is OK in this respect, but I must be careful about the video setup.

On my laptop the contrast between the text and background is a little low and I must be careful about ambient light levels and viewing angles or this gray on gray does not work for me.

Please make skins for Sonos on the mac.

To me it would be okay if the colour of the foreground (letters etc.) would be the same as the 'File, Edit, Manage, Help' colour on top of the app. screen. Or as the words "The System, The Music, Shop, Support" on top of this page...but it's a much darker grey being used in the app...annoying if your laptop screen is tilted a bit too much forwards/backwards.

Dimitri

I agree. I have about 12 rooms powered by SONOS, and this new controller is cool, but I can't see hardly anything on it. I don't like it when companies force their funky color schemes on their users.

-Wayne

My phone and the cr200 display are fine. Both darker than I would like but I can manage. The desktop on my pc and mac are way too dark. If I close the curtains I can just about use the interface but I get so angry with it, I just don't bother.
I've given up on SONOS fixing this, but hopefully some 3rd party interface will become available.

MikeG;164651 wrote:

I don't understand why Sonos can't provide at least one alternative with dark text on light background so customers can choose what works best for their eyes and/or desktop theme.

Hear hear! How about some skins, Sonos?

Howdi

While the colors are generally ok, the contrast is just not up to snuff. The very light blue on the black (?) is basically unreadable. Anyone who says otherwise is either way too in to Goth or has their monitor/ipad/ipod screen brightness too high.

Personally, I have never seen this in software before ... where it is to the point of frustrating !

Check these :

Original ... click this

Photoshop'd ... (only levels adj.) click this

That took 1 minute ... not saying it is ideal, but the latter is more readable.

Sonos ... you really gotta address this ... it's been perfection up to now :-)

Cheers
sd

dims;169981 wrote:

Howdi

While the colors are generally ok, the contrast is just not up to snuff. The very light blue on the black (?) is basically unreadable. Anyone who says otherwise is either way too in to Goth or has their monitor/ipad/ipod screen brightness too high.

Personally, I have never seen this in software before ... where it is to the point of frustrating !

Check these :

Original ... click this

Photoshop'd ... (only levels adj.) click this

That took 1 minute ... not saying it is ideal, but the latter is more readable.

Sonos ... you really gotta address this ... it's been perfection up to now :-)

Cheers
sd

I suggest you adjust your monitor. My Desktop Controller looks like the second screenshot, not the first. Your contrast and brightness settings are way off.

It does look like your colours are off.... Mine wasn't much of an issue before they changed the palette a bit with 3.8.

Another thing to try, just as an experiement, would be to adjust the theme for your desktop too. Maybe if you pick something with different default settings, it might help see if it's a monitor tuning issue, or some other wierd setting.

It is frustrating, painful, annoying and disgusting to deal with this crappy app as the only way to control such great, albeit expensive, speakers. I don't care that some people love it, some argue it is what we would approve of if we only understood software design, etc etc...
GIVE US A SELECTION, A CHOICE.
The app on my laptops is unreadable, hard to manipulate the controls, no allowance for subfiles of music so I have scroll through my 240 Amazon albums to find what I want, no way to adjust the view of the app, the most recent upgrade with blackblue on black is so bad that it took me a few days to find the shuffle control again (which seems to have been miniaturized). I am also getting sick of your frequent forced upgrades that often don't download and then that controller has to be completely reinstalled....like every 3 months of so these days?
If your nerds can't fix it, at least allow some independent software designers to come up with an alternative. Your controller SIMPLY SUCKS.
And, I must say that as a result I am falling out of love with Sonos and think it's now just overpriced products. It really isn't that much
better than good computer speakers. You are losing one of the old faithful advocates. I now tell people to look around for alternatives..Sonos really may not be for them, especially if they want ease and convenience and choice in their life.

Uhhh, do you realize you are posting in a thread talking about the controller version from 6 years ago? And that 6 year old version is the the exact same color scheme as the one you are asking to go back to?