New App Upgrade - HORRID
The new interface is nearly impossible to use... it doesn't even make sense how it works in relation to the previous interface which was better than good enough. As someone that has thousands of dollars invested in sonos I have to voice my utter disgust for this new app. PLs comment below and lets get Sonos to roll back from this atrocious attempt at an upgrade.
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That only sounds easy because it's some high level steps, not what you actually need to do:
Tap room actually means
- swipe down on the now playing screen*, assuming you didn't first click on the rooms thingy
- tap rooms
- (optional) scroll down to the room/speaker(s) you are looking for
- click the room you want to select
- be not really sure you actually selected, because making it darker doesn't feel like you just selected it.
- click the room you won't to select again
* Why always go back to that now playing screen you say? Well:
- it shows what's playing, including the album art
- it contains almost all key functionality needed except for changing rooms (even God doesn't know why) and what's playing, from play/pause, over volume control, to previous and next, favoring, browsing the album or artist, etc
Tap browse means
- swipe down on the now playing screen
- tap rooms
- scroll down to find the source you are looking for
- notice you don't immediately see what you were looking for, so instead you now
Tap search
- tap search
- tap search again to bring out the keyboard
- type in your search
- notice you have no results
- use the tabs to get to playlists
- wait a bit for the results to load
- click on more because what you are looking for is not in the top 3 results
- still don't see your playlist you are looking for. So now you
Open spotify and repeat that same search
- click on the top result because spotify prioritizes your playlists
- click on play
- use devices available (aka that room thingy) to select the room you wanted to hear that playlist in
That's almost 20 clicks - assuming you didn't make a mistake - to get your spotify playlist to play in a single room, and quite some of these click are the direct result of the new design.
Most of us have something else in mind when they think of 'easy',
Userlevel 2
While I appreciate John Bs attempts to help, I find it amusing that he complains about being selectively quoted when he selectively ignores all of lemko_rj detailed post about room selection issues, completely unrelated to the ' swipe down at now playing screen' that we all now know. A glib 'Tap Rooms button. Tap room. Tap Browse, Search, or My Sonos and choose your music.' and the usual link was not in the least helpful in that instance. I'm a long time Sonos fan, their hardware is excellent but this version of the Android app seems to be universally hated. To all the apologists and people taking personal offence to any Sonos criticism, do you really think this version of the app is better then V7? If so please detail why (as you ask everyone else to detail why we don't like it), and if you don't think it's better why are you defending it?
When in rooms, please explain why I cant go direct to search? I have to now close the room when enlarged and go to a teenie tiny search button and then search. I also can't just search unless I know my room is selected. I have 5 areas for sonos and if I want to hear a different song in a new zone I've got to navigate this silly app. PLEASE KEEP THIS SIMPLE! IT'S MENU AFTER MENU AFTER SUB MENU AFTER MENU! I can even click on a room and add an alarm or adjust the EQ.
How about allowing a search button in the cue menu? That way I can select a room, select the cue for that room and search. We make up playlists as we go and dig deep into the 3 streaming services we subscribe to.
PLEASE make all roads lead to the same spot, and revisit the UI. It's way to engineered but without user logic. I know why it seems to work from your perspective, but it sucks when trying to be a fun host and DJ an event. it's so clumsy.
So to recap . . .
Let me select the select a new song WITHIN the room queue tab
Chill on all the menus and drop menus. Large networks are super hard to control with this over menu-ing.
Can I get an AMEN from my fellow SONOS owners? I've got lots of money in this thing and Spotify has a better interface! Also, give us a black background toggle, my phone is blinding when it's dark and I want to hear a new song. Not very romantic to light the room with phone light.
Ideally, this should be customizable interface. We all have different workflow ideas and setups. Much like we can add and subtract quick buttons on our web browser or phone home screens. I'd love a quick room group button, individual room buttons with the ability to search in that pop up, an alarm button shortcut etc. My dinky phone has 24 icons on a single screen. That is more than enough space to make a very customizable setup. That would allow for a mute all button and a black background toggle.
Otherwise, keep up the good work! Oh, and Alexa kinda scares me. Will you ever have your own voice service that doesn't listen to anything but music requests? With a cool request like 'SONOS get this party started'?
Sorry for rambling. Gonna to listen to an entire album so I don't have to touch my playlist for an hour.
-Eric
How about allowing a search button in the cue menu? That way I can select a room, select the cue for that room and search. We make up playlists as we go and dig deep into the 3 streaming services we subscribe to.
PLEASE make all roads lead to the same spot, and revisit the UI. It's way to engineered but without user logic. I know why it seems to work from your perspective, but it sucks when trying to be a fun host and DJ an event. it's so clumsy.
So to recap . . .
Let me select the select a new song WITHIN the room queue tab
Chill on all the menus and drop menus. Large networks are super hard to control with this over menu-ing.
Can I get an AMEN from my fellow SONOS owners? I've got lots of money in this thing and Spotify has a better interface! Also, give us a black background toggle, my phone is blinding when it's dark and I want to hear a new song. Not very romantic to light the room with phone light.
Ideally, this should be customizable interface. We all have different workflow ideas and setups. Much like we can add and subtract quick buttons on our web browser or phone home screens. I'd love a quick room group button, individual room buttons with the ability to search in that pop up, an alarm button shortcut etc. My dinky phone has 24 icons on a single screen. That is more than enough space to make a very customizable setup. That would allow for a mute all button and a black background toggle.
Otherwise, keep up the good work! Oh, and Alexa kinda scares me. Will you ever have your own voice service that doesn't listen to anything but music requests? With a cool request like 'SONOS get this party started'?
Sorry for rambling. Gonna to listen to an entire album so I don't have to touch my playlist for an hour.
-Eric
Sonos has stated they are working on both the contrast and navigation issues with the next releases.
I totally agree. The new interface is terrible. Like a step backwards. The android widgets don't work properly now. The navigation to a location is way to cumbersome. Please revert back to prior sotfware
Userlevel 7
+21
You have upgraded to the latest version 8.3? This was released yesterday and is a significant change, and we are told more changes are coming too. It's still not perfect but it is a lot better and easier to navigate, IMHO of course.
Having that tab visible on a now black now playing screen isn't exactly a world chocking improvement. Especially with that screen now looking like a cluttered mess as a result, which is yet another step backwards.
Maybe it does help some that this bar is always visible, but compared to the old design the new one is still everything but great.
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