SONOS + ECHO DOT

This integration may never happen. Or if it does, may be short lived.

With Apple releasing a "high end" home speaker, Amazon is likely to release an improved Echo and they will want to have full control over their whole home-interaction experience as it matures. That's the future. We're less than five years away from asking our Echo to order groceries which will be delivered from Whole Foods via Amazon's delivery service.

I wouldn't be surprised if they pull out of this project from Sonos. This will leave Sonos in a bad position as consumers will eventually expect their home speakers to be seamlessly integrated with their voice-activated home. Sonos was successful because they applied innovative technology with great sounding speakers. They will no longer be the "innovator" because they won't be able to compete with Apple or Amazon.

Maybe we'll get lucky and Amazon will purchase Sonos, but I doubt it.

I have a fairly large investment in Sonos equipment, so I hope I'm wrong here. Best scenario is they do this integration and we get another few years out of Sonos gear.

TL;DR Use your line input and get over it. Save your money for whatever winning technology emerges.

You don't think Sonos would have entered a binding Joint Venture agreement then?

Humble? I think that chance has flown. Instead, they should aquaint themselves with a complex multiple vendor software development cycle.

Methinks you should reacquaint yourself with the meaning of humble.

For me what apple is targeting with the HomePod is Sonos, no Alexa, so once they get momentum the best alternative for HomePod as a smart home music system will be a mix of sonos and Alexa, that’s the challenge for Sonos, no to be fast but to be right.

I agree about the need to get the Sonos integration right but with the long wait, Homepod better be not only right too but it will need to be freekin magic when it finally comes out or it will end up being ignored by all except Apple diehards. Right now Echo has some key advantages that will be hard for Apple to overcome:

1- Echo is available now and it is incredibly useful for playing music in areas like a kitchen or desk even ahead of the release of Sonos integration. There will be an awful lot of folks committed to Echo by the time the first Homepod ships.

2- The addition of the screen on the Echo Show has improved the music listening experience more than I would have expected. Everybody in my family loves that you get album art and lyrics as you listen, It is also surprising how well voice and touch screen control complement each other. A voice command can put you directly into a screen that might otherwise take several steps to get to by working though menus while the touch screen control lets you quickly select something that would be awkward to articulate as a voice command. I think Apple made a mistake in not putting a screen on the Homepod assuming folks will somehow still be happy to dig out their cell phones to do things that are not suited to voice commands.

3- As much as folks might think the non-music features of Echo are irrelevant to music listening it really does make a huge difference in user experience when other things you do integrate smoothly with music playback. The Echo Show knows when to duck the music to background level so it can talk over it and when to mute or pause it and then resume automatically. This means taking an intercom call or checking your calendar while listening to music is a pure pleasure because all of the music adjustment needed to accommodate those tasks just happen effortlessly. Homepod can't afford to be any less polished in this regard.

I think if the Sonos integration with Alexa can maintain the same user experience you get with the Echo Show then Hompod is going to have a tough time competing.

Is there anything on any public beta that offers insights into the future of this subject?

How do we find out more on this, or join the beta?
Join the public Beta in your Sonos account. Private Beta is by invitation.
There really isn't any more to "find out" beyond what Sonos have already said.

Play-Fi (DTS) originally said they would have Alexa integration Q1 of 2017 and have now pushed it back to "sometime in the second half of 2017". Maybe the delay is on the Amazon side and that is holding everybody up.

They said 2017,.not 1st quarter 2017.

The adverts on telly do wake my DOT up but, I don't know why, she's never answered any of the subsequent queries. I suspect it is because the DOT is in another room and the sensitivity for her trigger word is higher than that for the subsequent request. I am, however, rather impressed at how well the IT can decipher my requests even being very close to my Play 3 stereo pair which ALWAYS have some audio through them.

There's no way to know if the "delay" is due to technical or aesthetic difficulties in getting the integration or the sheer awesomeness of the things that can be accomplished means there is a lot to do.

I bought a Dot last year when on deal for Prime members and she only ever wakes up when Arsenal commentaries are on my radio and Alexis Sanchez is playing - poor thing doesn't know if she's coming or going when that happens!!Haha. It can surely only be a matter of time before someone on the telly shouts "Alexa, play Motorhead at full volume", and a million homes go into meltdown.

I'm really disappointed about how long this is taking. A firm which was an innovator now feels like a dinosaur. I'm wondering if i might not be better off investing in an amazon echo rather than wait for my play 1's to integrate with my dot.

You could just go and buy a Duplex Phase Transponder that connects to the Dot. This item generates its own 100Gbit wifi subnet segment. It's protocol is compatible with the Sonos Mesh and allows for seamless transport of the Dot's streaming data across the network to the Play 1.

Alternatively, you could ignore my sarcastic drivel and wait patiently like the rest of us for this innovative and class leading functionality

If what I understand, when support for the Dot becomes available on Sonos, it'll be pretty useless for someone like me who subscribes to Apple Music which is not a service supported by the Dot. Have tried Spotify and Amazon Music in anticipation but have gone back to Apple Music, so unless I go back to one of these I won't be able to fully use Dot with my Sonos. I appreciate this will not apply to many many others though.

I think you too are making assumptions. The interviews I have read with the CEO, whilst being careful not to give too much away, do give hope that the Sonos Alexa integration will be more comprehensive that i first feared.

It does look like you will be able to call up music from your Local source. This may also mean it will work with all music services, but I suspect that may not be the case.

For me so long as i can call up music by Album/Artist/Track and play the whole album as one or individual tracks that will be great. This also assumes, Volume, Track skip and other features too. Will be interesting to see how zones are handled too. If it is anything like home automation you may need to state Room/Zone before initial music request. Just hope it is not required for subsequent requests on the same dot/echo.

What is clear is that Sonos sees voice control as very important so want to get it right at the outset. I can wait for that....but not too long 😃