Windows 10 Wake on LAN

Very much doubt it, very little windows or Mac development going on.
 

Also the better solution is to have NAS drive for your Sonos music, I made one from a raspberry pi and an old hard drive. Also some routers allow you to add a usb memory stick which can be used as a nas too. I then have my music divided across both devices as a back up too. 

Thanks @bockersjv 

Appreciate the suggestion but as Sonos is the only one of my devices/apps that has a problem accessing the external drive when the PC sleeps AND they are not a cheap product, I am really reluctant to have to spend more money adding extra hardware to my network just so Sonos can work like everything else.

It doesn’t feel like much effort to add a WOL call to the sonos app connection code.

Gbt

The playing of local library music evidently only accounts for a small percentage of overall Sonos usage these days. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was now down into single percentage figures. And of those users a majority probably use a NAS or a router-attached USB drive. 

The problem with the “it’ll only be a few lines of code” argument is that this rarely considers the additional costs of productisation (testing, documenting, supporting, etc), not to mention the opportunity cost of not doing some other, more profitable, development.

Can I ask: have you not explored the apps available for iOS or Android that are capable of sending a WOL packet? I use a very simple one for iOS called ‘Wake’. On Android there are similar apps, or comprehensive network scanning apps such as Fing which can send WOL as well.

I think WOL would too slow for this scenario anyway. The timeout for file access is quite short and Windows takes a while to wake up sufficiently. WOL is also famously unreliable, and router support variable.

As others have said, there is a close-to-zero chance of Sonos improving the local file scenario anyway.

WOL would be too slow if Sonos issued the magic packet, as it would soon run out of patience. (Slow-to-wake NASes can also trip timeouts.) However a separate app could save an excursion around the house to kick the PC into life.

thanks @ratty and @controlav I wasn't aware of the additional app to send WOL packets.

Shame that the app side of things appears to be the Achilles heel of Sonos (Ive read other rather alarming posts about S2 killing various systems that worked fine with S1 for example).

I have a workaround in that I can get to the external drive using a browser via Mezzmo which wakes up the PC with no problems then I can access the music files using S1. The point is - I should not need a workaround to use several hundred £’s worth of kit. 

Still feel that this is such a basic oversight for the developers, OK, many people stream music from various providers nowadays, but for those of us old school who like to use the files from music (vinyl) they bought over the years, we are apparently destined to be overlooked and undervalued - bit like the silver surfers of a few years back :)

Cheers

Gbt

Most users with several hundred £’s worth of kit and a reasonable local library would think nothing of adding a NAS. A basic one need not cost much more than £140. Most these days will wake from idle and spin up their disk(s) on receipt of a file request.

And as I remarked earlier, many users will simply make use of their router’s USB port and file sharing function.

I avoided the whole sleep issue by using a low power computer and solid-state drive for my Sonos music library. That also ducked the need to enable SMB v1 on my main NAS that has important data on it that I didn’t want at risk.

A Raspberry Pi with an external USB connected drive works well.

Yes, but often not quick enough for Sonos, so I just leave mine running…. With all the other costs of a modern household, leaving a disk spinning seems pretty minor...

The old trick was to browse Music Library/Albums. The artwork requests would nudge the disk into life. A subsequent play request wouldn’t then time out. 

Yes, and this did work… But being forgetful and lazy, it just seemed easier to leave the drive spinning ;-)

As as aside, it’s only a cheap LG NAS, but it’s been running 24x7 for 9 years now - and it will probably fail the minutes I save this post….