Radio skipping backwards - BBC radio repeats

Hi @Andyneouk1 - as mentioned I’ve raised this with the senior engineers for investigation.

Essentially what seems to be happening here, is that rather than a single continuous stream of data being sent to your speakers, BBC use HLS streaming which provides the speaker with a “playlist" of smaller segments.

If there were no issues occurring, you could imagine the speaker as receiving and then playing segment A, B, C, D, E and so on, in that order. In this case, however, the “Distributor" (the web server responsible for sending each segment from BBC’s side) is sending segment A, B, C, C, D, E, and the Sonos system is dutifully playing these segments in the order they arrive, resulting in a segment being repeated.

In any case, we’re happy to investigate this from our side and work with the BBC where necessary to get this resolved - thank you for your reports.

[Mod: Edited for clarity]

@Xander P - so are you saying that this is something people will experience whether listening to Sonos or via any other (internet radio) device?  Or is it possible that it could only happen via Sonos?

I can’t help wondering if this is linked to the general ‘strangeness’ that exists in the relationship between the BBC, TuneIn and Sonos (and maybe throw Alexa in there, too).  The BBC withdrew its stations from Tunein a while back because it really wants everyone to listen through BBC Sounds.  However, it has allowed Sonos and some other ‘third party’ music players to continue to play a URL directly, with that URL supplied by TuneIn.  Could this be in any way relevant?

If the HLS stream is the problem, then some of the users who have posted on this thread may want to try using a non-HLS stream, which they can add as a manual radio station to Sonos.  This would be as an experiment and/or temporary workaround.  The following link has non-HLS streams that can be tried. 

https://garfnet.org.uk/cms/tables/radio-frequencies/internet-radio-player/

To add a station to Sonos

https://support.sonos.com/s/article/260?language=en_US

Hi @John B, many thanks for the suggestion and links for trying non-HLS streams!

It’s certainly possible that this only happens for streams sent to Sonos devices, and the unique situation between Sonos, BBC, and TuneIn could indeed be a factor - having said that I have seen some reports of this issue occurring on other internet radio devices so I can’t say for sure - in any case I’ll pass this on to our engineers as it’s a good point to look in to :)

For the time being however, I’ll be giving your workaround a go, and I’ll post back to let you know if I’ve noticed any repeating segments from the non-HLS stream.

The BBC have some previous form on screwing things up on particular servers, causing problems that affect only a subgroup of users:

Hi @Xander P thanks for the info. Appreciate your response. What your saying makes sense. And like @John B says, I suspect its to do with the way BBC handled the tune in situation. I have emailed the BBC so I'll see if I get a reply. I will give the workaround a shot, didn't know that was an option. Thanks. 

I have the same issue to with Radio 2 skipping back numerous times during the day. Never used to happen until a couple of months ago. All other services work fine. Tried the links and suggested actions - nothing changed.

I submitted a support ticket with the BBC yesterday. They got back to me today asking a few questions but said they have tried it on their own sonos system and it has been fine.

I also tried the non-hls manual streams as suggested above and appear to have the same issue. 

I had this problem, contacted Sonos who said change from Tunein to MyRadio service.

No problems or repeats now.

Give it time. I thought a few weeks back that it had gone away because it hadn't happened to me for a while.…

I guess it is not totally impossible,  if MyRadio gets the stream by a different route. Sonos gets the stream direct using a URL provided by TuneIn. For the moment I remain unconvinced.

What's myradio? Is it another service within sonos? Don't think I've ever seen that. 

Same issue here for the last few months. Will skip back a few seconds then repeat. Happens at least once in the hour I listen ever morning, sometimes more (it's been twice this morning in 20 mins) 

BBC radio 2 via tune in on a Play 1, turned on with an alarm. 

Very annoying

I can't find a my radio but there is a myTuner radio. There is another issue at present with the BBC changing or removing some of their current streams. You might be better off trying Radio player which is part owned by the BBC

I’ve used TuneIn to find various radio stations and add them to My Sonos. With some of them, the station will start playing but then after a minute or two ‘rewind’ 30 seconds, so you’re hearing something you’ve already heard.

For example, I had the Ken Bruce show on BBC Radio 2 this morning and during the Popmaster quiz, in the middle of him asking one question, the audio jumped back to the question before.

Does this happen to anyone else? Is there a way around it?

I also started getting this in the last few days on Radio 2 on TuneIn.

Interested in any update on a fix \ diagnostic

Regards

I also experience BBC R2 jumping backwards throughout the day. Sometimes noticeable sometimes not. If I nip out in the car it becomes obvious when I get back in the house as the Radio played by SONOS will be mins behind the actual broadcast. 

It also takes an age to start the stream! There is definitely a difference when I stream from TuneIn as opposed to SONOS Radio (the former being better). Can anyone else comment on the speed to start the stream?

I've been suffering with this too and have also experienced this once when listening to DAB in the car.

I've added the stream from myTuner Radio a few days ago and haven't heard the skipping backwards.  What I do get is a message saying that the stream will be unavailable from the twenty-something of March.

Same here, switched to Tunein rather than mytuner or radioplayer to stop the message saying that the stream will be unavailable from 22nd March only to now have problems with 10 second or so repeat of dialogue or music, very frustrating

Exactly the same problem for me. Switched between Sonos Radio and TuneIn to play BBC Radio 2. Both skip. Been happening for months.

Agree with the view that Sonos engineers discussing this with engineers at BBC is going to be a more productive conversation.

This has been driving me crazy. Finally got round to looking into it to see if it was a fault with the unit, which is fairly new. Please push the BBC to sort it out Soon.

Same for me but only on my new Beam and on BBC Radio 5 Live. It regularly skips backwards about 20-25 seconds. This doesn’t happen on any of my other Alexa devices or on my older Beam in another room...

Still repeating on Radioplayer for me. No message about service being discontinued March 22nd though 

I added a URL and it does not appear to skip, however I get occasional message saying this service will soon be removed.... It says I should move to BBC Sounds, if only we could that too work....... 🤔

My S2 amp is skipping on radio 2 too. It’s highly unlikely that we all have the same WiFi/network issues. 

Frying pan … fire.  As others have found, this work-around takes you to a stream via TuneIn and so you get hourly messages letting you know that it won’t work after 21st March.  Is there any other way to add a streaming URL?  It doesn’t seem to be offered via RadioPlayer on the app, for example.

So I also get the BBC stations skipping backwards. I am using Alexa on Sonos and the TuneIn service. If I listen to the BBC Sounds app with my iPhone on WiFi, there is none of this skipping back. Could someone explain what is going on please, because from where I sit, the issue is with Sonos.