Hi @nodric 

Welcome to the Sonos Community!

I recommend you get in touch with our technical support team who have tools at their disposal that will allow them to give you advice specific to your Sonos system and what it reports about what exactly is happening - they may not resolve it immediately, but it may be important to get things properly documented if there is an issue we need to address.

I hope this helps.

I will do that, but the limited hours and lack of email support means I have to sit and wait for the chat queue to get to me. As this is a widely known issue (just Google it or read the threads in this community) I was hoping someone had an answer by now, or that your own tech support had created a FAQ on it. This, along with the long standing update failure (the built in app update always fails necessitating downloading of the software every time - confirmed by your tech support 6 months ago as an ongoing) on Macs is suggesting a lack of support. So I am less enthused or hopeful about support being much use. Let’s see what they say. I will report back here.

This help?

Hi @nodric
I understand, but a few posts here and there on the internet do not necessarily constitute an issue that we need to address - especially when it’s not uncommon for such reports being related to software updates on third-party products. For what it’s worth, we did not re-invent the wheel - we use the Samba implementation of SMB that comes with the Linux kernel. The same implementation has no issues with other NAS drives (I, for example, use a Raspberry Pi as a NAS, and see no such issue).

I’m not sure which threads you have been looking at, but I believe the Best Answer on the following thread may be of help:

• Sonos Connect can no longer play music after Synology SMB update

If these steps do not help, getting in touch would be the best recourse.

If you start a chat and are unable to get through to an agent, the chat is assigned to a case and enters a queue to be addressed by an agent via email in time - this replaces email-only support, through which you would not receive help from our automated assistant - not that the assistant would be able to help you in this particular case, but that wouldn’t normally yet be determined at this stage.

Being able to update the app on macOS is unrelated, but it is something we are looking into - as it can only truly be tested when we release an update, however, it has so far been problematic to resolve. In addition, the percentage of our users that use desktop apps is tiny, so the priority is somewhat lower than you might hope - not great for you, I understand, but an unfortunate reality of the economics of maintaining multiple apps for multiple operating systems.

I understand your frustration, but I hope this goes some way to help.

I'm not sure if either will fix the issue but my thoughts are the first option is better as it doesn't actually replace a package with a previous one and open you up to prompts about ‘Upgrade available’ etc.

Even if it’s an issue that has evidently been acknowledged, and is 100% reproducible? 

While playback is absolutely fine at SMB2 I still have to limit the FreshTomato f/w on my Netgear R7000 to SMB1 to carry out a full indexing/reindexing. Interestingly I can remove and re-add one of the smaller shares without causing Sonos to have indigestion. 

Hi @ratty 

The thread you linked to there is tagged to a specific issue with connecting Sonos to a USB drive plugged into a router, specifically. It does seem, however, that the issue tracker has been expanded since then to include NAS drives too, which I personally was not aware of, so good call out there. I admit I was puzzled as to why only USB+router combinations were affected when the issue first came to light, so to me it makes sense that the scope has been expanded.

However, in this instance it does seem that the issue @nodric reported has more to do with the software update that Synology drives received, the consequences of which can be resolved by following the steps included in the Best Answer here, meaning, as I mentioned, that “it’s not for us to address” in this particular case.

I hope this helps.

It’s more than a few posts but, I read your answer as this:

1. It’s not a Sonos issue, it’s a Synology issue only resolvable by downgrading their firmware/software that affects their implementation of Samba SMB.
2. Desktop users are not really important to Sonos so they can sing.

My reference to the second issue was to show how slow Sonos are in addressing real identifiable and repeatable issues. Your response is we are niche so the issue will remain and maybe will be forgotten. I am paraphrasing of course. They were not your words. FYI - This sucks as customer service and suggests that the desktop support for your platform is falling away and unless we want to operate our systems using IOS or Android we should probably look for a different streaming solution? Yes, that’s a question.

A really good vendor would work with Apple to resolve why your update process violates the OS and is prevented from installing. It is a security issue from what I can determine.

FYI I use the desktop app on my office Macs to listen to music when working. The desktop app is also easier to use for people with sight impairment and other limitations. Why not just discontinue it if it is so insignificant? Another question. If it is important then why not fix the issue? Another question.

On the Synology issue a quality vendor would reach out to their techs and investigate the issue and solve it, or at least understand it to give better responses to us annoying afterthoughts (customers). The definition of a customer? “They give you money”. They only give you money while you deliver a perceived value. Once the perception of value wains, so does your reason to exist. You have a job because I, and many like me, give you money. 

Solution

I will return the NAS to Amazon now I know Synologies SMB implementation is flawed.

Tertiary Solution

I will stop using the desktop app and look at other streaming solutions in the medium term.

I was initially thinking you'd come here for help, it's now apparent it's just for a rant.

No, I am a customer who needs support and now I am being told it is a Synology issue. I just spoke to them and now understand why it does not work. I will reply in the appropriate threaded reply above. On the other issue I think being told you are low priority speaks volumes to the way customers are viewed. Am I not allowed to express my dissatisfaction? Do we just roll over and accept whatever response we’re given? Did we not pay $1000s for the gear?

OK here is the explanation.

I just spoke to Synology. They decremented SMB v1 in their latest software/firmware release. They also strongly recommend not using SMB v1 or NTLM v1 as both have serious security vulnerabilities.

Sonos uses the NAS login username and password when authenticating to sync libraries etc. It requires NTLM V1 to be able to authenticate as Sonos does not support the newer encryption to enable it to logon using SMB v2/3 without NTLM v1.

The issue is at the Sonos side, assuming we want support for the latest more secure standards.

This is another example of Sonos being slow to fix things, or implement things, which is why I referred to the software update issue on the desktop app. Not an Apple issue, and not a Synology issue. Both are issues for Sonos to resolve and catch up.

Hi @nodric 

The update issue with macOS only affects the update process from within the app. As this can be easily circumvented by simply downloading the new installation file from our website, the issue as a whole is not considered vitally urgent - the app itself works as intended once installed. As I mentioned, we have been working on it the whole time, but perhaps with less staff that with other issues currently being worked on. To me, this does not mean that we are telling macOS users to “go sing”- we are telling them to please go to our downloads page to perform the update.

Are they talking about connections from S1 systems, or from S2 systems? S1 does not utilise SMBv2/3 as the Linux kernel it uses does not support SMBv2/3, and this is not going to change, due to those older, S1-only components not having the internal resources to run a newer Linux kernel. S2, on the other hand, does support SMBv2/3 which is why S2 systems can connect to various other NAS solutions without issue, despite them also disabling SMBv1 support. If you can verify that they were referring to connections from S2 systems, I would be happy to relay this response to my colleagues.

Corry,

To confirm, your S2 app requires NTLM v1 for authentication, which is why the other referenced post with a different issue was resolved, as it downgraded and used NTLM v1. I can confirm that turning on SMB2 with NTLM V1 using S2 solves the issue. Your S2 app needs to implement NTLM v2 authentication to be compliant with the later standards and to prevent the usage of SMB1 and NTLM v1.

Summary

It is an S2 issue with NTLM authentication over SMB v2 or higher. Enabling NTLM v1 solved the library sync issue. Enabling NTLM v1 is a security risk which is well referenced online by all software developers.

Hi @nodric 

Thank you - I will forward this on.

Hi @nodric 

Apologies - the other thread that I linked to only applies to S1 systems. That was my mistake.

Thanks for the feedback. We will submit this as a feature request for future NTLM v2 implementation.

@Corry P 

You volunteered the information that:

(of which I happen to be one such individual)

Can you say how tiny is the percentage of users who still use a local music library?

Hi @ratty 

Sorry - I don’t have that information. I just know it is relatively small.

I would assume, the relatively small is becoming relatively smaller.

Just a random thought - In the final iteration of local Sonos Music Library on my system, I recall it didn’t require SMB share(s) to be setup, as the players accessed the ‘SonosLibraryService’ on a Windows device. I couldn’t find much info on the service/protocol. I’m wondering if this is an option to avoid SMB/NTLM? Could this service be adapted/extended to non Windows devices in the same way as other Music Services?

Hi @craigski 

Good question! Yes, the SonosLibrayService executable will attempt to create a HTTP (or maybe it is HTTPS) connection to speakers first and only fall back to SMB if that fails.

I would presume this could be added to NAS drives, but would need some kind of app to be written for that device - key word is presume, as this is a bit beyond my paygrade. If it is doable, I would think that it would still be added to a system as a Music Library path - for it to be a service, cloud computing would need to be involved (like the old Western Digital MyCloud music service, or Plex).

It’s a background Windows service based on HTTP. Porting that to anywhere else would probably be a load of work.

IMO if Sonos made DLNA work properly that could be a viable alternative, with widespread support already built into routers, NASes, etc. I have a WiiM device, able to access a copy of my music library off a repurposed router using DLNA, and it works fine.

@craigski 

Having said that, if your NAS will run Plex, there’s no need for anything else!

Porting the SonosLibraryService is trivial if the target platform can run .NET, which most can these days. Decompiling it is easy, then recompiling it for the target .NET would be straightforward. The only tricky bit is setup, ie telling the underlying Sonos household about a new instance.