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Contributor II
November 15, 2017

Auto-sync radio

  • November 15, 2017
  • 14 replies
  • 542 views
(I dont know if this has been discussed before but it didn't come up in my searches. Apologies if it has)

Essentially I would like starting any live streaming service such as tunein radio to automatically look to see if it that stream is playing in any other room and automatically share that stream. It seems daft and annoying to me that if I select the same radio station in two rooms then they play with a very significant delay between the different rooms.

I realize that I can easliy link the rooms to solve this but, here's what happens in our house: We have the radio playing in the bedroom and bathroom. To avoid the annoying effects of the delay, I pick up my phone and link the rooms Now, let's imagine I'm in the shower and my wife heads downstairs. She taps the play/pause in the bedroom like she normally does and guess-what?.... it stops in the bathroom too because I linked them. If they simply shared the same stream then they would act like two regular radios in two rooms.
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    14 replies

    RichLAuthor
    Contributor II
    November 16, 2017
    I will make this my last post on the topic since I think those posting have made their views clear.

    I thank Ryan for his suggestion and for passing it on. Unfortunately the long press is only a part solution.

    The long press will join a group with an active speaker, which is great. Another will leave it.... unless there are multiple active speakers, where each long-press will select another active speaker to group with. In my house, with several teenagers, I end up performing complete survey of the current Sonos activity before it goes quiet.

    Given that I have to get all my tech to make the grade on the WAF (wife acceptance factor) simplicity & intuition come high on the deciding factors. Requiring 'training' is bad, always needing phone, is bad. The fact that the play/pause button acts like an on/off was an absolute winner in getting Sonos to move into my house in the first place!:D

    IMHO, my suggested 'hidden grouping' feature doesn't have any down-sides to the user except, perhaps if the developer effort required were to delay something more important. The feature could be completely hidden from the user, and everything could operate identically to how it does now apart from the fact that the same radio show in different rooms would be synchronized.
    November 16, 2017
    Requiring 'training' is bad, always needing phone, is bad.

    These two points cannot be emphasized enough. Sonos should have this made into posters and display them throughout all of their facilities so everyone there keeps it in mind at all times.
    Local music library with carefully constructed playlists - no shuffling!, Integration with Homeseer Automation, No touch screen devices, No streaming services, No Apple products ever
    Lyricist I
    January 23, 2018
    @RichL I think this feature would be great, and I cannot see why this would not be possible to implement in a connected multiroom setup.
    I have asked Sonos directly about this feature in 2015, is was passed on to the development team - so obviously they have not picked it up :?
    I'm a long time customer with Sonos, and in general I would consider Sonos quite conservative when it comes to changes. Then again their multiroom setup just works fantastic and it has been so for many years, even my devices from 2009 still work, so it is also cool that they do not leave you behind 😃
    Lyricist I
    June 7, 2019
    Hey folks from 1 year ago,

    I have the same scenario every morning: Play1 in the bathroom turns on at 6 in the morning. When I'm done my wife takes over the bathroom and I prepare breakfast downstairs.

    I didn’t know about the long press either. I think it will help me, so thanks for that.

    But before I read this, I also imagined that 'hidden grouping' would be a nice feature. Why should the system start a second or third async stream of the same source in the first place?