The Sonos Brexit and pragmatic ways past it

Forum|Forum|6 years ago
January 23, 2020
570 replies
22877 views

I will start this thread with a few caveats:

First, this thread is not for rants. There are plenty here for those, and there is no bar on opening new ones.

Second, the thread is directed for the subset of users that have a large investment in legacy products, and are content to see their Sonos systems as music systems that offer stable streamed music from either a NAS or from the net, and have no expectation of more bells and whistles - just that things continue to work as they are working today. I happen to be in this boat as well, as someone that has three out of six zones running very well on legacy products that I simply cannot afford to jettison until the hardware dies.

Third, this thread is based on facts, some of which have been coming to light only over the last 48 or so hours. It is therefore incomplete to an extent, and may even be wrong in places. Feel free therefore to clarify/correct/add as necessary - and I specifically invite @Ryan S to do so. But, no rants please - they have a place, but this is not it.

All that said, this is the solution I intend to proceed with and recommend here:

Opt for a legacy system operation in May, that will run legacy and modern products, exactly as these run today; no faffing around with two networks. No more enhancements, but expecting Sonos to honestly fulfil their recent promise of all bug fixes that the legacy products can accommodate. Ditto for what needs to be done to accommodate changes driven by at least the mainstream service providers.

By a happy coincidence, all legacy products have line in jacks. So if something even happens at the streaming service end that cannot be accommodated in legacy products, I am confident of finding some device that can be wired to the line in jacks of these, that will still allow streaming from the culprit service to work including in grouped mode with all other products in the system.

The streaming from the local NAS will not have any issues in this mode, other than hardware failures including that of the NAS, and a key assumption here is that NAS changes will not need a Sonos software update.

Although Sonos has said that new products can be added to such a system, I do not see how this is possible once new products come installed with versions that are beyond the frozen legacy system one. Unless Sonos is not going to sell any new products in future with versions beyond the 2020 legacy one - I doubt that. And once a product comes with the latest version, adding it to a legacy system without rendering legacy products inoperable is going to be tricky because it will involve first separating the one system into two; I also admit to being a little fuzzy with this bit. In my case, this is all moot; I have no need for another zone. As an aside, I am someone therefore that is not of much interest to Sonos!

I also assume that if anyone at any time in the future wanted to jettison legacy products for any reason, all they will need to do is leave all such products powered off, invoke updates and the result will be a Sonos system updated to the day they do the invocation. The concern here for me is different - I need to have an ironclad way of NOT updating my system before I am ready to separate or jettison legacy products, and this needs more insights into how things will work on this front in future.

I am pretty sure that this way ahead will work in my use case and I suggest it will also work for many that are heavily invested in Sonos legacy products, that do not want to write it off or to trade up to new products just to retain all existing functionality.

Yes, it involves losing future enhancements/features, but once we accept that these essentially are music boxes that will keep doing all they do today, that should be an acceptable trade off, I suggest. It is to me, for sure.

So this way, this event will be just a minor inconvenience, and I expect to be able to use all my existing products till the hardware fails.

What this event has convince me though is to now look at/recommend smart systems that are truly modular in the sense that the smart bits can be periodically replaced at low cost, while the core “dumb” electronic hardware can be of such build/after sales support, that it justifies the higher investment in the consequent price, if better sound quality is also needed than what the smart front ends can alone provide. But that's for the future.

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NeedSleep

Renowned Enthusiast I

Could you post a link to the reference document for blocking updates? The one link I can find is broken.. Much appreciateed

How is blocking Sonos updates a better option than remaining on the Sonos Legacy version? I’m not seeing the advantage there.

As a hedge against the legacy program as Sonos is unwilling or unable to provide details. I will update after if the program is ok.

exdirtfarmer

Enthusiast II

Could you post a link to the reference document for blocking updates? The one link I can find is broken.. Much appreciateed

How is blocking Sonos updates a better option than remaining on the Sonos Legacy version? I’m not seeing the advantage there.

It is not better at this point. It will probably be necessary to get on the Legacy Software. But I prefer to have control over when I get the Sonos updates. I want to update on my terms and not when company comes over and accidently hits the update button. There is NO GOING BACK to 8.4. Maybe this options iwll be available with Legacy Software.

Blocking the update at 8.4 was necessary for me to continue to use the system as I was with the CR-100 controller. I rarely use it but it’s a museum piece for me, nostalgia, like a turntable.

Powered by Firmware/Software 8.4 with Classic Blue Desktop Controller + CR100 + Ipod Dock + Homeseer 3 Sonos UPNP Plugin by dcorsus

K

KumarAuthor

I’ve deleted a number of responses. They were taking the thread in a direction it was not meant to go.

Can we please focus on the intended subject of the topic? There’s enough other topics that are rife with negativity. Thanks in advance.

I had a moment when I noticed that my posts suggesting just this have disappeared, but I now see they were pulled for good reasons, so I am fine with the intent behind that action.

N

NeedSleep

Renowned Enthusiast I

I’ve deleted a number of responses. They were taking the thread in a direction it was not meant to go.

Can we please focus on the intended subject of the topic? There’s enough other topics that are rife with negativity. Thanks in advance.

You deleted the post by Footsore with lots of relevant information and on topic. Can you put it back please?

Edward R

Retired Sonos Staff

I’ve deleted a number of responses. They were taking the thread in a direction it was not meant to go.

Can we please focus on the intended subject of the topic? There’s enough other topics that are rife with negativity. Thanks in advance.

I had a WTF moment when I noticed that my posts suggesting just this have disappeared, but I now see they were pulled for good reasons, so I am fine with the intent behind that action.

Hey, Kumar. Yeah, I can very well imagine, I’m sorry for the momentary confusion there. I just felt that your responses seemed out of place if the offending comments were removed and yours weren’t.

Try searching our articles for help with your question: https://www.sonos.com/en/support

Edward R

Retired Sonos Staff

There’s a version here - although some of the version numbers have changed, the basic principles hold :-

www.amun.org.uk/Sonos/Sonos Lock Down Procedures.pdf

I found it very useful when I locked my system down - I just don’t know who to thank for it :-)

I tried to post a longform copy of this up but was sent for moderation - I guess too long (or too many links). Who wrote it up, I think the user was Colin. Much of the investigative was collaborative and added to by numerous posters in the lengthy thread, now conveniently locked, then archived! There was a whole bunch of users trying to help each other and jgatie just being a troll as usual.

I use Open DNS to block:

update-firmware.sonos.com
update.sonos.com

As it is easier to do it there then in my Unifi Router which is a bit rubbish at blocking specific websites (but good at other stuff)

Dave

Here you go, @NeedSleep. Please leave the profanity out of your posts henceforth.

Try searching our articles for help with your question: https://www.sonos.com/en/support

K

KumarAuthor

@Edward R. Got it, appreciate the clarification.

Moving on...(hopefully🙂)

exdirtfarmer

Enthusiast II

Sorry, I am thinking that the Legacy Software term will be used for the version used/released in May when they roll out the new software incompatible with older devices. I guess we are all currently running Legacy Software. Mine is even more Legacy than most.

Powered by Firmware/Software 8.4 with Classic Blue Desktop Controller + CR100 + Ipod Dock + Homeseer 3 Sonos UPNP Plugin by dcorsus

A

amun

Could you post a link to the reference document for blocking updates? The one link I can find is broken.. Much appreciateed

How is blocking Sonos updates a better option than remaining on the Sonos Legacy version? I’m not seeing the advantage there.

Depends how much you trust Sonos, and what’s in their ‘upgrades’…. By locking the system off, it’s entirely up to me what happens on my system.

From my purely selfish personal point of view, if the legacy version is benign, then it would be a good thing for me, as I wouldn’t have to go to any effort to block it off any more. Apart from the fact that I’d have to buy yet another controller, of course ;-)

melvimbe

Could you post a link to the reference document for blocking updates? The one link I can find is broken.. Much appreciateed

How is blocking Sonos updates a better option than remaining on the Sonos Legacy version? I’m not seeing the advantage there.

It is not better at this point. It will probably be necessary to get on the Legacy Software. But I prefer to have control over when I get the Sonos updates. I want to update on my terms and not when company comes over and accidently hits the update button. There is NO GOING BACK to 8.4. Maybe this options iwll be available with Legacy Software.

Blocking the update at 8.4 was necessary for me to continue to use the system as I was with the CR-100 controller. I rarely use it but it’s a museum piece for me, nostalgia, like a turntable.

Sonos has stated that updates will be blocked automatically if you have a legacy product in your system. But if you don’t trust that, or want to stay on the Legacy version even when you don’t have any legacy products, then I guess blocking updates is a good option.

Danny

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