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digiMusic
Contributor I
December 2, 2015
Question

When will Sonos support Airplay?

  • December 2, 2015
  • 37 replies
  • 4180 views
Hi Sonos,
Please somebody tell us, if and when airplay support will be added. It is definitely possible to do as some people have already written open source code to do it. But it is a hassle to use as I need to run a program on my mac to be able to stream music directly to my sonos speakers from my music app on my iPhone or iTunes. I can already now stream my AppleMusic from the cloud , I can stream DRM music. With airplay we just don't need to worry about your controller limitations.

Why can't you guys add official support,so I don't need to remember to start the service on my mac?
You are in the business of hardware, let Apple and others be in the business of music software.
I am now Apple Music subscriber and most of my music is in the cloud. and all the speakers I bought over $4000 USD would be worthless to me because none of my new music is accessible via official channels.
Thank god for the open source project that makes is available and simple. So it is doable even by people who do not privy to your internals. It should be very easy for official Sonos developers.

Also I don't like your player interface! It is NOT as good as Apple or Spotify. Please Please can you just add support for AirPlay?

And if NOT, please tell me WHY NOT?

Regards,

-D.
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    37 replies

    Show previous replies
    Fofer
    Collaborator II
    February 10, 2016
    You didn't address the part of my post that said I "don't really care." By that definition, it's illegal to circumvent DRM, in order to rip purchased DVDs, to be able to backup, archive and organize and stream them from a media server, too. I (and many, many people) are still doing it. We don't care. Personally, I'm willing to take my chances, and I'll deal with the "punishment" if I were to be singled out for this crime. I will continue to use SonoAir because it makes my Sonos players capable of receiving AirPlay streams. Easy, and free.

    Call it civil disobedience, if you will. I don't care.
    Fofer
    Collaborator II
    February 10, 2016
    PS - The post you replied to was a couple months old. At the time, SonoAir was incompatible, due to the screwing around I mentioned above.

    PS - The tweet offering SonoAir beta 5 was posted on November 5. A month before your post.

    https://twitter.com/mihosoft/status/662399840614268928
    jgatie
    jgatie
    February 10, 2016
    You didn't address the part of my post that said I "don't really care." By that definition, it's illegal to circumvent DRM, in order to rip purchased DVDs, to be able to backup, archive and organize and stream them from a media server, too. I (and many, many people) are still doing it. We don't care. Personally, I'm willing to take my chances, and I'll deal with the "punishment" if I were to be singled out for this crime. I will continue to use SonoAir because it makes my Sonos players capable of receiving AirPlay streams. Easy, and free.

    Call it civil disobedience, if you will. I don't care.

    Why should I address the fact you don't care? You doubted it was illegal, I told you why it was. I even put in the caveat that it is only according to the letter of the law and is basically ignored except in cases involving billion dollar companies. And in no way was I chastising you for using SonoAir (or, if you are the creator, for writing it), nor was I saying you are a criminal. I simply was describing why a billion dollar company would not want to step over the line as easily as a guy in his basement would.

    As to your second post, at the time of my posting, I believed it was not working. I don't make it a habit to keep up with the release notes of a piece of software I do not use, so I was going by hearsay. I apologize for any inconvenience, and if you are the creator and feel you have suffered damages, feel free to sue! 😉
    Fofer
    Collaborator II
    February 10, 2016
    For the record, no, I didn't "doubt it was illegal." I repeated a word you put forth, said I didn't know -- and concluded by expressing my lack of care. Saying I didn't know and that I didn't care is not the same as doubting your assertion.

    No, I'm not the creator of SonoAir, either. Just a happy user, of a cool piece of software, that nicely fills an annoying gap. And I'm happy to share information about it with others who'd equally appreciate it. 🙂
    jgatie
    jgatie
    February 10, 2016
    "Illegal? I dunno (and don't really care...)"

    "I dunno" to me expresses either doubt or lack of knowledge, to either of which my reply was quite apt. If I misinterpreted? Again , , , sue me.
    Fofer
    Collaborator II
    February 10, 2016
    To answer the question posed by this thread, Sonos (most likely) won't be incorporating AirPlay anytime soon.
    But at least for Mac users, there's a 3rd party solution that's working fine right now.

    To be helpful, here are the relevant links:

    http://sonoair.mihosoft.eu/
    https://twitter.com/mihosoft/status/662399840614268928
    http://sonoair.mihosoft.eu/releases/experimental/SonoAir.zip

    Enjoy!
    jdesm
    Lyricist III
    February 21, 2016
    Thanks all for your answers. In terms of my question re:delay, it seems like airsonos (at least the raspberry version I tested) is consistently about 2-3 secs behind the rest of the airplay speakers out.

    The Airplay+Connect:Amp/Play 5 method is about 100ms uncompressed, probably half a second compressed.

    Through my apartment I do hear the difference no matter what, but it's usable at least for a while whilst I replace my last airplay speakers with Sonos equivalents (but it's quite a budget...!)

    Last little thing though - for some reason, using the "official" route, whilst the Connect:Amp plays the music fine, if I group speakers, the grouped speakers (i.e., not the ones connected to the amp) tend to drop out. Clearly, Airplay is not the issue as the speakers connected to the Amp keep playing; also, there are no dropouts when I use other sources (Apple Music, radio, etc)... is there anything different that I should be aware of, that is due to the fact that I'm using the line in source?

    (next I'll try to plug the connect via Ethernet, but am worried it may not help much as the play 1's I'm connecting to are wireless anyway...)

    Thanks!
    chicks
    chicks
    February 22, 2016
    Airplay sucks up wifi bandwidth, because the stream goes from your router to the iDevice, back to the router, and finally, to the Airport Express. It is almost certainly the cause of your dropouts, which are a well documented issue for Airplay. Sonos uses its own mesh network (unless you have it set to wifi mode, not recommended for more than a node or two), so is far more immune to dropouts.
    jdesm
    Lyricist III
    February 22, 2016
    Thanks; it's clearly not AirPlay though as the AirPlay connection is wired and also, the Connect Amp doesn't shut the sound. However I do have wifi mode enabled, maybe I'll try to go for mesh - thanks!
    digiMusicAuthor
    Contributor I
    February 23, 2016
    air-sonos works again! this is the best solution. I like what Sonos did with giving me ability to stream from Apple Music, but it is not enough.
    I can't "like" songs from Sonos app and I can't add them to "myMusic" and I can't really explore. Also, still can't play apple music files already downloaded to my iPhone or iMac because sonos controller can't do it. it can ONLY stream from AppleMusic directly.

    If they had added all features I just described, I would not need air-sonos. Otherwise, it is the best and only solution that really allows to consume music in a way that is suitable for me.
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