music cutting out - sonos sound cloud is unreliable

Hi ​@mdshamilton 

Thanks for your post!

Sorry to hear of the audio interruptions you’ve had on your Sonos system - I’m sure we’ll be able to fix them.

I’m going to be a bit pedantic here, but with technical explanations, it’s a must.

1. Sonos never downloads music - it streams it. 
2. We have not streamed music stored on phones for a couple of years (without the use of AirPlay, Bluetooth or UPnP/DLNA, that is).
3. Soundcloud is a music service. You can add Soundcloud to your Sonos system, but this is the only time your Sonos system will communicate with them.

A major recent change is that when initiating playback, the request for music goes through our cloud servers, but not the music itself - it is still streamed from the server supplying it to your Sonos speaker(s). One advantage of this is that it allows the Sonos Web App to work, which will soon replace the Desktop apps, the removal of which will allow or development teams to concentrate more on further improving the app experience.

I don’t think any of this is the cause of the audio interruptions you experience, but it’s hard to guess what might be - there are many possibilities. We are here for you, though, so 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.

I hope this helps.

Thank you for the explanation. I use Apple Music which doesn’t cut out when playing to headphones or from my phone. Did S1 stream from my phone and my downloaded music? Why do so many customers complain about music cutting out? What has Sonos done to investigate and address this ongoing problem? 

Hi ​@mdshamilton 

Your phone is not in the exact same location as your speaker, so it’s possible that interference is affecting it but not your phone, for example.

I don’t remember if On This Device (as a selectable source) was removed before or after the S1/S2 split, but at one point any Sonos system could do so, yes. If it were up to us, you’d still be able to - we were forced to removed the feature due to iOS and Android changing what apps were allowed to do.

Many people suffer interference - especially those in cities, and even more especially those who live in apartments. Interference is easily the single most common cause for such playback issues, and it is unique to each system, and indeed speaker, at times.

How we address it is to look into the logs of a Sonos system and find out what can be done to mitigate things - sometimes this is as easy as changing a WiFi channel being used - sometimes people need to coordinate this with neighbours to get good results - and sometimes people just need to move a device away from their routers. These issues are not Sonos issues per se - more WiFi issues, but Sonos does use WiFi in a way that other devices do not (a small amount of bandwidth, but constant, and to other local devices rather than just to the internet).

I may have discovered the problem with music cutting out. When I first bought my Sonos about 10yrs ago I bought a recommended Boost device too (to go with a soundbar, two ones and a sub) I understand that the Arc that I have now has the ability to act as a Boost/Sonos network. So I’ve unplugged the Boost and instead plugged the cat5 cable into the Arc (to connect to the sub and 2 fives). So far I haven’t had any music drop outs. My iPhone also seems to be connecting to my WiFi 7 router more reliably so perhaps the older Boost signal was interfering with the WiFi in my house. I did contact Sonos support who pointed me to playing music from within the app and not via airplay and to uninstall and reinstall Apple Music within the app. (I did that and also uninstalled and reinstalled the Sonos app itself). 

Hi ​@mdshamilton 

Good news indeed! Fingers crossed!

For your information, all Sonos devices that have built-in ethernet ports (barring Arc Ultra) will broadcast SonosNet when connected to a network with an ethernet cable, and all speakers barring Era, Move and Roam models and the Arc Ultra will prefer SonosNet over any available WiFi network. Additionally, each speaker that picks up SonosNet will re-broadcast it, creating a mesh network.

The models mentioned will not connect to SonosNet, nor will future products - WiFi has moved on considerably since Sonos first came about, and modern routers can now cope with our demands.

If your Boost was within 1m (3 feet) of your router, that proximity was probably the initial issue.

I hope this helps.

Thanks for your response. The Boost was over 5 metres from the router which is in a different room but I think you’re right the stronger signal from a WiFi 7 router probably messed with the SonosNet from the Boost.
I still get music drop outs playing via airplay. If I have any issues going forward I’ll unplug the arc from the cat5 cable and will give that a try as a possible solution to the airplay problem. I prefer the added functionality I get from playing via airplay such as playing from the Apple classical music app and being able to select an artist in Apple Music and play all their albums (within the Sonos app that functionally doesn’t appear to be available - one album at a time only). 

Hi ​@mdshamilton 

At 5m, maybe not, but if they were on the same channel, or worse, overlapping channels, it could be an issue, yes.

AirPlay also depends on the source device’s connection - try not to walk around with the source if it is your phone while playing, and remember that the phone needs to receive and send at the same time - it is more work, so more bandwidth is needed than just playing on the phone.

Other music services allow you to start playing tracks from a single artist - the behaviour you report is Apple’s choice of what happens.

I hope this helps.

Hi ​@mdshamilton 

Great to hear that things have improved for you - thanks for updating the thread!