Easily accessible group & volume scenes

  • 19 March 2013
  • 17 replies
  • 1215 views

Userlevel 1
It would be great if you could store "scenes", i.e. predefined groups and associated volume levels. They should be as easily accessible as the 'Sonos favorites'. An example would be "party" which could group all units in the house and sets the volume at the right levels between the units. Or "watching movie" which only turns on the playbar and associated Play:3 or Play:5's in the tv room, a the right volume level and turns off all other sonos units in the house. Or "OFF" which degroups all units and puts them all on mute.

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17 replies

Userlevel 1
This is such a great idea. We recently built a home with 24 different sonos zones. Volume management is a bit crazy. It would be FANTASTIC to have some volume presets to help manage it all.
Userlevel 1
This is a really good idea! I would very much like to be able to choose "Pool Party" or "Rock out in the Kitchen" and have the groups and inputs switch at once.

FWIW the way my swimming pool controller does the setup for their equivalent is very simple and clean (and from memory the Philips Hue lighting works the same way). You just set everything to the way you want it - the case of Sonos that would be setting the groupings, what is playing on each group, volumes, etc - and then hit one button save a snapshot of all those settings as a "scene" which you name. This avoids needing to clutter the user interface with any specific editing/customization of the scene at all, just simply all that needs to be exposed is the (1) a button with ability to take a snapshot of the whole system and prompt the name of the scene, then (2) a selectable list of saved scenes which when one is selected sets everything back to that saved set of settings again. After that of course, you can just add any other zones, change volumes, change inputs, etc as normal.
Userlevel 2
This reply was created from a merged topic originally titled sound scenes.  I have to admit I'm quite surprised that Sonos hasn't done one of the
most simple things that would elevate them into the level of Crestron or Savant. simple audio scene or volume recall!!

 It would be incredibly easy for you to create custom presets that allows you on your numerous  sonos zones to set volume levels across all the zones just like a scene...  
So when I come home I can hit a scene called "party" and actually have my favorite station or set list playing and all 12 of my Sonos amps fine-tuned volumized for that event..  instead of everytime i come home having to individually adjust a massive amount of volumes depending on what i want to do.
I can't understand why it hasn't been done yet
would be great to get the option to choose between mode/scene 1 ( playbar with sub & 2 play 3) for tv and mode/scene 2 ( play 3 & sub) for music ( all players are in the same room)

i guess that i am not the only one who would like to separate TV & music sonos experience by putting the playbar aside if not watching TV - esp. as the PLAY 3s & sub are "covering" the whole room!

its currently anoying to separate the rear chanels first, then pair them as a stereo setup , then disconect the sub from the playbar and re add the sub to the play 3s ( & don t forget to fullfil the sub setup each time!) - would be easy if both setups were done once and then saved....
Same sort of problem 1 room using multiple speakers in different combinations. One group focused on TV viewing with bar and rear. The other group 4 play ones around the room for music so no specific focus required Come on support team this should not be too hard to implement
Userlevel 2
It's really surprising that this needs hasn't been recognized and solved by now. The Sonos products are otherwise so elegant.

It's a massive pain in the butt to have to use the clunky grouping UI and fiddle volume levels over and over again to get things balanced and enjoyable. Every day using the Sonos requires this.

To add to the good ideas above regarding "snapshotting" the current settings, there should be an iOS notification screen extension that let's you recall such scenes even from the lock screen. Then you don't have to go to all the steps just to get to the various UIs for setting volumes and groups. (A precedent for this is the Lutron lighting control app.)

The slow pace of app innovation at Sonos is disconcerting. The app IS the user interface to the system... we would expect to have this refined monthly and not have to wait years for features like this. There are many ways that Apple, Samsung, Google and even Amazon could lap Sonos. It's feeling like a matter of time before they will.
Userlevel 2
Add audio scenes (set volume levels for zones) and zone lock our abilities ( for the kiddies to not turn on dads master bedroom by accident )
So simple and already available on numerous simplified home controllers like hue etc. come on ! 😞
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+1 this would increase the functionality of Sonos for me 200%. I like my Sonos system, I have a dozen components, but having alarms that turn on scenes (group speakers, select source, adjust volume) would make me LOVE LOVE LOVE it.
Userlevel 1
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I need this so bad! Please make it happen Sonos... I want to be able to lock "Volume ratios" so that my 1´s are always a tad lower then my 5...
Userlevel 1
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I concur! This is a very fundamental feature for usability. I currently have to uses rules in OpenHAB home automation to make this happen. Saving settings as snapshot presets seems rather simple from an implementation standpoint.
Userlevel 1
Please, please, please add scenes Sonos! I desparately want to be able to switch to different multi-room configurations in one step. And it's critical that I be able to group multiple components in a scene to listen to the TV output from our playbar!
Userlevel 7
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Please, please, please add scenes Sonos! I desparately want to be able to switch to different multi-room configurations in one step. And it's critical that I be able to group multiple components in a scene to listen to the TV output from our playbar!

This is a popular request and one that I am sure Sonos are aware of. I'm not sure describing it as critical is realistic given that you would still need a controller to activate the required scene and grouping speakers is already trivially easy and quick.
Userlevel 1
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Actually grouping is easy. Setting relative volume is a pain in the ass that requires walking around the house and tweaking for relative volume. Computers and apps are supposed to mundane tasks for us like repeatable settings. Ones the house is grouped and relative volumes set for a party, it's ridiculous to not be able to save that as a scene or preset.
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We need this!
I'm new to sonos but have purchase 6 play3, 6 play1, 2 subs and sound bar - 15 and counting... this is such a obvious HOLE in the application and to see that this thread was starting 5 years ago is discouraging. NICK MILLINGTON this needs you!
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I'm new to sonos but have purchase 6 play3, 6 play1, 2 subs and sound bar - 15 and counting... this is such a obvious HOLE in the application and to see that this thread was starting 5 years ago is discouraging. NICK MILLINGTON this needs you!

The SonoSequencr app really works great for now. /:
A good start here would be to allow the sub to belong to more Stereo Pairs