Contributor I

Answered

How to determine the end-of-life (EOL) for each Sonos product?

Forum|Forum|6 years ago
January 22, 2020
58 replies
31304 views

Now that Sonos have announced that their products have an end-of-life (EOL), sometimes in as little as 5 years from purchase, can they please clarify their expected EOL projections for all products? Classifying them as “modern” or “legacy” does not help and is far too simplistic. Products can move status overnight without warning.

It would be useful to know that a Sonos product bought today for several hundred pounds is expected to be viable for, say, 5yrs. If Sonos wishes to be a software company, they will need to embrace a more mature approach to this issue, and offer an SLA within each product sale to set customer expectations.

For example, the Windows 10 support life-cycle has a five-year mainstream support phase that began on July 29, 2015, and a second five-year extended support phase that begins in 2020 and extends until October 2025. Microsoft manages this level of expectation management and costs a fraction of the cost of a home speaker system.

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Best answer by Ken_Griffiths

He also clarifies things here…

https://en.community.sonos.com/announcements-228985/introducing-sonos-move-brilliant-sound-anywhere-6829500/index9.html#post16395469

As I read it, Sonos look to provide customer support/updates for their products for 5 years or so after they actually stop manufacturing them and even then they will just step back to what we can perhaps now call 'legacy unsupported' mode and remain in that mode until they give up their ghost. Whilst in legacy mode the devices will simply not receive any further software updates.

As a customer myself with a large number of their (old/new) products, that all sounds very fair to me, but it’s each to their own I guess.

Show previous replies

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yeager1212

Lyricist I

I feel many will try to unload their soon to be unsupported Sonos products, cut their losses and walk away from this company. As may I..

I haveonly owned Sonos products for a little over a couple years. Seeing the end is near on $1200 I spent. Was getting ready to buy one of their surround systems until the latest support announcement...

Really hate this throw away society we are living in....

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NeedSleep

Renowned Enthusiast I

But that’s the rub isn’t it. What’s the end of the manufacturing period? Will Sonos let us know? I have some Play:1 units that have been discontinued but when was their manufacturing end date? How are the Play:1 units along that 5yr window?

This was my original point - reference again Windows 10 example, where a consumer has a clear idea of the level of support they are going to recieve or when it will now end.

I guess Sonos customers can hope they aren’t buying at the end of the manufacturing period

Oh yeah I totally agree with your points. I think in time they will have to be up front about this or who is going to want to roll the dice?

The play one is a good example. They are still being sold in retail channels today. Sonos has discontinued them since the one SL came out. How much longer will they have software support for?

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rwrgeo

Renowned Enthusiast II

The Play:1 situation sounds complicated. As its not been replaced I don’t even know if the Play:3 ceased manufacturing.

Another good example here is the Connect, from what I’m reading it’s only pre 2015 that are legacy but seems like the hardware revision wasn’t widely publicised, model names description remain the same etc. This component was only publicly replaced last year. People may have unwittingly bought a legacy product in the last five years - either new or second hand - without knowing they were buying an old model.

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bonervz

Enthusiast II

The Play:1 situation sounds complicated. As its not been replaced I don’t even know if the Play:3 ceased manufacturing.

Another good example here is the Connect, from what I’m reading it’s only pre 2015 that are legacy but seems like the hardware revision wasn’t widely publicised, model names description remain the same etc. This component was only publicly replaced last year. People may have unwittingly bought a legacy product in the last five years - either new or second hand - without knowing they were buying an old model.

All SONOS are legacy now in my view as you cannot trust SONOS. Who knows when my next $500 investment will end up as a $500 unsupported POS. So to answer the question and stay on topic for fear of being deleted (SONOS do not like criticism), the end-of-life (EOL) for ALL SONOS products was two days ago. Cheers.

Sonos from leader to loser in 2020.

T

torchill

Contributor II

Between this failed bricking of old devices experiment and the belief that bricking devices is ECO-Friendly, I am done with SONOS!!! Bring on BOSE.,

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wjjakobo

Lyricist I

The Play:1 situation sounds complicated. As its not been replaced I don’t even know if the Play:3 ceased manufacturing.

Another good example here is the Connect, from what I’m reading it’s only pre 2015 that are legacy but seems like the hardware revision wasn’t widely publicised, model names description remain the same etc. This component was only publicly replaced last year. People may have unwittingly bought a legacy product in the last five years - either new or second hand - without knowing they were buying an old model.

All SONOS are legacy now in my view as you cannot trust SONOS. Who knows when my next $500 investment will end up as a $500 unsupported POS. So to answer the question and stay on topic for fear of being deleted (SONOS do not like criticism), the end-of-life (EOL) for ALL SONOS products was two days ago. Cheers.

Amen. Not sure why any of us invested in Sonos when the life of a Sonos speaker turns out to be 1/4 as long as any other speaker product.

D

DK_Madsen

Enthusiast II

But that’s the rub isn’t it. What’s the end of the manufacturing period? Will Sonos let us know? I have some Play:1 units that have been discontinued but when was their manufacturing end date? How are the Play:1 units along that 5yr window?

This was my original point - reference again Windows 10 example, where a consumer has a clear idea of the level of support they are going to recieve or when it will now end.

I guess Sonos customers can hope they aren’t buying at the end of the manufacturing period

The play 1 was discontinued in 2017, but still to this day i am able to buy a brand new play 1 from a national electronics seller.

No one knows when the last Play 1 rolled of the production line, maybe they had HUGE stock of Play 1’s when they discontinued it and this stock is still being sold.

Who knows if the killdate will be 5 years from the last Play 1 was sold in the retail link or it is 5 years from last produced box.

If i was a retailer and Sonos contacted me with an offer to buy up Play 1 stock and they did not tell me that less than 5 years from i purchased it, it would be made obsolete even though sonos has always said it was a “lifetime” support company, i would be livid, because i would know that some of the grief that people would direct at Sonos for doing this, would rub of on me for selling people these devices.

Stanley_4

Grand Maestro

The play 1 was discontinued in 2017,

I’m not sure where you got that date, the Play 1 was available here, new from a Sonos authorized seller as recently as December. AFEES is still selling it.

https://www.shopmyexchange.com/browse/electronics/_/N-4294831683+103533

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SonosManu

Enthusiast II

Everybody should sign the petition here:

http://chng.it/jrkJMZDnpg

Jahoker

Contributor I

The play 1 was discontinued in 2017,

I’m not sure where you got that date, the Play 1 was available here, new from a Sonos authorized seller as recently as December. AFEES is still selling it.

https://www.shopmyexchange.com/browse/electronics/_/N-4294831683+103533

Still for sale on Amazon.co.uk too, amongst a load of other UK retailers.

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