Headphone Linking, TV Audio Swap, and app control for Ace Ultra

For scenarios 4 and 5, I think you mean “transfer music” rather than the stated TV audio, since you are not in room 1 for either scenario.

Scenario 4 -

Action - Room 2 is playing music.  While in room 2, with the  Ace Ultra, press (hold) the content key to transfer music to the Ace Ultra.  Audio stops on Room 2 and plays on the Ace Ultra.    Move to room 1 and press the content key.

Result  - Audio stops on Ace Ultra and plays on room 2 ? (this is a headphone linking scenario, not TV audio swap?)

Scenario 5 -

Action - Room 2 is playing music.  While in room 2, with the  Ace Ultra, press (hold) the content key to transfer music to the Ace Ultra.  Audio stops on Room 2 and plays on the Ace Ultra.    Move to room 3 and press the content key.

Result  - Audio stops on Ace Ultra and plays on room 3...standard headphone linking  scenario.

You may also have meant music in scenario 3, as although in room 1 it was music that was playing.

Scenario 3 -

Action - Room 1 is playing music.  While in room 1, with the  Ace Ultra, press (hold) the content key to transfer music to the Ace Ultra.  Audio stops on Room 1 and plays on the Ace Ultra.    Move to room 2 and press the content key

Result  - Audio stops on Ace Ultra and plays on room 2 ? (this is a headphone linking scenario, not TV audio swap?)

I may be over simplifying this…

For TV Audio swap it’s basically a line of sight over the 5Ghz. If you leave the room the Audio will eventually drop from any Ace.

If Linking for music (Ace Ultra) you are basically on WiFi hence you can move to any room and the Link will be maintained. Dis-engaging the link no matter where you are should return the audio to the original source and the Ace Ultra resets to allow Linking or TV Audio Swap to a different source.

Using the Ace Ultra for Linking should not (TMWOT) willy-nilly drop the original source and connect to another source just being in the proximity of a different source that is playing music. That would be very upsetting to me if I started listening to classical via Linking and because I enter a room where my wife is listening to Jazz have the Ace Ultra drop my link and steal my wife’s music. Needless to say she’d be irritated as well. 😂

No, that is incorrect.

In the Open House Keynote video, Tom initially swaps audio from the turntable/Fives in the Den to Ace Ultra, then moves to family room and swaps the audio from Ace Ultra to the Beam. It does not automatically return to the original source, but to the speaker/room you are closest with.

As ​@Mr. T says, see about 2:30 in...

Well if that’s the case the speaker taking the audio better not be in use. As I can see major problems with your senario if someone else is using the speaker. Like my wife ☹️

I hope the Ace Ultra is smart enough not to steal audio from  a speaker already in use.

That is if you use the Content Key. I’d imagine if you just turned Ace Ultra off then the audio would be returned to the original source. Therefore, depending on how and where you “dis-engage” the link determines the possible outcomes.

To your point that needs to be clear in the documentation so as not to cause a ruckus in the home.

Oops.  Looks like I didn’t proofread enough.  Corrections made to the original post.

From the support documentation, I still believe headphone linking only applies to music, with no change to how TV Audio Swap works currently.

Therefore, clarification from Sonos would be helpful.

TV Audio Swap applies to TV audio.

Headphone linking applies to music, with no crossover between the two.

And if a speaker is Grouped to a HT Room playing TV audio, what happens?

There is a technology in the personal printing world called “Follow-Me Printing”. You may already know of this but I’ll elaborate in case someone is unaware. 

Follow-Me Printing is used extensively in colleges and universities. A student can start a print job in their dorm and print it out at the lecture hall. Thus the term Follow-Me Printing.

If using the Ace Ultra in my media room and I walk into my Den I should have the option to either release the audio back to the original source or just turn off the Ace Ultra as suggested or transfer the audio to a speaker not in use using the action button...thus initiating a Follow-Me Music scenario.

Pressing the action button should not automatically transfer the music to another speaker or cause me to have to remember to turn the Ace Ultra off to prevent the transfer from happening. Therefore, either through a specific number of pushes on the Action Button should music be transferred to a speaker just because I’m in the proximity. I would favor using the action button as follows:

• One push to transfer the audio back to the original source or stop it
• Two pushes to transfer the audio to a speaker not in use

Of course all the above is a want by me; and not necessarily what SONOS wants.

EDIT regarding a previous post above:

• During setup of the Ace Ultra the user can set it for both TV Audio Swap and Linking or just one or the other.

Except those actions already have existing functionality.

You can already do this ‘stealing audio’ with speakers already though.  Start music playback in one room 1.  With the Sonos app, clock on the speaker icon (for grouping)  next to room 1,  then deselect room 1 and select room 2.

I’m not sure about returning to source if the Ace Ultra is powered down.  That could be a problem functionally if you did not want music to start playing back at the original source.

https://support.sonos.com/en-us/article/known-limitations-with-headphone-linkingI find the limitation of one Ace Ultra per system for headphone linking to be interesting.  I can see that being the case if you only had one compatible speaker to ‘host’ the headphones, but if you have multiple compatible speakers, why can’t they all ‘host’ headphones.  I wonder if perhaps it’s more that you would run into confusing issues, as users would probably want the headphones to play the same content at times.

Also interesting that there is a restriction on content sources..  My guess would be that the ‘host’ is using it’s own resources to send audio to the Ace Ultra, so perhaps the more complex (high resource usage) don’t allow enough resources for headphone swapping?  That begs the question, if one room is the source, and grouped to another room, couldn’t the second room have enough resources to host an ace ultra regardless of the original source?  Again, perhaps they are just disallowing the complex sources in order to keep the rules relatively simple for users.

A single press of the content key will pause the music.  A long press will perform the linking feature to move audio to/from the closest Sonos room.

https://support.sonos.com/en-us/article/sonos-ace-ultra-button-controls

Given that, if you have audio playing in Ace Ultra that you don’t want to transfer to the current room your in, just pause it.  If you want to transfer to the original room, you probably need to walk back to that room before transferring.  In most cases, this should be fine, as why would you want the music to play in a room you are not currently in.  I do wonder if you can transfer the audio via the Sonos app though.

I was just thinking what happens currently when you turn off Ace during an active TV Audio Swap session. But for headphone linking, it would make more sense to not resume the audio on the source device, unless that action is specifically requested by the user. ie. not just turning Ace Ultra off.

Whatever the outcome of Linking with music when done it is what it is. I’ll be able to experiment when I get my own set. Unless one of you Beta testers want to spill the beans.😂

However, that said if I’m done with Linking I rather have the music return to the original source or just stop which would be a choice of which button I push. 

If pushing the action button while in another room links to that particular speaker what happens if I have multiple rooms in the same space 🤔.

It’s like dividing by zero.

My take… I think Tom’s use of pull and push are key for music linking (not talking about TV swap). By using the button on the headphones, you pull the music from the closest speaker to the headphones. You push the music from the headphones to the closest speaker. Somehow, it determines the closest speaker. You turn the headphones off, nothing happens, headphones turn off (my guess). You apparently can also control what will play in the headphones with the Sonos controller. But we’ll have to see what that looks like.

TV swap most likely works like it currently does, using the closest soundbar to swap/swap back.

JMHO - not  a beta tester

Why show an existing feature? Keynotes are for ‘new’ stuff ;)

But I still want to know about Linking to a Grouped speaker connected to a HT Room playing TV audio. 

Say, as an example:

• I have my Arc Ultra Room Grouped to my Play 5 gen 2 Room, both playing TV sound.
• I want to listen to the TV audio in my garage, that is out of range of the Swap option, but has good Wi-Fi coverage.
• I Link to the Grouped Play 5 Room that is already playing the TV audio to my Ace Ultras.
• Can I then hear the TV sound on the Ace when I take them to the garage?

That solves an issue that I actually have here today with my Ace headphones.