No Airplay 2 for Playbar. GUTTED !!!!!

one of the reasons for paying a premium for Sonos gear is the promise of longevity. if the company is going to arbitrarily obsolete product then what is the point? For example, what is the technical reason a Play 3 cannot support Airplay 2?

The older units have insufficient processing power for Airplay 2.

The older units have insufficient processing power for Airplay 2.
what about an option for a paid processor upgrade? with the board swap performed by authorised dealers - surely would be cheaper for the customer than new devices. if they do not support current technologies then the resale is poor also.....

The older units have insufficient processing power for Airplay 2.
what about an option for a paid processor upgrade? with the board swap performed by authorised dealers - surely would be cheaper for the customer than new devices. if they do not support current technologies then the resale is poor also.....

I highly doubt the processor can be upgraded easily and inexpensively enough to make it worth it to Sonos and/or its customers.

[quote=jI highly doubt the processor can be upgraded easily and inexpensively enough to make it worth it to Sonos and/or its customers.[/quote]

The Playbar is CAD $899 + taxes = CAD $1035

I agree that an hardware upgrade perform by an authorized dealer ($$) that would cost let's say between CAD $300 and $400 and only add Airplay 2 compatibility, would not be attractive to many customers. Thus not worth to Sonos.

But, if Sonos would come up with a small box, compatible with Airplay 2, with optical and HDMI inputs, that would be receiving from now on the signal that is currently being sent to the Playbar.

Exemple, in my case, from the optical output of my TV which gets all the different signals from the HDMI output of my Rotel pre-amp/processor/now-retired-and-only-acting-as-HDMI switch. Btw my Rotel wish to thank Sonos for the very smart idea of not putting at least one HDMI input on the Playbar when every other similar devices in the industry already had at least one even 5 years ago. So now my TV optical output would go in the small box optical input.

And that small box would dispatch the signal through wi-fi (or RJ-45 hardwire connection) to all speakers : Front/Center/Right channels to the Playbar and Left/Right surrounds to ANY rear surround speakers (not only new AP2 compatible surround speakers like Sonos One).

That way, only the new small box would need the new AP2 compativle hardware. And the small box would play to role of the master device. The Playbar would become a slave device (F/C/R channels) exactly as a pair of Sonos One is on a 5.1 setup (L/R surrounds).

Sonos came up many years ago with a small box called The Bridge (if I remember correctly) so that someone could put up an exclusive wi-fi network only for his Sonos setup. I'm sure Sonos could come up with a similar box to give AP2 and HDMI (and more powerful CPU and memory thus compatible with futur features via wifi updates ) to customers that paid CAD $2000 for a Playbar + Sub combo or even more for a 5.1 setup. Those customers might probably be willing to pay $200 or $300 for such a box to keep their more than $2000 equipment up-to-date.

Just an idea...