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Question

era100 rear speakers fail to update when paired with Arc

  • February 19, 2026
  • 3 replies
  • 23 views
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My rear speakers never update, but everything else does.

This seems to be a Sonos bug that they refuse to acknowledge.

The issue is that from a network perspective the Arc and its subs appear as one entity all having the same MAC address (the arc connects to the network on wifi 2.4GHz and to the subs using a local 5GHz signal that does not go through the router).

Come update time there is no network route to the subs, and the arc does not have the smarts to do the update on behalf of the subs.

As a work around I have allocated the subs mac address in my router. When the update to the subs fails, I turn off the arc, restart the app, do an update, usually twice, once for each sub, then turn on the arc and we are back working.

This is better that resetting subs as a lot of the advice suggests.

It would be nice if there someone had a better workaround as it is obviously a network issues, not signal strength, interference etc.

3 replies

Stanley_4
  • Stanley_4
  • Grand Maestro
  • February 19, 2026

The Sub and surrounds appear to fall back to your Wi-Fi connection if the main speaker's 5 gHz link isn't available.

If you assigned DHCP reserved addresses to all Sonos that often helps. Only doing some Sonos hasn't really been tested.

Did you do a network refresh to lock in the new addresses once reserved? Power down all Sonos Reboot router and controller then power the Sonos back up. 

If after all of this you still have issues submit several diagnostics. One before the update, one after the initial update fails and a third after the update with the primary speaker powered down. Then call Sonos Support and give them the diagnostic numbers and discuss your issue.

106rallye
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  • 106rallye
  • February 19, 2026

“This seems to be a Sonos bug that they refuse to acknowledge.

The issue is that from a network perspective the Arc and its subs appear as one entity all having the same MAC address (the arc connects to the network on wifi 2.4GHz and to the subs using a local 5GHz signal that does not go through the router).”

This is not a “Sonos bug” but just the way Sonos works. If it would be a bug there would be a lot more complaints - my Arc Ultra and surrounds work the same way and my surrounds are updated with the rest of my system. So there must be something special to your network that prevents the surrounds from being updated. Can you tell us what components (router, access points etc.) drive your network?

 

    buzz
    • buzz
    • February 19, 2026

    I think that the issue is that after the SUB and surrounds switch to the private 5GHz connection, the router may assume that they are no longer on the network because they have been quiet for so long and the router may give up their default IP address assignments. Then, during an update they will try to use their WiFi connection, but there may then be a conflict. Try powering down the soundbar. The SUB and surrounds should switch to WiFi. Now you can reserve the SUB and surround IP addresses.

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