Bose Discontinuing Soundtouch

Oops, title should be Soundtouch, not Soundlink, which is their BT speaker line.

I'm confused. The moderator stated "We will still continue to support our SoundTouch products with new updates and support. " I suppose that is confirmation that they'll be no new products.

Honestly, I'd rather they continue the line. My guess would be that they are not leaving the multiroom audio space, just opting to use airplay 2, alexa multiroom, etc for protocols and GUI interfaces. They'll still make smart speaker products.

Their new speaker line, which was on display at BB (no sign of the Soundtouch line), makes no mention of multi room. I think they’ve given up, perhaps due to so many issues, or perhaps Sonos patent infringement. They’re pushing Alexa integration, perhaps they’re going to use Alexa’s multi room capabilities.

https://www.bose.com/en_us/products/speakers/smart_home/smart_speakers.html

Notice how evasive the Bose reps are regarding Soundtouch in this thread. Their new line is completely new, from the ground up, incompatible with Soundtouch. She’s dead, Jim.

https://community.bose.com/t5/SoundTouch-Speakers/Smart-Home-series-seriously-seriously-Bose/m-p/148053

Imagine the uproar in here if Sonos started making Alexa controlled speakers that were 100% incompatible with Sonos speakers sold in the past? This forum would be burned to the ground.

Next time a poster threatens to shoot the bunny by going to Bose, the conversation is going to end pretty quick. 😃

That's an excellent thread you've found there, and really illustrates the different philosophies between Sonos and Bose in terms of support and release of products. Bose is going with the traditional 'product line' approach. With Bose method, you will never get any bricked devices the way you potentially do with Sonos. Bose doesn't worry about old devices working with new devices, as they are just declared to be within different product lines not designed to work together. Which is great for those customers that are completely satisfied with what they currently have, and horrible for customers who want their investments to grow with new products and features.

I like Sonos approach much better, since it fits my buying habits better. I don't want my devices to be out of date and incompatible with anything new 2 years after I bought them. At the same time, I'm replacing devices after 5 years or so, even if they still work fine, with the latest and greatest version.

Yes it is a shame they will not support backward compatibility with their multi room system. But at least for the HT system components will be able to work with the new sound bars. So if a bose user has the bose Acoutimass sub and surround speaker for the solo or 300, they will work with the soundbar 300 and 700 if they chose to upgrade to a smart soundbar. But if it will stop working with satellite speaker in other rooms. But Bose is going to add more smart speaker to give multi room with alexa enable smart speakers. So you will see a wave smart speaker next year.

shoturtle wrote:

But Bose is going to add more smart speaker to give multi room with alexa enable smart speakers. So you will see a wave smart speaker next year.

All of which will be completely incompatible with three generations of their SoundTouch speakers. Bad news for existing customers who want to expand.

I assume Sonos is also going to "add more smart speaker to give multi room with alexa enable (sic) smart speakers". Except their new models will be compatible with all previous models. There is no defending Bose on this one.

What about all those people that have come on here to say "Sonos sucks I'm jumping ship to Bose"?

Its especially funny the people who are like you discontinued my 10 year old remote or dock or hey Sonos probably will end of life my ZonePlayer ….. I need to go to Bose? Really? I mean its comical.