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So I recently picked up a new Sonos Move for an outdoor garden application for my father.  He wants to be able to have a wireless speaker that can be played to from his iPhone for 5+ hours in the garden, and want to be able to pair multiple of them.  The Sonos move seemed to fit the bill best.  In addition, we have already ordered everything to overhaul his wifi network (multiple indoor/outdoor access points based around TP-Link Omada).

I have the same TP-Link Omada setup in my house, and have been testing the speaker to figure out all the details before we set them up at his house.  The Move seems to not be able to handle roaming between access points at all.  If I move from one side of the house to the other, it clings to the original access point for as long as possible.  It will reconnect to the other access point if I unplug the source access point, when looking at the device in the Omada controller software, I can see it switch instantly when it loses the original access point completely, but it will not re-establish the stream when this happens.

I have run this simultaneously with several HomePods, and when I drop the access point, all of the HomePods will roam to the new access point without skipping a beat.  I can still control audio via airplay 2, and there is zero downtime.  The move has the same issue when running by itself.  Every other device I am using in my house also roams perfectly with this setup (i.e. on a phone call with WiFi calling, phone roams to new access point when I go upstairs, nothing is dropped), the only device that has issues is the Sonos Move.

 

Being a portable device, this sort of breaks the core functionality all together.  Ideally, with multiple access points, he should be able to carry the Move from the house out to the garden, the move should roam from the source access point to the outdoor access point, and the music should keep playing uninterrupted.  Again, everything else I own handles this flawlessly, including HomePods playing audio from the same source, and it is quite frustrating that a product that literally has ‘Move’ in the same, cannot move around the house with multiple access points when a device that is meant to be stationary, can roam without issue.

I’m wondering if there is any update on when a fix may be coming?  I found a forum post from over a year ago where someone was reporting the same issue with the ‘Roam’ (it’s even more ironic that this one can’t roam) where it was said a fix was coming, but I haven’t seen any updates at all since.

I would really like to get this fixed, we’ve invested a lot of money in the WiFi setup to make this work, and we are planning on using the speakers for some background music in the garden for a small at home wedding that will take place in that yard.  It’s very disappointing to see that this may not work because of unimplemented roaming features that the rest of the industry seems to have nailed.

Maybe not as you intended, but the Move is also a bluetooth speaker. Why not use this feature?

For the wedding I would certainly advise you to use bluetooth. Wifi is easily impaired by people that stand in the way of the signal. At least with bluetooth you can keep the phone near to the speaker.

Maybe not as you intended, but the Move is also a bluetooth speaker. Why not use this feature?

For the wedding I would certainly advise you to use bluetooth. Wifi is easily impaired by people that stand in the way of the signal. At least with bluetooth you can keep the phone near to the speaker.

Thanks! I appreciate the suggestion and will try both for the sake of the wedding.  We’re adding a pretty robust WiFi solution and I’m hoping due to the location of the outdoor AP WiFi will work, but, I will have bluetooth options set up as well if we need to use it.

I still want to figure this out though for the long term, part of the appeal was they could use these generally in the house as well, and take them out to the garden when just hanging out / relaxing.

Unlike iOS or Android devices, Move and Roam won’t flip to a stronger signal unfortunately.

Does TP-Link Omada not manage a forced handoff?

Unlike iOS or Android devices, Move and Roam won’t flip to a stronger signal unfortunately.

Does TP-Link Omada not manage a forced handoff?

It does, but forced handoff causes the stream to drop, without rebooting the Move it takes a few minutes to have airplay up and working again. I’m still hoping this is coming as it was mentioned by Sonos staff in another thread over a year ago that this was coming soon in an update… I just can’t find any new information on this.

Does the MAC address of the Move, as seen from the core network, change when it’s handed off to another AP? Virtual MACs would be surprising in a mesh, but it might be worth checking. 

Does the MAC address of the Move, as seen from the core network, change when it’s handed off to another AP? Virtual MACs would be surprising in a mesh, but it might be worth checking. 

The MAC doesn’t change, but if it is forced to switch to a new access point, or I temporarily disable the current access point, the Move hops to the new network pretty quickly, same MAC, but it takes 30 seconds to a minute to accept the newly assigned IP.  The IP is set up as a static DHCP reservation, and there are no conflicts.  The HomePods and everything else are setup up the same way and hop/get new IPS/continue streaming without any audible drops in all of these scenarios.  With standard DHCP the same issue exists as well on the move.  Also, I just wanted to clarify that the setup is not a mesh, but a multi-AP network, all APs at my house, as well as the ones that we will install at my fathers house, have ethernet backhauls.  All APs in this case should act the same as the others, with no core/central AP.

Well perhaps Sonos hasn’t streamlined the DHCP request procedure sufficiently then, since the Move is not (yet) geared up for fast roaming. 

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